The Drinking Den (16 page)

‘We should make a punch!' Mes-Bottes exclaimed. ‘Two litres of fire-water, lots of lemon and not too much sugar!'

But Coupeau, seeing Gervaise's anxious face in front of him, stood up and said they would not be drinking any more. They had emptied twenty-five litres, which meant one and a half litres for everyone, counting the children as grown-ups: that was quite enough. They had just had a bite to eat together, as friends, without any fuss and bother, because they respected one another and wanted to celebrate a family occasion among themselves. Everything had gone off nicely, they were merry, but they didn't now want to get pig drunk, if they were to show some consideration for the ladies. In a word, to put it in a nutshell, they had got together to drink the health of the happy couple, not to get rat-arsed. This little speech, which the roof-mender delivered in persuasive tones, putting his hand to his chest at the end of every sentence, was greeted with warm approval by Lorilleux and M. Madinier. But the rest, Boche, Gaudron, Bibi-la-Grillade and especially Mes-Bottes, all four of them, quite lit up already, sniggered that their tongues were sticking to the backs of their throats and they all had a bitch of a thirst that had to be slaked.

‘Those who are thirsty, are thirsty,' Mes-Bottes pointed out. ‘And those who are not, are not. Which is why we're going to order the
punch. We're not twisting anyone's arm. The lords and ladies can call for some sugar-water.'

And, as the roofer was starting to deliver another sermon, Mes-Bottes, who by this time was also standing, slapped his thigh and called out: ‘Come off it! Why don't you kiss my arse! Waiter, two litres of brandy!'

Coupeau said, very well then, but he'd settle up at once; that way, there'll be no argument. There was no reason why decent folk should have to pay for drunkards. And, as it happened, Mes-Bottes, after searching his pockets for some time, found only three francs, seven
sous
– well, why had they left him kicking his heels on the Saint-Denis road? He couldn't stand there getting soaked, so he had broken into the five-franc piece. It was their fault, so there! He'd give them the three francs, keeping the seven
sous
for his tobacco the next day. Coupeau was furious; he would have struck him if Gervaise had not tugged at his coat, imploring him not to, terrified. So he decided to borrow two francs from Lorilleux, who at first refused, then lent them to him surreptitiously (because his wife, naturally, would have disapproved).

Meanwhile, M. Madinier had picked up a plate. The young or unaccompanied ladies, Mme Lerat, Mme Fauconnier and Mlle Remanjou, were the first to put in their five-franc pieces, discreetly. After that, the gentlemen went into a huddle at the far end of the room to do the sums. There were fifteen of them, which made seventy-five francs. When the money was all in the plate, each man added five
sous
for the waiters. It took a quarter of an hour of tedious calculation before it was settled to everybody's satisfaction.

But when M. Madinier, who wanted to deal directly with the boss, had asked for the wine merchant to come up, they were all astonished to hear him say, with a smile, that it wasn't nearly enough. There were extras. And, when the word ‘extras' was greeted with furious exclamations, he spelled them out: twenty-five litres of wine, instead of twenty, which was the amount agreed upon in advance; the
oeufs à la neige
, which he had added when he saw that the dessert course was a bit meagre; and finally a flask of rum, along with the coffee, in case some people liked it. At this, a huge row broke out. Coupeau, feeling
it was his responsibility, defended himself: he had never mentioned twenty litres; as for the egg custard, that was part of the dessert course; too bad if the innkeeper had chosen to add it of his own free will. As for the flask of rum, it was a con, a way of pushing up the bill by slipping liqueurs on to the table when no one was expecting them.

‘There's an extra six francs to pay,' the wine merchant insisted. ‘Give me my six francs… And I'm not even counting that gentleman's three loaves of bread, either!'

The whole group pressed around him, pinned him in a circle of angry gestures and a yelp of voices, strangled with fury. The women, in particular, abandoned all reserve and refused to put in another centime. Yes, indeed! Thank you very much, this was a fine wedding banquet! That was Mlle Remanjou, who wasn't getting roped into another dinner like this one! Mme Fauconnier thought the food was not at all good; at home, she could have made you a mouth-watering little something for her forty
sous
. Mme Gaudron complained bitterly at having been pushed down to the worst end of the table, next to Mes-Bottes, who had shown not the slightest consideration for her. In the end, this sort of function always turned out badly. If you wanted to have people at your wedding, you should invite them as your guests, for goodness' sake! Gervaise, who had taken refuge with Mother Coupeau at one of the windows, said nothing, shamed by the sense that all these recriminations were rebounding on her.

Eventually, M. Madinier went off with the wine merchant and they could be heard arguing downstairs. Then, half an hour later, he returned. He had settled, giving the restauranteur three francs. But the company remained angry, irritated, constantly returning to the matter of those extras. And the clamour was increased by a violent outburst on the part of Mme Boche. She had not relaxed her watch on Boche and noticed him in a corner, clasping Mme Lerat round the waist; at which, she threw a carafe at him with all her might and it shattered against the wall.

‘One can see that your husband is in the clothing trade, Madame,' the tall widow said, pursing her lips in a very significant way. ‘He runs after every skirt he sees… And he does so even after the smart kicks I gave him under the table.'

The evening was ruined. The mood became more and more sour. M. Madinier suggested a song, but Bibi-la-Grillade, who had a fine voice, had just vanished; and Mlle Remanjou, who was leaning on a window-sill, saw him under the acacia trees, gallivanting around with a buxom, bareheaded lass. The cornet and the two violins were playing ‘The Mustard Vendor', a quadrille where the dancers clapped hands in the pastourelle.
²³
At this, there was a stampede: Mes-Bottes and the Gaudrons went down and even Boche left. Through the windows, they could see the couples whirling among the leaves, coloured a crude, theatrical green by the lanterns hanging from the branches. The night, swooning in the heat, slept without a breath. In the room, a serious conversation had started between Lorilleux and M. Madinier, while the ladies, not knowing how to appease their thirst for anger, were looking over their dresses, to see if any stains had landed on them.

Mme Lerat's fringes must have dipped in the coffee. Mme Fauconnier's silk dress was covered in gravy. Mother Coupeau's green shawl, which had fallen off a chair, had just been found in a corner, crumpled and trodden on. But it was Mme Lorilleux above all who refused to calm down. She had a stain on her back, and however much they swore that she didn't, she could feel it. In the end, twisting in front of a mirror, she managed to catch sight of it.

‘What did I tell you?' she yelled. ‘It's chicken fat. The waiter will pay for this dress. I'll take him to court. Oh, that really puts the cap on the day! I'd have done better to stay in bed. In any case, I'm off. I've had it up to here with this confounded wedding of theirs!'

She left in a fury, making the stairs shake beneath her feet. Lorilleux ran after her, but the best he could manage was to persuade her to wait for five minutes on the pavement, if they were to leave together. She should have left straight after the storm, as she wanted to. Coupeau would make up to her for today. When he learned how upset she was, he seemed worried; and Gervaise, to spare him any trouble, agreed to leave immediately. So they all embraced and M. Madinier said he would take charge of seeing that Mother Coupeau got home. Mme Boche was going to take Claude and Etienne to sleep at her house for the first night. Their mother had nothing to worry about: the kids would sleep on some chairs, laden down with indigestion from the egg
custard. The newly-weds were finally on their way out with Lorilleux, leaving the remainder of the group at the wine merchant's, when a battle started downstairs, on the dance-floor, between theirs and another party: Boche and Mes-Bottes, who had been kissing a lady, didn't want to return her to two soldiers to whom she belonged and were threatening to sweep them all away, lock, stock and barrel, while the cornet and the two violins pressed on deafeningly with the polka from
The Pearl Fishers
.

It was barely eleven o'clock. On the Boulevard de la Chapelle and through the whole district of La Goutte-d'Or, the fortnight's pay-day, falling that particular Saturday, had created a huge, drunken din. Mme Lorilleux was waiting twenty yards from the Moulin d'Argent, standing under a gaslight. She took Lorilleux's arm and stepped out ahead, without looking round, at such a pace that Gervaise and Coupeau were quite out of breath following them. From time to time, they stepped off the pavement to give way to a drunk who had fallen down and was lying with his hooves in the air. Lorilleux turned round, trying to patch things up.

‘We'll take you to your front door,' he said.

But Mme Lorilleux, in a loud voice, said it seemed odd to spend one's wedding night in that dreadful hole, the Hôtel Boncoeur. Couldn't they have delayed the marriage, saved up a few
sous
and bought some furniture, so that they could go back to their own home for the first night? Oh, it would be really nice for the two of them, in an attic-room where the rent was ten francs and they couldn't even get a breath of air.

‘I've given notice about that,' Coupeau protested, timidly. ‘We're not staying up there, we're keeping Gervaise's room, which is larger.'

Mme Lorilleux was so taken aback that she swung round.

‘Well, if that isn't the limit!' she exclaimed. ‘You're going to sleep in Tip-Tap's room!'

Gervaise went white. The nickname, which was being said to her face for the first time, struck her like a blow. Then she grasped the meaning of what her sister-in-law was saying: Tip-Tap's room was the one where she had lived for a month with Lantier, a room still cluttered with the remnants of her past life. Coupeau did not see that; he was just hurt by the nickname.

‘You've no business to go sticking names on other people,' he snapped. ‘Perhaps you don't know that they call you Carrot-Head in the neighbourhood, because of your hair. There, you don't like that, do you? Why shouldn't we keep on the first-floor room? The children won't be there tonight; we'll be just fine.'

Mme Lorilleux said nothing, maintaining a dignified silence and extremely annoyed at being called Carrot-Head. Coupeau, to console Gervaise, gently pressed her arm; and he even managed to cheer her up, by telling her that they were starting off in married life with the sum of just seven
sous:
three big coins and a little one, which he jingled in his trouser pocket with his hand. When they reached the Hôtel Boncoeur, they said good-night to one another as distantly as possible. Then, just as Coupeau was trying to push the two women towards each other for a kiss, telling them not to be stupid, a drunkard, who had appeared to be heading past them on the right, made a sudden swerve to the left and threw himself between them.

‘Well, I never! It's Old Bazouge!' Lorilleux said. ‘He's had his quota for the day.'

Gervaise, startled, pressed against the door of the house. Bazouge, an undertaker in his fifties, was wearing a pair of black trousers spattered with mud, a black coat fastened on his shoulder and a dented black leather hat, flattened in some fall or other.

‘Don't worry, he won't harm you,' Lorilleux said. ‘He's one of the neighbours: third room down the passage, before you get to ours. A nice thing it would be, if his bosses were to see him like this.'

Meanwhile, Old Bazouge was offended by the young woman's terror.

‘Come, come,' he stammered. ‘We don't eat people in my job. I'm as good as anyone else, darling… True, I've had a bit to drink. When there's work on, you have to keep oiling the wheels. I can't see you or anyone else here taking a bloke that weighs six hundred pounds from the fourth floor down to street level with only two to carry him, and without dropping him… Give me happy faces, that's what I like.'

But Gervaise merely shrank further into the shadow of the door, with an overwhelming desire to burst into tears, which was spoiling her day of gentle happiness. She had no more thought of kissing her
sister-in-law, but begged Coupeau to get rid of the drunk. So Bazouge, staggering, gave a gesture expressing philosophical disdain.

‘It won't stop you getting there, darling. You may even be happy to go, one day. Yes, there are some women I know who would thank you for taking them off.'

And, as the Lorilleux made up their minds to take him away, he turned round and stammered one last remark, between his hiccups.

‘When you're dead… now, you listen to me… when you're dead, you're a long time dead!'