The Ladies' Paradise (BBC tie-in) (Oxford World's Classics) (39 page)

Mouret’s sole passion was the conquest of Woman. He wanted her to be queen in his shop; he had built this temple for her in order to hold her at his mercy. His tactics were to intoxicate her with amorous attentions, to trade on her desires, and to exploit her excitement. He racked his brains night and day for new ideas. Already, to spare delicate ladies the trouble of climbing the stairs, he had installed two lifts lined with velvet. In addition, he had just opened a buffet, where fruit cordials and biscuits were served free of charge, and a reading-room, a colossal gallery decorated with excessive luxury, in which he even ventured to hold picture exhibitions.
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But his most inspired idea, which he deployed with women devoid of coquetry, was that of conquering the mother through the child; he exploited every kind of force, speculated on every kind of feeling, created departments for little boys and girls, stopped the mothers as they were walking past by offering pictures and balloons to their babies. Presenting a balloon as a free gift to each customer who bought something was a stroke of genius; they were red balloons, made
of fine indiarubber and with the name of the shop written on them in big letters; when held on the end of a string they travelled through the air, parading a living advertisement through the streets!

Mouret’s greatest source of power was publicity. He spent as much as three hundred thousand francs a year on catalogues, advertisements, and posters. For his sale of summer fashions he had sent out two hundred thousand catalogues, of which fifty thousand, translated into every language, were sent abroad. He now had them illustrated with drawings, and even enclosed samples with them, glued on to the pages. His displays appeared everywhere. The Ladies’ Paradise was staring the whole world in the face, invading walls, newspapers, and even the curtains of theatres. He declared that Woman was helpless against advertisements; in the end she inevitably went to see what all the noise was about. And he set even more cunning snares for her, analysing her like a great moralist. For example, he had discovered that she could not resist a bargain, that she bought things without needing them if she thought she was getting them cheaply; and on this observation he based his system of price reductions, progressively lowering the prices of unsold items, preferring to sell them at a loss, faithful to the principle of the rapid turnover of stocks. Then, penetrating even further into women’s hearts, he had recently conceived of ‘returns’, a masterpiece of Jesuitical seduction. ‘Take it all the same, madam: you can return the article to us if you find you don’t like it.’ And a woman who was resisting was thus given a final excuse, the possibility of going back on an act of folly; her conscience satisfied, she would buy it. Returns and price reductions were now part of the standard methods of the new business.

But it was in the interior arrangement of the shops that Mouret revealed himself to be an unrivalled master. He laid it down as a law that not a corner of the Ladies’ Paradise was to remain deserted; everywhere he insisted upon noise, crowds, life; for life, he would say, attracts life, gives birth and multiplies. He put this law into practice in a whole variety of ways. First of all, there should be a crush at the entrance; it should seem to people in the street that there was a riot in the shop; and he obtained this crush by placing bargains at the entrance, shelves
and baskets overflowing with articles at very low prices, so that working-class people began to congregate there, barring the threshold, and giving the impression that the shop was bursting with customers, when often it was only half full. Then, all through the galleries, he had the art of hiding the departments in which business was slack—the shawl department in summer and the cotton materials in winter, for example; he would surround them with active departments, drowning them with blaring noise. It was he alone who had thought of putting the carpet and furniture departments on the second floor, for in those departments customers were rarer, and their presence on the ground floor would have created cold, empty gaps. If he could have found a way of making the street run right through his shop, he would have done so.

Just now Mouret was undergoing one of his fits of inspiration. On Saturday evening, as he was casting a last glance over the preparations for Monday’s big sale, which they had been working on for a month, he had suddenly realized that the way he had arranged the departments was stupid. It was, however, an absolutely logical arrangement—materials on one side, manufactured goods on the other, an intelligent system which should enable the customers to find their own way about. He had dreamed of this system while he was still working in the muddle of Madame Hédouin’s little shop; and now, on the day when he was putting it into effect, he felt his faith in it shaken. Suddenly he had shouted that he wanted it all changed. This meant moving half the shop, and they had forty-eight hours to do it in. The staff, bewildered and working at full stretch, had had to spend two nights and the whole of Sunday in the midst of an appalling mess. Even on Monday morning, an hour before the opening, the goods were not yet in place. The governor was surely losing his mind; no one could understand it, and there was general consternation.

‘Come on! Let’s hurry!’ Mouret shouted, with the calm assurance born of his genius. ‘Here are some more suits I want taken upstairs … And are the Japanese things installed on the central landing? … One last effort, lads, and you’ll see what a sale we’re going to have!’

Bourdoncle, too, had been there since dawn. He understood no better than the others, and was watching the governor most anxiously. He hadn’t dared to question him, knowing how he responded in such moments of crisis. All the same, he decided to risk it, and asked gently:

‘Was it really necessary to turn everything upside-down like that, on the eve of our exhibition?’

At first Mouret shrugged his shoulders without replying. Then, since Bourdoncle insisted, he burst out:

‘So that the customers should all huddle together in the same corner, perhaps? An excellent geometrical idea I had when I thought of that! I’d never have forgiven myself… Can’t you see that I’d have localized the crowd? A woman would have come in, gone straight to where she wanted, passed from the petticoat department to the dress department, from the dresses to the coats, and then left, without even having got a bit lost! Not one of them would really have seen our shop!’

‘But,’ Bourdoncle pointed out, ‘now that you’ve mixed everything up and thrown everything all over the place, the staff will wear their legs out taking customers from department to department.’

Mouret made a gesture of supreme contempt.

‘I don’t care a damn! They’re young; it’ll make them grow. So much the better if they walk about! They’ll look more numerous, they’ll swell the crowd. As long as there’s a crush, all will be well!’

He was laughing, and deigned to explain his idea, lowering his voice:

‘Listen, Bourdoncle, this is what will happen … First, this continual circulation of customers scatters them all over the place, multiplies them, and makes them lose their heads; secondly, as they have to be conducted from one end of the shop to the other—for example, if they want a lining after having bought a dress—these journeys in every direction triple, as they see it, the size of the shop; thirdly, they’re forced to go through departments where they’d never have set foot, temptations present themselves as they pass, and they succumb; fourthly …’

Bourdoncle was now laughing with him. At this Mouret, delighted, stopped in order to shout to the porters:

‘That’s very good, lads! A quick sweep, and it’ll look splendid!’

But, turning round, he caught sight of Denise. He and Bourdoncle were opposite the ladieswear department, which he had just split in two by having the dresses and costumes taken up to the second floor, at the other end of the shop. Denise, the first to come down, was wide-eyed with astonishment at the new arrangements.

‘What’s this,’ she murmured; ‘are we moving?’

This surprise seemed to amuse Mouret, who adored these theatrical effects. Denise had been back at the Paradise since the beginning of February, and she had been agreeably surprised to find the staff polite, almost respectful. Madame Aurélie especially was very kind; Marguerite and Clara seemed resigned; even old Jouve was obsequious in a rather embarrassed way, as if he wanted to wipe out the unpleasant memory of the past. It sufficed that Mouret had said a few words; everyone was whispering, watching her as they did so. In the midst of this universal friendliness, the only things which hurt her were Deloche’s curious sadness, and Pauline’s inexplicable smiles.

Meanwhile, Mouret was still looking at her with delight:

‘What is it you’re looking for, Mademoiselle Baudu?’ he asked at last.

Denise had not noticed him. She blushed slightly. Since her return he had taken an interest in her, and this touched her very much. Without her knowing why, Pauline had given her a full account of the governor’s affair with Clara: where he saw her, what he paid her; and she often returned to the subject, even adding that he had another mistress, that Madame Desforges who was well known to everyone in the shop. These stories upset Denise, and in his presence she was again filled with all the fears she had had in the past, an uneasiness in which her gratitude struggled against her anger.

‘It’s all this moving around,’ she murmured.

Then Mouret came closer and said in a lower voice:

‘This evening, after the sale, will you come and see me in my office? I want to speak to you.’

Quite agitated, she nodded without saying a word, and went into the department where the other salesgirls were arriving. But Bourdoncle had overheard Mouret, and was watching him with a smile. He even ventured to say, when they were alone:

‘That girl again! Be careful, it’ll end up by getting serious!’

Mouret sharply defended himself, hiding his emotion beneath an air of casual superiority.

‘Don’t worry, it’s just fun! The woman who can catch me isn’t yet born, my dear chap!’

As the shop was opening at last, he rushed off to give a final glance at the various departments. Bourdoncle shook his head. That girl Denise, so simple and gentle, was beginning to worry him. He had defeated her once already by brutally dismissing her. But here she was again, and he was treating her now as a serious enemy, saying nothing, but once more biding his time.

He caught up with Mouret, who was downstairs in the Saint-Augustin Hall opposite the entrance, shouting:

‘Didn’t you hear what I said? I said that the blue parasols were to be put round the edge … I want all that redone, and be quick about it!’

He was deaf to all arguments, and a team of porters had to rearrange the display of parasols. Seeing the customers arriving, he even had the doors closed for a moment, declaring that he would rather not open at all than leave the blue parasols in the centre. It ruined his composition. Those with a reputation as window-dressers, Hutin, Mignot, and several others, came to have a look, craning their necks; but they pretended not to understand what he was trying to do, for they belonged to a different school.

Finally the doors were opened again, and the crowd streamed in. From the beginning, even before the shop was full, there was such a crush in the entrance hall that the police had to be called in to keep people moving along on the pavement. Mouret’s calculations had been right: all the housewives, a serried band of shopkeepers’ and workmen’s wives, were assaulting the bargains and remnants, which were displayed right into the street. Outstretched hands were continually feeling the materials hanging at the entrance, a calico at thirty-five centimes, a wool and cotton grey material at forty-five centimes, and above all an Orleans
cloth at thirty-eight centimes which was playing havoc with the poorer purses. There was much elbowing, a feverish scrimmage round the racks and baskets in which piles of goods at reduced prices—lace at ten centimes, ribbons at twenty-five centimes, garters at fifteen, gloves, petticoats, ties, cotton socks and stockings—were collapsing and disappearing, as if devoured by the voracious crowd. In spite of the cold weather, the assistants who were selling to the crowd on the pavement could not serve fast enough. A fat woman screamed. Two little girls nearly suffocated.

The crush increased as the morning wore on. Towards one o’clock queues were being formed, and the street was barricaded as if there were a riot. Just at that moment, as Madame de Boves and her daughter Blanche were standing hesitantly on the opposite pavement, they were approached by Madame Marty, who was likewise accompanied by her daughter Valentine.

‘What a crowd, eh?’ said Madame de Boves. ‘They’re killing each other inside. I shouldn’t have come; I was in bed, but I got up for a breath of fresh air.’

‘It’s the same with me’, the other declared, ‘I promised my husband to go and see his sister in Montmartre. Then, as I was passing, I remembered I needed a piece of braid; I might as well buy it here as anywhere else, don’t you think? Oh! I shan’t spend a penny! I don’t need anything, anyway.’

However, they had not taken their eyes off the door, caught up and carried away by the strength of the crowd.

‘No, no, I’m not going in, I’m frightened,’ murmured Madame de Boves. ‘Let’s go, Blanche, or we’ll be crushed to death.’

But her voice was faltering, and she was gradually giving way to the desire to follow everyone else inside; her fear was melting away in the irresistible lure of the crush. Madame Marty had also given way. She was repeating:

‘Hold my dress, Valentine … My goodness! I’ve never seen anything like this. You’re just carried along. What’s it going to be like inside!’

Caught in the current, the ladies were no longer able to turn back. As rivers draw together the stray waters of a valley, so it seemed that the stream of customers, flowing through the entrance
hall, was drinking in the passers-by from the street, sucking in the population from the four corners of Paris. They were advancing very slowly, jammed so tightly that they could hardly breathe, held upright by shoulders and stomachs, whose flabby warmth they could feel; and their satisfied desire revelled in this painful approach, which inflamed their curiosity even more. There was a pell-mell of ladies dressed in silk, tradesmen’s wives in shabby dresses, hatless girls, all of them excited and carried away by the same passion. A few men, swamped by all these ample bosoms, were casting anxious glances around them. A nurse, in the thick of the crowd, was holding her baby high in the air, and it was laughing with delight. Only one of them, a skinny woman, lost her temper, shouting out abuse, and accusing a woman next to her of digging her elbows into her.