Monomaniac (La bête humaine) — Section 5

CHAPTER III

The following day, a Sunday, five o'clock in the morning had just struck from all the belfries of Havre, when Roubaud came down under the iron marquee of the station, to resume duty.

It was still pitch dark; but the wind, blowing from the sea, had increased, and drove along the haze, smothering the hills which extend from Sainte-Adresse to Tourneville; while westward, above the offing, appeared a bright opening, a strip of sky, where shone the last stars.

The gas-lamps under the marquee were still alight, but looking pale in the damp chill of this matutinal hour.

Shunters were engaged in making-up the first train for Montivilliers, under the orders of the assistant station-master on night duty.

The doors of the waiting-rooms had not yet been opened, and the platforms stretched forward, deserted, in this drowsy awakening of the station.

As Roubaud left his apartments, upstairs, over the waiting-rooms, he found Madame Lebleu, the wife of the cashier, standing motionless in the middle of the central corridor, on which the lodgings of the members of the staff opened.

For weeks past this lady had been in the habit of getting up during the night to watch Mademoiselle Guichon, the office-keeper, whom she suspected of carrying on an intrigue with M.

Dabadie, the station-master.

As a matter of fact, she had never surprised the least thing, not a shadow, not a breath.

And, again on this particular morning, she had quickly returned to her own quarters, taking no news back with her, save the expression of her astonishment at what she had caught sight of in the rooms occupied by the Roubauds, during the two or three seconds the husband had required to open and shut the door.

There she had seen the beautiful Séverine, who was in the habit of lying abed until nine o'clock in the morning, standing up in the dining-room dressed, combed, and booted.

And she had roused Lebleu to tell him of this extraordinary occurrence.

On the previous night they sat up until the arrival of the Paris express at 11. 05, burning to learn what had become of the affair with the sub-prefect.

But they were unable to read anything in the attitude of the Roubauds, who returned with faces wearing their everyday expression; and in vain did they listen until midnight: not a sound came from the rooms occupied by their neighbours, who must have gone to bed at once, and fallen fast asleep.

Their journey could certainly not have been attended with a good result, otherwise Séverine would not have risen at such an early hour.

The cashier having inquired how she looked, his wife had been at pains to describe her: very stiff, very pale, with her great blue eyes appearing so bright against her black hair; she was standing quite still, and had the aspect of a somnambulist.

But they would find out all about it in the course of the day.

Down below, Roubaud found his colleague Moulin, who had been on duty during the night; and as he took over the service, Moulin walked along with him for a minute or two, posting him up in the few small events that had occurred since the previous evening: some vagrants had been surprised as they were effecting an entrance into the cloakroom; three porters had been reprimanded for indiscipline; a coupling-hook had just broken while the Montivilliers train was being made-up.

Roubaud listened in silence, and with calm countenance.

He was only a trifle pale, due no doubt to a remainder of fatigue, which was also visible in his heavy eyes.

When his colleague ceased speaking, he still seemed to look at him inquiringly, as if he expected something more.

But what he had heard was all, and he bent his head, gazing for an instant on the ground.

As the two men walked along the platform they reached the end of the corrugated iron roofing, and on the right stood a coach-house where the carriages in constant use remained, such as came in one day, and served to make up the trains on the morrow.

Roubaud raised his head, and was looking fixedly at a first-class carriage with a coupé, bearing the No. 293, which as it happened a gas-lamp lit up with its vacillating glimmer, when Moulin remarked: "Ah!

I forgot----" The pale face of the other coloured, and he was unable to restrain a slight movement.

"I forgot," repeated Moulin; "that carriage must not leave.

Do not put it on the 6. 40 express this morning."

A short silence ensued before Roubaud, in a very natural voice said: "Indeed!

Why is that?"

"Because," replied Moulin, "a coupé has been booked for the express of this evening.

We are not sure that one will come in during the day, so we may just as well keep this one."

"Certainly," replied Roubaud, staring at his colleague.

But he was absorbed by another thought, and all at once, flying into a rage, he exclaimed: "It's disgusting!

Just see how those fellows do the cleaning!

That carriage looks as if it had the accumulated dust of a week on it."

"Ah!"

resumed Moulin.

"When trains arrive after eleven o'clock at night, there is no fear of the men giving the coaches a brush up.

It's as much as they will do to cast a glance inside of them.

The other night, they overlooked a passenger asleep on one of the seats, and he only awoke the next morning."

Then, stifling a yawn, he said he was going up to bed.

But as he went off, an abrupt feeling of curiosity brought him back.

"By the way, what about your affair with the sub-prefect?"

he inquired.

"It's all settled, I suppose?"

"Yes, yes," answered Roubaud.

"I made a very good journey.

I'm quite satisfied."

"Well, so much the better.

And bear in mind that the 293 does not start," replied the other.

When Roubaud found himself alone on the platform, he slowly went back towards the Montivilliers train, which was ready.

The doors of the waiting-rooms were open, and some passengers appeared: a few sportsmen with their dogs, and two or three families of shop-keepers, taking advantage of the Sunday--only a few people altogether.

But when that train had gone, the first of the day, Roubaud had not much time to lose.

He immediately had to make up the 5. 40 slow train for Rouen and Paris.

At this early hour not many servants of the company were about; and the work of the assistant station-master on duty, was complicated by all sorts of details.

When he had superintended the making-up of the train, consisting in each carriage being taken from the coach-house and placed on a truck, which a gang of men pushed along under the marquee, he had to run off to the main building, to give a glance at the ticket office, and the luggage booking department.

A quarrel breaking out between some soldiers and one of the staff, necessitated his intervention.

For half an hour, in the icy draughts, amid the shivering public, his eyes still heavy with sleep, and in the ill-humour of a man jostled at every moment in the obscurity, he hurried hither and thither without a moment to himself.

Then, when the departure of the slow train had cleared the station, he hastened to the box of the pointsman, to make sure that all was right in that quarter.

For the through train from Paris, which was behind time, was coming in.

He returned to the platform to see the stream of passengers leave the carriages, give up their tickets, and crowd into the omnibuses from the hotels, which in those days entered the station, to wait under the marquee, where they were separated from the line by a mere paling.

And then, only, did he find leisure to breathe for a moment, the station having again become silent and deserted.

Six o'clock struck.

Roubaud sauntered out of the main building; and, beyond, with space before him, he raised his head and inhaled the fresh air, watching day at last breaking.

The wind from the offing had completely driven away the mist.

It was the clear morning of a fine day.

He looked northward, in the direction of Ingouville, as far as the trees of the cemetery, standing out in a violescent line against the whitening sky.

Then, turning towards the south and west, he observed a final flight of light white clouds floating slowly along in a squadron across the sea; while the entire east, the immense opening formed by the mouth of the Seine, began to be embraced in approaching sunrise.

In a casual way, he removed his cap, embroidered with silver, as if to refresh his forehead in the sharp, pure air.

This outlook to which he was accustomed, this vast flat sweep of dependencies of the station--the arrival on the left, then the engine depôt, to the right the departure, a regular little town--seemed to appease him, to bring him back to the calmness of his daily occupations which were ever the same.

Factory chimneys were smoking above the wall of the Rue Charles Lafitte; and enormous heaps of coal could be seen following the line of the Vauban basin.

A hum already began to rise from the other docks.

The whistling of the goods trains, the awakening of the town, the briny smell of the sea wafted by the wind, made him think of the fête of the day, of this vessel they were about to launch, and around which the crowd would be crushing.

Roubaud, returning inside the station, found the gang of shunters commencing to make up the 6. 40 express; and thinking the men were putting No. 293 on the truck, all the calm that the fresh morning air had brought him, disappeared in a sudden burst of anger.

With an oath he shouted: "Not that carriage!

Leave it alone!

It is not to go till to-night."

The foreman of the gang explained to him that they were merely pushing the carriage along, to take another from behind it.

But, deafened by his own passion, which was out of all proportion, he did not hear.

"You clumsy idiots!"

he exclaimed; "when you are told to leave the thing alone, do so!"

Having at length been made to understand, he continued, furious, turning his wrath against the inconvenience of the station, where it was not even possible to turn a carriage round.

In fact, the station, one of the first built on the line, was not equal to modern requirements.

It was unworthy of Havre, with its old timber coach-house glazed with small panes of glass, and its dismal, naked buildings full of cracks.

"It's a disgrace.

I can't comprehend why the company has not knocked it all down."

The shunters looked at him, surprised to hear him speak so freely, he who was generally so well disciplined.

Perceiving their attitude, he all at once ceased his remarks, and, silent and stiff, continued to watch the manœuvres.

A line of discontent furrowed his low forehead, while his round, coloured face, bristling with the reddish beard, took an expression of intensely strong will.

From that moment, Roubaud was in possession of all his equanimity.

He gave active attention to the express, busying himself with every detail connected with it.

The couplings appearing to him to be badly attached, he insisted on having them screwed up before his eyes.

A mother and two daughters, on terms of intimacy with his wife, wanted him to seat them in the compartment for ladies only.

Then, before whistling to give the signal to start, he again made sure that the train was in perfect trim; and he stood watching it, as it moved away, with that clear gaze of a man whose least carelessness might involve the loss of human lives.

He had at once to cross the line, to be present at the arrival of a train from Rouen, which was just entering the station.

There he met a man from the Post Office, with whom he every day exchanged news.

This was a short rest for him in his busy early hours, and as no immediate duty required his attention, he had time to draw breath.

On this morning, as was his habit, he rolled a cigarette, and chatted gaily.

Day had broadened, and the gas-lamps under the marquee, had just been extinguished; but the glazing of this extension of the station was so bad, that the light continued gloomy.

Outside, the vast stretch of sky on which the building opened, was already ablaze with a fire of sun-rays; while the entire view became rosy, and the smallest objects stood out crisp, in this pure air of a fine winter morning.

M.

Dabadie, the station-master, usually came down from his rooms at eight o'clock, when the assistant station-master went to him to make his report.

The former was a handsome man, very dark, neat in his attire, with the bearing of a commercial magnate engrossed in business.

Indeed, he willingly left the passenger department of the station to his assistants, so that he might give particular attention to the movement in the docks, to the enormous transit of merchandise; and he was in constant contact with the high commerce of Havre, and of the entire world.

To-day he came late.

Roubaud had already pushed the door of his office ajar twice, without finding him.

On the table lay his letters, which had not even been opened.

Among them Roubaud had just noticed a telegram.

Then, as if drawn to the spot by fascination, he had been unable to leave the threshold, returning, in spite of himself, to cast rapid glances at the table.

At last, at ten minutes past eight, M. Dabadie appeared.

Roubaud seated himself without speaking, to allow him to open the telegram.

But the chief was in no hurry.

Wishing to be pleasant with his subordinate, whom he esteemed, he said: "I suppose all went well in Paris?"

"Yes, sir, I thank you," replied Roubaud.

He had ended by opening the telegram; but he did not read it.

He continued smiling at his assistant, whose voice thickened in the violent effort he was making to get the better of a nervous twitch contracting his chin.

"We are very pleased to keep you here," said the station-master.

"And I, sir, am very glad to remain with you," answered Roubaud.

Then, as M. Dabadie made up his mind to run his eye over the telegram, Roubaud, who felt a slight perspiration moistening his face, watched him.

But the agitation which he expected to see on the countenance of his chief, did not appear.

The latter placidly continued perusing the telegram, which he eventually threw back on the table.

No doubt it had to do with a simple detail connected with the service.

He at once began to open his letters, while his assistant, in accordance with daily custom, made his verbal report on the events of the night and morning.

Only, on this occasion, Roubaud hesitated, and had to think before he could recall what his colleague had told him about the vagrants caught in the cloakroom.

A few more words were exchanged, and when the two deputy chiefs of the docks and slow train departments came in, also to make their reports, the station-master dismissed Roubaud by a gesture.

The newcomers brought another telegram, which one of the staff had just handed them on the platform.

"You can go," said M. Dabadie to Roubaud, seeing he had stopped at the door.

But the latter waited with fixed, expectant eyes; and he only went away when the small piece of paper had fallen on the table, put aside with the same indifferent gesture as before.

For a few moments, he wandered under the marquee, feeling perplexed and dizzy.

The clock pointed to 8. 35. The next departure was the slow train at 9. 50. He usually took advantage of this hour of rest, to stroll round the station, and he now walked about for a few minutes without knowing where his feet were taking him.

Then, as he raised his head, and found himself opposite the carriage numbered 293, he abruptly turned aside in the direction of the engine-house, although he had nothing to attend to in that quarter.

The sun was now rising on the horizon, filling the air with golden dust.

But he no longer enjoyed the fine morning.

He hastened along as if very much occupied, endeavouring to overcome the uneasiness caused by the suspense.

All at once a voice stopped him.

"Good morning, M. Roubaud!

Did you see my wife?"

It was Pecqueux, the fireman, a great, thin fellow of three-and-forty, with big bones, and a face tanned by fire and smoke.

His grey eyes, under a low forehead, his great mouth, set in a prominent jaw, had the constant, jovial expression of a man addicted to merry-making.

"What!

Is that you?"

said Roubaud, stopping astonished.

"Ah!

yes.

Your engine met with an accident.

I forgot.

And so you're not going off again until to-night?

Twenty-four hours' holiday.

Good business, eh?"

"Good business!"

repeated the other, not yet recovered from his libations of the previous evening.

Born at a village near Rouen, he had entered the service of the company quite young, as engine-fitter.

Then, at thirty, tired of the workshop, he had wanted to be a fireman so as to become driver.

It was then that he married Victoire, who belonged to the same village as himself.

But years went by, and he continued fireman.

He would never become driver now, being of bad conduct, careless in dress and mode of life, a drunkard, and a runner after petticoats.

He would have been dismissed twenty times over, had it not been for the protection of President Grandmorin, and had not his superiors become accustomed to his vices, for which he condoned by his good humour, and his experience as an old workman.

He only gave cause for alarm when under the influence of drink, for he then became a real brute, capable of any violence.

"Did you see my wife?"

he inquired again, with a broad grin.

"Yes, indeed," answered the assistant station-master; "we saw her.

We even had a very nice lunch in your room.

Ah!

you've a good wife, Pecqueux; and it's wrong of you to be unfaithful to her."

He gave a broader grin than before.

"Oh!

how can you say such a thing?"

he exclaimed.

"It's she who wants me to enjoy myself!"

This was true.

Victoire, who was two years his senior, and who had grown enormously stout, was in the habit of slipping five-franc pieces into his pocket, so that he might amuse himself when away.

She had never suffered much from his infidelity; and, now, their mode of life was settled.

He had two wives, one at each end of the line.

Victoire, who knew everything, accepted the position, and even went so far as to mend his linen, in order that the other one might not be able to say that she allowed their husband to go about in rags and tatters.

"No matter," resumed Roubaud, "it's not at all nice on your part.

My wife, who is very fond of her foster-mother, wants to scold you."

But he held his tongue, on seeing a tall, lean woman come from a shed beside which they were standing.

She proved to be Philomène Sauvagnat, sister of the chief of the depôt, and the second Madame Pecqueux.

The couple must have been talking together in the shed, when Pecqueux came out to call to the assistant station-master.

Philomène still looked young in spite of her two-and-thirty years, but was raw-boned, with a flat chest, a long head, and flaming eyes.

She had the reputation of drinking.

Her occupation consisted in keeping house for her brother, who lived in a cottage near the engine-depôt, which she very much neglected.

They came from Auvergne, and the brother, an obstinate man and a strict disciplinarian, greatly esteemed by his superiors, had met with the utmost vexation on account of this sister, even to the point of being threatened with dismissal.

And, if the company bore with her, now, on his account, he only kept her with him because of the family tie.

But this did not prevent him belabouring her so severely with blows whenever he caught her at fault, that he frequently left her half dead on the floor.

She had commenced an intrigue with Pecqueux about a year before; but it was only Séverine, who had fallen out with her, thinking it due to Mother Victoire for her to do so.

Having already been in the habit of avoiding her as much as possible, from a feeling of innate pride, she had subsequently ceased to greet her.

"Well, Pecqueux, I shall see you again, later on!"

said Philomène saucily.

"I'll leave you now, as M. Roubaud has a moral lecture to read you, on behalf of his wife."

Pecqueux, who was a good-natured fellow, continued laughing.

"No, no, stay," he answered.

"He's only joking."

"I can't," retorted Philomène.

"I must run and take these two eggs from my hens, to Madame Lebleu, to whom I promised them."

She had purposely let fly this name, being aware of the secret rivalry between the wife of the cashier, and the wife of the assistant station-master, affecting to be on the best of terms with the former, so as to enrage the other.

But she remained, nevertheless, becoming all at once interested, when she heard the fireman inquiring for news of the affair with the sub-prefect.

"So it's all settled; and you're very glad of it, are you not, M. Roubaud?"

inquired Pecqueux.

"Very pleased indeed," answered the assistant station-master.

Pecqueux gave a cunning wink.

"Oh!

you had no need to be anxious," said he, "because when one has a big-wig behind one, eh?

You know who I mean.

My wife also is very grateful to him."

The assistant station-master interrupted this allusion to President Grandmorin, by abruptly remarking: "And so you only leave to-night?"

"Yes," answered the other; "the repairs to La Lison will soon be finished.

They're completing the adjustment of the connecting-rod.

And I'm waiting for my driver, who has gone for an airing.

Do you know him, Jacques Lantier?

He comes from the same neighbourhood as yourself."

Roubaud did not answer for an instant, but stood there as if absent-minded.

Then, recovering himself with a start, he exclaimed: "Eh!

Jacques Lantier, the driver?

Of course I know him!

Oh!

you understand, enough to say good-day and good-night.

It was here that we came across one another, for he is my junior, and I never saw him down there at Plassans.

Last autumn he did my wife a little service, in the form of an errand to some cousins at Dieppe.

He's a capable young fellow, according to all I hear."

He spoke at random, with abundance of verbosity.

All at once he went off with the remark: "Good day, Pecqueux.

I've got to take a look round here."

It was only then that Philomène moved away at her long stride; while Pecqueux, standing motionless, with his hands thrust into his pockets, laughing at ease at his laziness on this bright morning, was astonished to see the assistant station-master rapidly returning, after limiting his inspection to circumambulating the shed.

He had not been long taking his look round.

What on earth could he have come to spy out?

Nine o'clock was on the point of striking, as Roubaud returned under the marquee.

He walked to the end, near the parcel office, where he gave a look, without appearing to find what he sought; and then, impatiently, strode back again, peering inquiringly at the offices of the different departments, one after the other.

The station, at this hour, was quiet and deserted.

He alone wandered about, more and more enervated at this peacefulness, in the torment of a man menaced with a catastrophe, who at last ardently hopes for it to come.

His composure was exhausted.

He found it impossible to remain for a minute in the same place.

Now his eyes never quitted the clock.

Nine, five minutes past.

As a rule he only went up to his rooms for the knife-and-fork breakfast at ten, after the departure of the 9. 50 train.

But all at once the thought struck him that Séverine must also be waiting there in expectancy; and he proceeded to join her.

In the corridor, Madame Lebleu, at this precise moment, was opening the door to Philomène, who had run round in neighbourly fashion, with untidy hair, and held a couple of eggs in her hand.

They remained on the threshold, so that Roubaud had to enter his apartment before their eyes.

He had his key, and was as quick as he could be.

Notwithstanding, in the rapid opening and closing of the door, they perceived Séverine, seated on a chair in the dining-room, with her hands idle, her profile pale, and her body motionless.

And Madame Lebleu, dragging in Philomène and closing her own door, related that she had already seen Séverine in the same state, in the early part of the morning.

No doubt the business with the sub-prefect was taking a bad turn.

But no; and Philomène explained that she had hastened to make a call because she had news; and she repeated what she had just heard the assistant station-master say himself.

The two women were then lost in conjectures.

It was the same at each of their meetings--gossiping without end.

"They've had their hair combed, my dear," said Madame Lebleu.

"I'd stake my life on it.

They're tottering on their pedestals."

"Ah!

my dear lady," answered Philomène, "if we could only be rid of them!"

The rivalry between the Lebleus and the Roubauds, which had become more and more envenomed, simply arose from a question of apartments.

All the first floor of the main station building, served to lodge members of the staff; and the central corridor, a regular corridor of a second-rate hotel, painted yellow, lighted from above, separated the floor in two, with lines of brown doors to right and left.

Only the windows of the apartments on the right, looked on the courtyard facing the entrance, which was planted with old elms, and above these an admirable view spread out in the direction of Ingouville; while the apartments on the left, with semicircular, squatty windows, opened right on the marquee of the station, whose high slanting roof of zinc and dirty glass barred the horizon from view.

Nothing could be more gay than the one side, with the constant animation in the courtyard, the verdure of the trees, the broad expanse of country; nothing more dismal than the other, where it was almost impossible to see, and where the sky was shut out as in a prison.

On the front, resided the station-master, the assistant station-master Moulin, and the Lebleus; on the back, the Roubauds and Mademoiselle Guichon, the office-keeper, without counting three rooms reserved to inspectors who made occasional visits.

It was an established fact that the two assistant station-masters had always lodged side by side.

If the Lebleus were there, it was due to an act of politeness on the part of the gentleman who had been succeeded by Roubaud, and who, being a widower without children, had thought proper to show Madame Lebleu the courtesy of giving up his apartments to her.

But should not this lodging have gone to the Roubauds?

Was it fair to relegate them to the back of the building, when they had the right to be on the front?

So long as the two households had lived in harmony, Séverine had given way to her neighbour, her senior by twenty years, who, moreover, was in bad health, being so stout that she was constantly troubled with fits of choking.

War had only been declared, since the day Philomène set the two women at variance, by her abominable tongue.

"You know," resumed the latter, "that they are quite capable of having taken advantage of their trip to Paris, to ask for your ejectment.

I am told that they have written a long letter to the manager, setting forth their claim."

Madame Lebleu was suffocating.

"The wretches!"

she exclaimed.

"And I am sure they have been doing their best to get the office-keeper on their side.

For the past fortnight she has hardly greeted me.

There is another one who is no better than she should be!

But I'm watching her."

She lowered her voice to say that Mademoiselle Guichon must be carrying on an intrigue with the station-master.

Their doors faced one another.

It was M. Dabadie, a widower, and the father of a grown-up daughter still at school, who had brought this thirty-year-old blonde to the station.

Already faded, she was silent, slim, and supple as a serpent.

She must have been a sort of governess.

And it was impossible to catch her, so noiselessly did she glide along through the narrowest apertures.

"Oh!

I shall succeed in finding it out," continued Madame Lebleu.

"I will not be ridden down.

We are here, and here we remain.

All worthy people are on our side.

Is it not so, my dear?"

Indeed, all the station was impassioned with this battle of the lodgings.

The corridor, particularly, was torn asunder by it.

It was only the assistant station-master Moulin, satisfied at being on the front, who did not take much interest in the matter.

He was married to a little, timid, delicate woman, whom nobody ever saw, but who presented him with a baby every twenty months.

"Anyhow," concluded Philomène, "if they are tottering on their pedestals, this shock will not bring them down.

Be on your guard, for they know someone of great influence."

She still held her two eggs, and she presented them, eggs laid that same morning, which she had just taken from under her hens, and the old lady was effusive in thanks.

"Oh!

how kind of you!"

said she.

"You are spoiling me, I declare.

Come and have a chat more frequently.

You know that my husband is always in his counting-house; and I have a tedious time of it, riveted here on account of my poor legs!

What would become of me, if those wretches were to take away my view?"

Then, as she accompanied her, and opened the door, she placed a finger on her lips.

"Hush!

Let us listen," said she.