Honore was never unfaithful to his wife except when he went with a party of his fellow horsctraders to the house in the Rue des Oiseaux, in Saint-.Margelon: but this could be regarded as virtually a professional necessitv, and in any case he considered that prostitutes belonged to a world that was not quite real. His attentions to the maidservant. in the days when thev had one, mav be equally discounted. It was quite customary, in respectable country households, for the confidential serving-maid to join with the wife in ministering to the master’s pleasure, and Adelaide never considered it a matter for serious reproach. H onore’s conduct in the village gave her no grounds for complaint. The village wives w ere virtuous on the whole, and loving his own, he would not have wished to shame her in the eves of the neighbours.
Adelaide was worthy of the consideration he showed her. Only once did she fall from grace: but this solitary lapse gave her so much pleasure that she acquired signal merit in not repeating it. On a winter's afternoon, when she happened to be alone in the house with the maid, a tramp aged about forty asked permission to sleep in the cowshed. The maid went with him to get him a bale of straw, and came back complaining that he had tried to put her on her back. The tale left Adelaide thoughtful, filled with a sense of oppression, while her cheeks grew flushed with commiserating warmth. She went to the shed. The man was already stretched on the straw between two warm cows who lav chewing the cud. She sat down beside him, reaching out charitable hands, and presently bent over him. The man did not move, fearful of alarming the head that hung poised above him. He was a poor man without tradition, who did not allow shame to trouble his pleasure. He murmured tender oaths while Adelaide moaned softly and the cow s breathed over them.
When Adelaide made her confession the cure was at first delighted. Although he was sorry for Honore, he considered it a matter for rejoicing that the devil should thus serve the cause of Christianity in Claquebue. The worm was in the fruit, and the scandalous happiness of the black sheep who enjoyed God’s gifts unscathed was approaching its end. But a vcar passed without Adelaide’s confessing to anv further act of adultery. The cure grew anxious. Whenever a tramp knocked at his door he gave him a crust of bread and, apologising on the grounds that he himself had no room, directed him to Honore’s house, where he could count on finding shelter for the night. But Adelaide never weakened again, and Honore acquired a reputation for being wonderfully charitable to tramps.
A few years previously I had witnessed, in the same house, an act of adultery which was however more in the nature of an honourable sacrifice, since the elder Mme. Haudouin, in yielding to a Bavarian non-commissioned officer, did so in order to save her son’s life. She had reached the age when women have little more to expect of masculine desire, and the Bavarian was one of those candid, fresh-cheeked young men who see more of mystery than of reality in a well-filled bodice. Mme. Hau-douin’s bodice was impressive, particularly in the half-light of the kitchen; he was struck by it directly he entered, and did not take his eves off it all the time he was questioning her. Confronted by the frightened, suppliant woman, the chance seemed to him so tempting that he did not hesitate, despite the risk of being shot by his own people if he was caught. After sending his men to search the outhouses he kissed.Mme. Haudouin on the lips and thrust her towards the bedroom. The youthful kiss, such as age and propriety had long forbidden her to hope for, did not leave her unmoved: but the anguish of knowing that her son was in the room had a chilling effect upon this first tremor of emotion. She shut her eyes as she lay on the bed, then opened them again as she perceived the voung man’s clumsiness. There was no time to be lost, since they might be surprised at any moment; she wanted to help him, but her married life had furnished her with little experience of value at that moment. They set out together as it were upon a voyage of discovery, apologising with smiles for their respective shortcomings. Despite herself.Mme. Haudouin gave rein to a curiosity which her husband’s nocturnal activities had left unsatisfied; and when matters had been satisfactorily adjusted she felt a first melting of her hitherto unaroused flesh. The sense of guilt still burdened her, but when he was about to draw away she clung to him impulsively and drew his face to her own. Then, when she sought to thrust him from her, ashamed of having yielded, it was he who persisted. And now a smile was forced from her, of gratitude and complicity; her drowsy body, stiffened with age, was pierced by a sharp twinge of rapture and she stifled a long cry of amazement. The young Bavarian got up quickly from the bed, afraid of having stayed too long already, and as he adjusted his uniform he reached out a hand to help her to her feet. Then he saw that she was an old woman; he had been tricked into an act of betrayal by an old woman’s bosom; and a wry smile rose to his lips at the thought that he might have died an ignominious death.
Alme. Haudouin confessed within the week. She was a person of orderly habits who never fell behind in her duties. She went with an easy conscience to confession, feeling no great remorse for an action to which circumstances had compelled her. She told the story rapidly, giving for decency’s sake no more than the bare outline, and maintaining all the dignity of a woman who has sacrificed herself in a noble cause.
“Yes,” said the cure, “but did you enjoy it?”
And at this the poor soul stammered an avowal and began to tremble. The cure said nothing to reassure her, being on the contrary only too happy to demonstrate that the most devoted sacrifices become the blackest of sins when the devil is their witness, and that we run hideous risks in consummating the act of the flesh, no matter how just the cause. Mme. Haudouin bitterly repented her lapse, so much so, indeed, that she died of it in less than three years.
Four
While his mother was bending over the stove Alexis stealthily crossed the kitchen behind her back and took his place at the table, which was laid for the evening meal. He had important reasons for not wishing to be seen. Clotilde and Gaston paid no attention to their brother’s entry: with their elbows on the window-ledge they were seeing who could spit farthest. Gustave spat impetuously and in too much of a hurry, loudly applauding his own achievements. Clotilde, on the other hand, spat with care and economy and without saying a word. The result was a foregone conclusion: after five minutes Gustave had run out of spit and his sister was beating him by a yard or more.
“You see, you’re no good at all,” she said coldly. “You’re not even worth playing with.”
At that moment the dog, Blackie, came in and lav under the table, where they followed him. He was called Blackie because he was black. His predecessors had been called Bismarck, in token of the war. The first had suffered from this, at least for a time, the most hideous misdeeds being attributed to him simply for the pleasure of abusing “that pig of a Bismarck.” But with the passage of the years Bismarck had become a pet name which the elder children, Juliette and Ernest, still bestowed on Blackie from time to time without thinking.