What most astonished the young woman was that she was endlessly short of money amid a river of gold, the tide of which almost enveloped her. On certain days she was at her wit's end for want of ridiculously small sums--sums of only a few louis. She was driven to borrow from Zoe, or she scraped up cash as well as she could on her own account. But before resignedly adopting extreme measures she tried her friends and in a joking sort of way got the men to give her all they had about them, even down to their coppers. For the last three months she had been emptying Philippe's pockets especially, and now on days of passionate enjoyment he never came away but he left his purse behind him. Soon she grew bolder and asked him for loans of two hundred francs, three hundred francs-- never more than that--wherewith to pay the interest of bills or to stave off outrageous debts. And Philippe, who in July had been appointed paymaster to his regiment, would bring the money the day after, apologizing at the same time for not being rich, seeing that good Mamma Hugon now treated her sons with singular financial severity. At the close of three months these little oft-renewed loans mounted up to a sum of ten thousand francs. The captain still laughed his hearty-sounding laugh, but he was growing visibly thinner, and sometimes he seemed absent-minded, and a shade of suffering would pass over his face. But one look from Nana's eyes would transfigure him in a sort of sensual ecstasy. She had a very coaxing way with him and would intoxicate him with furtive kisses and yield herself to him in sudden fits of self-abandonment, which tied him to her apron strings the moment he was able to escape from his military duties.
One evening, Nana having announced that her name, too, was Therese and that her fete day was the fifteenth of October, the gentlemen all sent her presents. Captain Philippe brought his himself; it was an old comfit dish in Dresden china, and it had a gold mount. He found her alone in her dressing room. She had just emerged from the bath, had nothing on save a great red-and-white flannel bathing wrap and was very busy examining her presents, which were ranged on a table. She had already broken a rock-crystal flask in her attempts to unstopper it.
"Oh, you're too nice!" she said. "What is it? Let's have a peep! What a baby you are to spend your pennies in little fakements like that!"
She scolded him, seeing that he was not rich, but at heart she was delighted to see him spending his whole substance for her. Indeed, this was the only proof of love which had power to touch her. Meanwhile she was fiddling away at the comfit dish, opening it and shutting it in her desire to see how it was made.
"Take care," he murmured, "it's brittle."
But she shrugged her shoulders. Did he think her as clumsy as a street porter? And all of a sudden the hinge came off between her fingers and the lid fell and was broken. She was stupefied and remained gazing at the fragments as she cried:
"Oh, it's smashed!"
Then she burst out laughing. The fragments lying on the floor tickled her fancy. Her merriment was of the nervous kind, the stupid, spiteful laughter of a child who delights in destruction. Philippe had a little fit of disgust, for the wretched girl did not know what anguish this curio had cost him. Seeing him thoroughly upset, she tried to contain herself.
"Gracious me, it isn't my fault! It was cracked; those old things barely hold together. Besides, it was the cover! Didn't you see the bound it gave?
And she once more burst into uproarious mirth.
But though he made an effort to the contrary, tears appeared in the young man's eyes, and with that she flung her arms tenderly round his neck.
"How silly you are! You know I love you all the same. If one never broke anything the tradesmen would never sell anything. All that sort of thing's made to be broken. Now look at this fan; it's only held together with glue!"
She had snatched up a fan and was dragging at the blades so that the silk was torn in two. This seemed to excite her, and in order to show that she scorned the other presents, the moment she had ruined his she treated herself to a general massacre, rapping each successive object and proving clearly that not one was solid in that she had broken them all. There was a lurid glow in her vacant eyes, and her lips, slightly drawn back, displayed her white teeth. Soon, when everything was in fragments, she laughed cheerily again and with flushed cheeks beat on the table with the flat of her hands, lisping like a naughty little girclass="underline"
"All over! Got no more! Got no more!"
Then Philippe was overcome by the same mad excitement, and, pushing her down, he merrily kissed her bosom. She abandoned herself to him and clung to his shoulders with such gleeful energy that she could not remember having enjoyed herself so much for an age past. Without letting go of him she said caressingly:
"I say, dearie, you ought certainly to bring me ten louis tomorrow. It's a bore, but there's the baker's bill worrying me awfully."
He had grown pale. Then imprinting a final kiss on her forehead, he said simply:
"I'll try."
Silence reigned. She was dressing, and he stood pressing his forehead against the windowpanes. A minute passed, and he returned to her and deliberately continued:
"Nana, you ought to marry me."
This notion straightway so tickled the young woman that she was unable to finish tying on her petticoats.
"My poor pet, you're ill! D'you offer me your hand because I ask you for ten louis? No, never! I'm too fond of you. Good gracious, what a silly question!"
And as Zoe entered in order to put her boots on, they ceased talking of the matter. The lady's maid at once espied the presents lying broken in pieces on the table. She asked if she should put these things away, and, Madame having bidden her get rid of them, she carried the whole collection off in the folds of her dress. In the kitchen a sorting-out process began, and Madame's debris were shared among the servants.
That day Georges had slipped into the house despite Nana's orders to the contrary. Francois had certainly seen him pass, but the servants had now got to laugh among themselves at their good lady's embarrassing situations. He had just slipped as far as the little drawing room when his brother's voice stopped him, and, as one powerless to tear himself from the door, he overheard everything that went on within, the kisses, the offer of marriage. A feeling of horror froze him, and he went away in a state bordering on imbecility, feeling as though there were a great void in his brain. It was only in his own room above his mother's flat in the Rue Richelieu that his heart broke in a storm of furious sobs. This time there could be no doubt about the state of things; a horrible picture of Nana in Philippe's arms kept rising before his mind's eye. It struck him in the light of an incest. When he fancied himself calm again the remembrance of it all would return, and in fresh access of raging jealousy he would throw himself on the bed, biting the coverlet, shouting infamous accusations which maddened him the more. Thus the day passed. In order to stay shut up in his room he spoke of having a sick headache. But the night proved more terrible still; a murder fever shook him amid continual nightmares. Had his brother lived in the house, he would have gone and killed him with the stab of a knife. When day returned he tried to reason things out. It was he who ought to die, and he determined to throw himself out of the window when an omnibus was passing. Nevertheless, he went out toward ten o'clock and traversed Paris, wandered up and down on the bridges and at the last moment felt an unconquerable desire to see Nana once more. With one word, perhaps, she would save him. And three o'clock was striking when he entered the house in the Avenue de Villiers.