GERMINAL
"Mother has gone to Montsou to try and get a loaf," said Pierronne again. "We are chilled with waiting for her."
But her voice choked; she had followed her neighbour's glance, and her eyes also fell on the bottle. Immediately she began again, and narrated the story. Yes, it was wine; the Piolaine people had brought her that bottle for her man, who had been ordered by the doctor to take claret. And her thankfulness poured forth in a stream. What good people they were! The young lady especially; she was not proud, going into work-people's houses and distributing her charities herself.
"I see," said Maheude; "I know them."
Her heart ached at the idea that the good things always go to the least poor. It was always so, and these Piolaine people would have carried water to the river. Why had she not seen them in the settlement? Perhaps, all the same, she might have got something out of them.
"I had come," she confessed at last, "to know if there was more going with you than with us. Have you just a little vermicelli by way of loan?"
Pierronne expressed her grief noisily.
"Nothing at all, my dear. Not what you can call a grain of semolina. If mother hasn't come back, it's because she hasn't succeeded. We must go to bed supperless."
At this moment crying was heard from the cellar, and she grew angry and struck her fist against the door. It was that gadabout Lydie, whom she had shut up, she said, to punish her for not having returned until five o'clock, after having been roaming about the whole day. One could not subdue her; she was constantly disappearing.
Maheude, however, remained standing; she could not make up her mind to leave. This large fire filled her with a painful sensation of comfort; the thought that they were eating there enlarged the void in her stomach. Evidently they had sent away the old woman and shut up the child, to blow themselves out with their rabbit. Ah! whatever people may say, when a woman behaves ill that brings luck to her house.
"Good-night," she said, suddenly.
Outside night had come on, and the moon behind the clouds was lighting up the earth with a dubious glow. Instead of traversing the gardens, Maheude went around, despairing,
[234]
