GERMINAL
which did not even allow them to pay their way. Do what they could, there were nothing but difficulties until death. Besides, it must be understood that a collier needed a glass to wash away the dust. It began there, and then he was always in the inn when worries came. Without complaining of anyone it might be that the workmen did not earn as much as they ought to.
"I thought," said Madame Grégoire, "that the Company gave you lodging and firing?"
Maheude glanced sideways at the flaming coal in the fireplace.
"Yes, yes, they give us coal, not very grand, but it burns. As to lodging, it only costs six francs a month; that sounds like nothing, but it is often pretty hard to pay. To-day they cut me up into bits without getting two sous out of me. Where there's nothing, there's nothing."
The lady and gentleman were silent, softly stretched out, and gradually wearied and disquieted by the exhibition of this wretchedness. She feared she had wounded them, and added, with the stolid and just air of a practical woman:
"Oh! I don't want to complain. Things are like this, and one has to put up with them; all the more that it's no good struggling, perhaps we shouldn't change anything. The best is, is it not, to try and live honestly in the place in which the good God has put us?"
M. Grégoire approved this emphatically.
"With such sentiments, my good woman, one is above misfortune."
Honorine and Mélanie at last brought the parcel.
Cécile unfastened it and took out two dresses. She added comforters, even stockings and mittens. They all fitted beautifully; she hastened and made the servants put on the chosen garments; for her music mistress had just arrived; and she pushed the mother and children towards the door.
"We are very short," stammered Maheude; "if we only had a five-franc piece—"
The phrase was stifled, for the Maheus were proud and never begged. Cécile looked uneasily at her father; but the latter refused decisively, with an air of duty.
"No, it is not our custom. We cannot do it."
[83]
