“Exactly,” responded Bebert. “I want to know what all this is about. I've let you alone long enough.”
“But I don't disturb anybody,” said Emile. “I don't see why...”
“Come here.”
Emile was on the point of not obeying, but he thought better of it and yielded.
“Here I am,” he said going into the kitchen where Bebert was sitting. “What do you want?”
They gazed at each other for a moment in silence and Bebert questioned: “What have you got against me?”
“What?”
“Don't try to be funny”—warned Bebert. “And don't try to be clever either! You heard what I said. Will you answer?”
“But I've nothing against you,” declared Emile timidly. “Why? What have I done to make you think so?”
Bebert thumped the table violently with his fist. “Ah, you are going to ask questions,” he exclaimed, furious. “You have the cheek to ask questions. It'll end badly, I tell you, if you take that tone with me.” At the same time he stared fixedly at Emile in order to intimidate him, and oblige him to talk.
Emile was looking at him, open-mouthed. He did not grasp at all why Bebert was shouting, why he was in such a rage.
“Well,” said the other, “have you made up your mind?”
“Monsieur Bebert,” stammered Emile.... “Don't get angry. It's not reasonable. I don't see... I don't understand... no never... I've never had anything against you... not yesterday anymore than today... Do you think... I'm not lying... I'm talking” (he placed his two hands on his heart) “just as you told me to, truly... sincerely...”
Bebert growled that all that was nonsense.
“Yes... Yes... I'm not hiding anything!” Emile went on more and more agitated. “What could I have against you? I live all alone here in my room... I try not to disturb anybody... How could I know that it wouldn't seem natural to you? When you call me in the night sometimes, I don't answer, on purpose....”
“Why?”
“Because I don't want to have a row,” said Emile after a second's hesitation. “You see? If, when you try to pick a quarrel with me, I was to let myself go, it would be awful.”
“Perhaps you're right,” approved Bebert who smiled in a satisfied way and seemed disarmed, “to keep yourself quiet. But when you shut yourself up in your room like that, it's not a life for me. What? Why can't you come and talk to us when you come home from your work?”
Emile drew back. His face was contracted, he averted his eyes.
“Look here,” went on Bebert. “Nobody wants to eat you, but it gets on my nerves to have people sulking round me. I get it on the brain... I can't bear it.”
“Ah!”
“Yes, I'm like that.”
Bebert had quite cooled down. With a mechanical gesture he hitched his trousers up, stretched himself, then approaching Emile and putting a hand on his shoulder: “Let's be friends,” he proposed, clapping him with robust good nature on the back.“Tiens! I'm a pal—And from now on, I forget everything. I don't mind. That all right?”
Emile said in a very low voice: “It's all right, Monsieur Bebert.”
“That's something like,” exclaimed the other. “So, as tonight it's Saturday and you don't go to work tomorrow— what do you say to this? We will go down to the bar Tango and meet one of my pals. I'll stand a bottle of fizz. Well, will you come?”
And as Emile showed no eagerness: “And I'd like,” said Bebert, “to hear you say no! I'd consider it a slap in the face, and I warn you, I don't like that.”
PART TWO.Student in Sin
VII
The wretched Emile never forgot that abominable evening. He accompanied Bebert, very reluctantly, to the bar Tango where Bouboule was waiting, and he took an instant dislike to the fat man. He considered Bouboule's pink silk shirt, his cuffs with metal studs, his ridiculous Cronstadt hat with great annoyance, and thought him a self-satisfied and most unpleasant person. But Bebert having formally introduced them to each other, he was obliged to hide his uneasiness. Bouboule behaved in the most decorous manner possible, he called Emile “Monsieur Emile” and expressed himself with the uttermost politeness.
“I drink,” he declared lifting his glass, “to the harmony which should reign between brother and brother-in-law, and to Madame Irma's success in business.”
Then he smacked his lips and added: “The wine of France, Monsieur Emile, no one's ever found anything better yet.”
“This isn't bad, is it?” asked Bebert.
Emile agreed that it was very good.
Bouboule thought he ought to go one better.
“Nectar,” he proclaimed emptying his glass.
He winked, smacked his lips a second time and, inclining the neck of the bottle, poured himself out some more, which he swallowed without stopping to take breath.
Emile was impressed. He looked at Bouboule with stupor and, not sure that his admiration was not stronger than his antipathy, declared: “If I drank like that I should soon be screwed.”
“Oh not a bit of it,” replied Bouboule with modesty. “A little wine doesn't hurt anybody.”
Bebert began to laugh. He pushed Emile with his knee under the table and asked Bouboule: “How much of this could you hold?”
“At least five bottles.”
“Five bottles!” exclaimed Emile.
“Certainly.”
“Well,” said Bebert, “I'll pay for them if you can drink them. Will you bet?”
Bouboule accepted and declared that the first bottle did not count. “Leave that out—So to win I must empty five others. You'll see, I can drink!”
“Patron!” called Bebert.
He gave the order, and the festival began.
The other clients of the bar crowded round. This performance interested them far more than affairs in Morocco or the rise and fall of the franc.
They shouted encouragements to Bouboule. They spoke in the most free and familiar fashion to Emile, taking him for what he was not, and Emile, seated among these men, suffered physically. He did not know how to remain unnoticed and far from being amused by the magnificent airs of Bouboule, he found him vulgar and repulsive.
Yet Bouboule was a superb sight. He swallowed one glass after another, after having stirred the wine with one finger, big glasses filled to the brim and after each emptied bottle announced: “One... two... three....”
He slowed down somewhat at the fourth bottle.
“Well Monsieur Bouboule,” jeered the onlookers. “What the hell's the matter? Are you going to give in?”
Bouboule smiled.
“In Canada,” he answered with an air of clownish superiority, “I drank forty whiskies at a go.”
“In Canada?”
“I've been there,” he affirmed. “And the proof of it is that to get the Montreal women over to the Americans, I used to marry each time in front of the clergyman. It's a joke all the same.”
Bebert put in his word: “Canada and Crenelle are two different places, cully!”
“Two?”
“Of course!”
“Well,” said Bouboule disdainfully turning the fourth bottle upside down to show that it was empty, “that makes four.”
“Bravo Bouboule!” shouted a shrill voice.
“Wait a bit,” said Bouboule, whose one idea was to win his bet. “I can do what I said I would do. The bet was five bottles. Let it go!”
This bottle, the last, he uncorked himself and brandished it at arm's length for all to see, then silently, with effort, set to work. But he drank less easily and his bulging eyes rolled in their sockets and became bloodshot. His heavy cheeked face grew purple. Once or twice he seemed on the point of giving in: he breathed heavily, wiped his mouth, and was obliged to display a fierce energy to get the glass to his lips. However, he held out to the end, and there was loud and well deserved applause when he threw the fifth vanquished bottle under the table and heaved a real sigh of relief.
Bebert, a good loser, held ou
t a hundred franc note, and with a “Pay yourself,” that made a sensation, got up and said: “Are we going to Titin's now?”
“But the women?” objected Bouboule.
At this word, Emile, in spite of himself, made the strange reflection that the note held out by Bebert to the waiter had been earned by his sister.
“Well, what about the women?”
Bouboule explained: “Well yes. What would they think if they didn't find us here later on when they come?”
He turned to Emile and added: “Monsieur Emile thinks as I do. We can't behave like that to the ladies. It wouldn't be correct.”
Bebert told him laughing, that he was certainly drunk.
Then he took Bouboule by the arm, hoisted him on to his legs and in the street declared: “It's for your sake, you dirty dog, that I wanted to make a move. You need a breath of air after all that fizz. Let yourself go. We'll get back to the bar for the women when it's time. We can take a stroll till then.”
There was a touching comradeship between them, for Bouboule did not walk very straight, and Bebert supported him.
It was raining.
“Cully! My pal!” said Bouboule.
“Yes, yes,” answered Bebert, “You've had sixty of the best out of me. You're a card.”
“Certainly I'm a... card.”
“A wonder.”
And Bouboule who had himself well in hand, looked straight in front of him and repeated: “A real... yes... a real, a real... an honest to God... genuine...”
Emile followed behind. He was shocked by fat Bouboule's behavior. No one was looking at him and he wondered if he could not take advantage of it to slip away.... He had left his glass of wine half full on the table for fear of getting drunk and now, under the fine penetrating drizzle that was freezing him to the bone, he followed the two men, pitying himself for being in their company.
“And where is Monsieur Emile?” demanded Bouboule as if he had guessed what Emile was thinking.
Bebert helped him to turn round.
“Walk here close to me,” said Bouboule. “There! There! Arm in arm.”
“I like him, d'you know,” he added to Bebert. “He's a pal, such a sociable chap. Aren't you, Monsieur Emile?”
“A good sort... an honest boy...”
“But where are we going?” enquired Emile gently. “Couldn't we take the passage way under the Metro?”
“What?” said Bouboule.
Emile repeated: “Under the Metro.”
And to decide the drunkard, he reasoned: “It isn't raining under the Metro.... We'll be under cover.”
“Under cover?”
Bouboule stopped short, and leaning on Emile, said in an indistinct and confidential voice:
“Under cover? Well, Monsieur Emile, I'm going to tell you what I think, because I know... and I'm proud of it, the house, a wonderful house... where as for being under cover... one is under cover, Monsieur Emile.... You are quite right... to the right, march... there's No. 162, my children... and the little ladies are very obliging.”
VIII
Emile was obliged to follow. Bouboule held him and did not let go. Wearing their wet coats, they entered a large room full of women who were dancing to the sound of an automatic piano, and who at once rushed forward to welcome them. Emile was dumfounded. He guided Bouboule to the end of the room, made him sit down on a bench and collapsed at his side.
The women crowded round, hopping and uttering little cries. They half opened their dressing gowns.
“Two women,” said Bebert with simplicity.
“Well then, take me, me... me...” They all spoke at once displaying their painted smiles, their breasts, their thighs, their bodies naked and alive.... “Which of us do you want? Say... Which?”
Bebert pointed out two of the ladies and assigned them seats on the bench near fat Bouboule. They did not need much urging. One of them, who was fair, and was called Denyse, sat astride on Emile's knee and asked without ceremony: “Will you stand drinks?”
“Yes,” said Emile.
“Then it'll be a cherry for me,” she ordered in a loud voice.
“And you Carmen, what will you have?”
Carmen, who was rubbing herself against Bouboule, and caressing his hands, announced: “A liqueur brandy.”
“And cigarettes,” added Bouboule joyfully.
The waiter recommended a special liqueur to the gentlemen, gave the order at the cash desk, and came back with his tray.
It was Bouboule's turn to pay. They clinked glasses with familiarity. The girls laughed, fluttered, stole cigarettes which they hid in the colored veils which kept their hair in place, then as the automatic piano began to play a loud valse they sang, excited by the noise.
Voila
Maria,
La terreur des Batignolles,
Elle degringole
Les passants,
Tous les hommes pourtant
En raffolent...
“Do you like dancing?” asked Denyse of Emile.
“No I don't dance.”
“And what about making love?”
Emile shrugged his shoulders.
“Oh, look here,” said the girl... “It's good all the same, a little lady... What do you think? I'll show you...”
She laid her plump naked leg on his knee—a leg almost elegant by a white silk sock and a neat patent leather shoe— and pressing herself close to him tried to allure him with her eyes.
“Nobody resists me,” she confided. “Every one knows that I'm the prettiest girl in the house and the sauciest.”
“No—no,” said Emile.
Denyse burst into a shrill laugh and she pressed Emile's legs tighter, giving little jerks to communicate some of her excitement to him and decide him to go upstairs—but Emile resisted. He did not answer the very direct questions which the little lady asked and tried as best he could not to be tempted by her promises.
Bebert, seated opposite, was watching him. “You'll find it difficult to get out of it...” he observed. “That kid is very determined.”
“What did I tell you,” continued Denyse... “there, come along, you'll only have seven francs to pay at the cash desk, and then the little present for me. It won't ruin you.”
“I've told you no.”
“You're wrong.”
Emile bashfully disengaged himself. He had had enough of the farce. Was he going to be annoyed against his will? He looked angrily at Denyse.
“Oh, well,” said she, “you ought to have told me that you were only a mean brute...”
“Leave me alone,” grunted Emile.
“There! don't get cross!”
Bebert interrupted:
“Sometimes,” he said to Denyse, “one makes a mistake about people.”
“Or one meets silly asses.”
“So much the better,” said Emile, who would have been wiser to hold his tongue.
“So much the better?”
Denyse pouted, she looked at herself in the looking glass, arranged the meshes of fair hair which escaped from under her head dress, and pointing at Emile, who was speechless, said aloud: “Did you hear, I was talking about silly asses.... He understands.”
“What's the matter?” enquired Bouboule with courtesy. Denyse left the table. The room was full of a “special evening” crowd—soldiers, workmen, little clerks in bowler hats, young men in caps drank with the girls and followed them occasionally in the direction of a narrow staircase. It was impossible to hear oneself speak. An orchestra composed of a banjo and a concertina played dance music as soon as the automatic piano stopped. Shimmies, fox trots, blues succeeded the valses and the polkas, and then the concertina with its nasal and sonorous gurgle began a Java and, at the first note, all the women stood up. Rattles fastened on to the player's foot accentuated the rhythm. Most of the women danced with each other and took advantage of the dance to display their most secret charms to the drinkers. As they exhibited them they imparted to them a lascivious movement in which t
hey were expert. One saw them in all their nakedness in spite of their red, green, tango, pink, blue or yellow veils which were tied in a knot on the shoulder and fell gracefully down the back, and a Negress whom a sailor was pushing backward showed between her thighs the long, stiff and uncurled hair of her obscure fleece.
Emile could not believe his eyes. He looked, seized by a strong uneasiness, at all the rounded hips, the entangled legs, the breasts of which some were firm and well shaped, the clean-cut flanks that dazzled him, and a mute intoxication took possession of his senses. However he dared not let it be noticed because of Bebert who was not in the least moved by the sight and turned his back. Wherever he looked, Emile saw women, and he could not avoid them, for they took pleasure in forcing the attention of a man whoever he might be.
Carmen was the only girl not dancing. She busied herself with the conquest of Bouboule, whispered in his ear, and kissed him. Bouboule at the height of satisfaction, was being most complacent, when after the Java, Denyse who had seated herself at a table with three young men wearing black surah shirts, gave a little nod of beckoning to Carmen.
“Will you allow me?” asked Carmen with great politeness. She got up, and in a low voice Denyse began to relate an apparently scandalous story. Emile thought at first that they were talking about him, but Carmen leaned towards Denyse and both looked silently at Bebert and his friend. Carmen came back to the table with an ill-natured expression that surprised Emile.
Bouboule also seemed to be struck by it. “What is the matter?” he asked. “Isn't there going to be any more loving?”
“Oh,” said Carmen, “find somebody else.”
Denyse had left her companions. She was now at the cash desk speaking to thepatron, who, behind an enormous artificial plant, could see without being seen. A short time afterwards, that individual emerged from his hiding place and approached Bebert.
“Tiens! good evening, Monsieur Paul,” said Bebert.
Monsieur Paul was a heavy and circumspect man who did not laugh on every day of the week.
“You have not!” he declared without any other explanation, “to take root at this table, messieurs. D'you hear me? As for Madame Carmen, she is wanted.”
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