by Emile Zola
‘Anyway, I told them of our hardship and asked them to lend us two hundred francs to stop the proceedings against us. And you should have heard how they protested… two hundred francs, when they had lost two thousand on the Bourse! Was I joking? Did I want to ruin them?… I’ve never seen them in such a state. They who used to be so good to me, who would have spent anything on earth to give me presents. They must really be going mad, for there’s no sense in ruining their lives like that when they’re so happy in their lovely house, with no worries and nothing to do other than enjoy at their leisure the fortune they worked so hard for.’
‘I hope you didn’t insist,’ said Jordan.
‘I certainly did insist, and then they started on you… as you see, I’m telling you everything; I had promised to keep that to myself but it just slipped out… They repeated that they had foreseen it, that writing for the newspapers was not a proper job and we’d end up in the poor-house… Then, since I was beginning to get angry too, I was just going to leave when the Captain arrived. You know he has always adored me, Uncle Chave. Faced with him they became reasonable, especially as he was exulting, asking Papa if he intended to go on getting himself robbed… Mama took me aside and slipped fifty francs into my hand, telling me we could gain a few days’ reprieve with that, time to sort things out.’
‘Fifty francs! A pittance! And did you accept?’
Marcelle tenderly took his hands, calming him down with her quiet good sense.
‘Come now, don’t be angry… Yes I accepted. And I so clearly understood that you would never dare take it to the bailiff that I went there myself straight away, you know, to the Rue Cadet. But just imagine! He refused to accept it, saying he had strict orders from Monsieur Busch, and that only Monsieur Busch could stop the proceedings… Oh, that Busch! I don’t hate anyone, but how he exasperates and disgusts me, that man! No matter, I ran to his house in the Rue Feydeau and he had to content himself with the fifty francs, so there we are! We can look forward to a fortnight of not being harassed.’
Jordan’s face had tensed in the grip of powerful emotions, while the tears he was holding back were dampening his eyelids.
‘You did all that, my little wife, you did all that?’
‘Yes, I didn’t want anyone pestering you any more! I don’t care about having to listen to a lot of rubbish, so long as you’re allowed to work in peace!’
And she was laughing now, telling him of her arrival in Busch’s office, with all his filthy files, and the brutal way he had received her, threatening not to leave them so much as a rag if they didn’t pay the whole debt there and then. The amusing thing was that she had given herself the treat of infuriating him by contesting his legal right to recover the debt, those notes for three hundred francs, now increased, with all the extras, to seven hundred and thirty francs fifteen centimes, when they had cost him maybe a hundred sous in some bundle of old rags. Busch was choking with rage: first of all, he had paid a lot for those notes; then there was the time he’d lost and the effort of two years’ running about just to discover the signatory, and the intelligence he’d had to use in that manhunt—didn’t he have to be reimbursed for all that? So much the worse for those who got themselves caught! In the end he had, after all, taken the fifty francs, since his prudent doctrine was always to compromise.
‘Ah, my little wife, how brave you are, and how I love you!’ said Jordan, allowing himself to kiss Marcelle even though the editorial secretary was just passing.
Then, lowering his voice:
‘How much is there left at home?’
‘Seven francs.’
‘Good,’ he replied, well pleased, ‘we can manage for two days on that, and I’m not going to ask for an advance, which would anyway be refused. That’s really too painful… Tomorrow I’ll go and see if I can place an article with Le Figaro.* Ah, if only I had finished my novel and it was selling a bit…’
Marcelle now kissed him back.
‘Yes, go on, we’ll manage very well!… You’ll come back with me, won’t you? That will be nice, and for tomorrow we’ll buy a smoked herring at the corner of the Rue de Clichy, where I saw some splendid ones. This evening we have bacon and potatoes.’
After asking a colleague to check his proofs, Jordan left with his wife. Saccard and Huret were also leaving. In the street a coupé was just stopping outside the newspaper office, and they saw Baroness Sandorff step out of it; she greeted them with a smile then hurried upstairs. She sometimes came in to see Jantrou. Saccard, always excited by her, with her big, bruised-looking eyes, almost decided to go back up.
Upstairs, in the editor’s office, the Baroness didn’t even want to sit down. She was just dropping in to say hello, simply to ask him if he knew anything useful. In spite of his suddenly changed fortunes she still treated him as she did when he used to come every morning as a jobber, bending over double to beg an order from her father, Monsieur de Ladricourt. Her father had been an appallingly brutal man, and she could not forget the kick with which he had thrown Jantrou out, in his anger at a large loss. But now that she saw Jantrou at the very source of news she had become familiar once more, trying to pump him.
‘Ah well, nothing new?’
‘No indeed, I don’t know anything.’
But she went on looking at him, smiling, convinced that he was just unwilling to say anything. Then, to force him into making confidences, she talked about the stupid war that was going to set Austria, Italy, and Prussia in conflict.* The stock-markets were panicking, Italian holdings had fallen terribly, as had all the other stocks for that matter. And she was very worried, for she didn’t know to what extent she ought to follow this movement, as she already had substantial sums involved for the next settlement day.
‘Doesn’t your husband keep you informed?’ asked Jantrou with a laugh. ‘After all, he’s very well placed at the embassy.’
‘Oh! My husband,’ she murmured with a dismissive gesture, ‘I don’t get anything out of my husband any more.’
Jantrou found this even funnier, and went so far as to refer to Delcambre, the Public Prosecutor, the lover who, it was said, paid her losses when she eventually decided to pay them.
‘And your friends at Court and the Palais de Justice?’
She pretended not to understand and carried on, in pleading tones, not taking her eyes off him:
‘Come on, be nice… You know something.’
Once, some time ago, in his craze for everything in skirts that came his way, whether grubby or elegant, he had thought of treating himself to her—as he brutally put it—this gambling woman who was so familiar with him. But at the first word, the first gesture, she had drawn herself up, so full of loathing and contempt that he had sworn never to try again. This man, so often kicked by her father! Ah, never! She had not fallen that low.
‘Be nice? Why should I be? You’re not at all nice to me.’
At once she grew serious again and her eyes hardened. She was turning her back on him to leave when, out of spite and wanting to hurt her, he said:
‘You just met Saccard at the door, didn’t you? Why haven’t you asked him, since he’ll give you whatever you want?’
She immediately came back.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Heavens, whatever you choose it to mean… Come on, don’t play the woman of mystery, I’ve seen you at his house and I know him!’
A feeling of revolt rose in her, all the pride of her race, still alive, surged up from the murky depths, from the mire in which her passion was steadily drowning her, day by day. But she did not lose her temper, she simply said, in a harsh and clear voice:
‘Ah! As for that, my dear sir, what do you take me for? You are mad… No, I am not the mistress of your Saccard, because I chose not to be.’
He then bowed to her, with his elaborate literary man’s courtesy.
‘Well, Madame, you made a big mistake… Believe me, if the chance comes round again don’t miss the opportunity; you, who are always chasing
after useful tips, you’d find them easily enough under that gentleman’s pillow. Oh my word! Yes, the nest will soon be there, you will only have to poke your pretty fingers into it.’
She decided just to laugh, as if resigned to making allowances for his cynicism. But when she shook hands with him he found her hand was quite cold. Had she really not gone beyond her unpleasant duties with the icy and bony Delcambre, this woman with such red lips, who was said to be insatiable?
The month of June went by; on the 15th Italy had declared war on Austria.* Meanwhile, with a sudden lightning march, Prussia had invaded Hanover in under a fortnight, conquered the two Hesses, Baden, and Saxony, taking by surprise unarmed populations that were not at war, and France had made no move; well-informed people were quietly whispering at the Bourse that France had a secret agreement with Prussia, ever since Bismarck had met the Emperor at Biarritz; there was confused talk of the rewards France would gain for her neutrality. But the markets went on falling unremittingly, disastrously. When the news about Sadowa arrived like a thunderbolt on 4 July* there was a collapse of stocks of all kinds. It was believed that the war would go on relentlessly, for though Austria was beaten by Prussia, Austria had defeated Italy at Custoza;* and it was already being said that she was gathering the remnants of her army together and abandoning Bohemia. Orders to sell showered the trading-floor, but there was no sign of buyers.
On 4 July Saccard, who had gone to the newspaper offices very late, towards six o’clock, did not find Jantrou, whose passions for some time had been leading him astray: there were unexpected disappearances, binges from which he returned shattered and bleary-eyed, though it was impossible to say which, whether women or alcohol, was destroying him the more. At that time of day the newspaper office was emptying, and hardly anyone was left except Dejoie, who was dining on the corner of his table in the anteroom. After writing a couple of letters, Saccard was about to leave when Huret stormed in, red in the face and not even taking the time to close the doors behind him.
‘My dear fellow, my dear fellow…’ he spluttered.
He seemed to be choking, and put his two hands on his chest.
‘I have just left Rougon,’ he said… ‘I’ve been running, because I didn’t have a cab, but eventually I found one. Rougon has received a telegram from you know where. I’ve seen it… Such news! Such news!’
With a violent gesture, Saccard stopped him and rushed to close the door, having caught sight of Dejoie, who was already prowling about with his ears pricked up.
‘So what is it then?’
‘Well, the Emperor of Austria cedes the Veneto to the Emperor of France and accepts his mediation, so the Emperor will now address himself to the kings of Prussia and Italy to bring about an armistice.’
There was a silence.
‘So it’s peace then?’
‘Evidently.’
Saccard, astonished and not yet able to think, let out an oath.
‘Hellfire! And the whole of the Bourse still falling!’
Then, in a mechanical tone, he added:
‘And this news, not a soul knows of it?’
‘No, the telegram is confidential, there won’t even be an announcement in the Moniteur* tomorrow morning. Paris will certainly know nothing about it for at least the next twenty-four hours.’
Then came the lightning-stroke of sudden illumination. Saccard ran once more to the door and opened it to see if anyone was listening. He was beside himself, and came back and stood in front of Huret, clutching him by the lapels of his coat.
‘Be quiet! Not so loud!… We are masters of this situation if Gundermann and his gang are not forewarned… Not a word, do you hear? Not to a living soul, not your friends, nor your wife!… And what a piece of luck that Jantrou isn’t here! We shall be the only ones who know, we shall have time to act… Oh, I don’t mean to work solely for myself! You are in on it, and our colleagues at the Universal too. But a secret cannot be kept when there are too many people involved. All is lost if there is the slightest indiscretion before the opening of the Bourse tomorrow.’
Huret, very disturbed, overwhelmed by the grandeur of the coup they were going to attempt, promised to remain absolutely silent. Then they divided up the work between them, deciding that they must begin their campaign at once. Saccard already had his hat on when a question rose to his lips:
‘So it was Rougon who asked you to bring me this news?’
‘Of course.’
Huret had hesitated, for he was lying: the telegram was simply lying on the minister’s table and, being left alone with it for a moment, he had dared to read it. But since it was in his interest to keep the two brothers in agreement this lie seemed to him very adroit, especially since he knew they were not at all anxious to see each other and speak of such matters.
‘Well, there’s no denying it, he’s done me a good turn this time… Let’s get going!’
In the antechamber there was still only Dejoie, who had tried hard to listen but without being able to catch anything distinctly. Nevertheless he seemed to them very agitated, having scented some enormous booty in the air, so excited by this smell of money that he went to the window on the landing to watch them crossing the courtyard.
The difficulty was to act quickly but with the utmost caution. So they parted in the street: Huret was to deal with the evening kerb market, while Saccard, despite the lateness of the hour, went hunting for jobbers and brokers and other dealers, to give them orders to buy. But he wanted to split these orders up and spread them around as much as possible, for fear of arousing suspicion; and above all, he wanted to make it seem as though he was meeting the dealers by chance, rather than tracking them down at home, which would have looked odd. Luck happily came to his aid, for on the Boulevard he saw the broker Jacoby, with whom he stopped to chat and to whom he gave a very substantial order without causing too much astonishment. A few paces further on he bumped into a tall, blonde girl whom he knew to be the mistress of another dealer, Delarocque, Jacoby’s brother-in-law; and since she said she was expecting him that night, he asked her to pass on to him a card with a few words scribbled in pencil. Then, knowing that Mazaud was going to a banquet with former colleagues that evening, he betook himself to the restaurant and changed the orders he had given him earlier that day. But his best stroke of luck was to be accosted, just as he was going home, by Massias, who had just come out of the Théâtre des Variétés. They walked together up to the Rue Saint-Lazare; this gave Saccard time enough to present himself as an eccentric who believed a rise was coming—oh! not immediately of course; he ended up giving Massias numerous orders for Nathansohn and various other dealers, telling him he was acting for a group of friends, which was true enough. By the time Saccard went to bed he had taken up a bullish position for orders worth more than five million francs.
At seven o’clock next morning Huret was at Saccard’s house, telling him what he had managed to do at the kerb market on the pavement in front of the Passage de l’Opéra, where he had bought as much as possible but with restraint, so as to avoid causing a rise in the share-prices. His orders amounted to a million, and both men, thinking their coup to be still far too modest, resolved to continue their campaign. They still had the morning. But first they threw themselves upon the newspapers, trembling with fear that they might already have the news, a note or a mere line that would send their plans crashing. No! The Press knew nothing, the papers were full of the war, loaded with despatches and detailed accounts of the Battle of Sadowa. If no rumour emerged before two o’clock in the afternoon, if they had an hour after the Bourse opened or even just half-an-hour, they were made; they would make a clean sweep of the Jewish tribe, as Saccard put it. And they went their separate ways, each one rushing to throw further millions into the battle.
Saccard spent that morning tramping the streets and sniffing the air, with such a need to walk that he had sent away his cab after his very first call. He went to Kolb’s place, where the jingling of the gold was delightful
to his ears, like a promise of victory, and he had sufficient strength of will not to say anything to the banker, who as yet knew nothing. Then he dropped in on Mazaud, not to give him any new orders but just pretending to be worried about the order he had given the previous evening. There, too, ignorance reigned. Little Flory alone caused him some anxiety by the persistent way he kept hovering around, though the sole reason for this was the young clerk’s profound admiration for the financial intelligence of the manager of the Universal Bank. And as Mademoiselle Chuchu was beginning to be very expensive and he was risking a few little speculations, Flory longed to know what the great man was doing so as to follow his lead.
At last, after a hasty lunch at Champeaux’s, where he had the pleasure of hearing the pessimistic moanings of Moser and even Pillerault, predicting a further tumbling in the market, Saccard found himself at half-past twelve in the Place de la Bourse. He wanted, as he put it, to see everyone come in. The heat was overpowering, a fierce sun beat directly down, bleaching the steps, and the warmth bouncing off them filled the peristyle with the heavy, burning heat of an oven. The empty chairs seemed to be cracking in the fiery heat, while the speculators remained standing and sought out the slender bars of shade cast by the columns. Under a tree in the garden he noticed Busch and La Méchain, who began to chatter excitedly when they saw him; it even seemed for a moment as if they were going to approach him, but then they thought better of it; did they know something, then? These base ragpickers, always hunting through the refuse of the Bourse? He shuddered at the thought. But then a voice called his name and he recognized Maugendre and Captain Chave, sitting on a bench quarrelling, for the former was now always jeering at the wretched pettiness of the Captain’s ventures, gaining a mere louis for his cash, the sort of thing he might just as well have done in some obscure provincial café after a few desperate rounds of piquet: honestly, couldn’t he, that day, risk something more substantial on a safe bet? Wasn’t a further fall certain, as clear as daylight? And he called Saccard to witness: wasn’t it true that there’d be a further fall? As for himself, he had bet very heavily on a fall, so convinced indeed that he had staked his entire fortune. Faced by this direct question Saccard replied with smiles and vague shakings of his head, but felt remorseful at not being able to warn this poor man, whom he had known when he was so industrious and clear-headed, still selling his tarpaulins; but he had sworn himself to absolute silence and had the ruthlessness of a gambler determined not to risk disturbing his luck. Just then he was distracted by seeing the coupé of Baroness Sandorff passing by; he followed it with his eye and saw it stop, this time in the Rue de la Banque. Suddenly he thought of Baron Sandorff, Counsellor at the Austrian Embassy; the Baroness must surely know, and she was probably going to wreck everything with some misguided womanly act. He at once crossed the road and hovered round the coupé, now still and silent as if dead, with the coachman sitting stiffly on his box. But one of the windows was lowered, and he bowed gallantly and moved forward.