Meanwhile Négrel was continuing to frighten M. Grégoire. He found Cécile not unattractive and he was prepared to marry her, if only to please his aunt; but he brought no amorous zest to the idea, for, as he said, he was a seasoned bachelor who had long since grown out of such infatuations. And he was a republican, so he claimed, though this did not prevent him from treating his workers with harsh discipline nor from making witty jokes about them in front of the ladies.
‘I do not share my uncle’s optimism either,’ he declared. ‘I fear there may be serious disturbances…And so, Monsieur Grégoire, I would advise you to barricade yourself in at La Piolaine. You may find yourself being looted.’
Just then, his face beaming with its usual kindly smile, M. Grégoire had been vying with his wife in expressions of paternal solicitude for the miners.
‘Loot me!’ he cried in amazement. ‘Why on earth would they loot me?’
‘Are you not a Montsou shareholder? You don’t do anything, you just live off the work of others. So that makes you a dirty capitalist in their book…You may be certain that if the revolution succeeds, you will be forced to hand back your fortune as if you had stolen it.’
In an instant M. Grégoire lost his innocent trust in the ways of the world and woke from the serene unawareness in which he had hitherto lived.
‘Stolen it?’ he gasped. ‘My fortune? Did my great-great-grandfather not earn the money he invested all those years ago, and earn it the hard way, too? Were we not the ones who took all the risks in setting the company up? And do I make improper use of the income I receive from it now?’
Mme Hennebeau was alarmed to see mother and daughter both white with terror, and she hastened to intervene:
‘My dear Monsieur Grégoire, Paul’s only joking.’
But M. Grégoire was beside himself. When Hippolyte came round with a platter of crayfish, he absent-mindedly grabbed three and started crushing the claws with his teeth.
‘Of course, I’m not saying there aren’t shareholders who abuse their position. I mean, for example, I’ve heard stories of government ministers receiving shares in Montsou as a douceur for services rendered to the Company. And there’s that nobleman who shall remain nameless, a duke, who’s our largest shareholder and lives a life of scandalous extravagance, throwing away millions on women and parties and useless luxuries…But what about the rest of us who lead quiet lives like the good, decent people we are, who don’t speculate, who live soberly and make do with what we’ve got and give our fair share to the poor!…Go on with you! The workers would need to be proper thieves to steal so much as a pin from us!’
Négrel had to calm M. Grégoire himself, for all that he found his anger highly entertaining. The crayfish were still doing the rounds, and the sound of cracking shells was to be heard as the conversation turned to politics. In spite of everything, and still shaking, M. Grégoire declared himself to be a liberal and longed for the days of Louis-Philippe.5 Deneulin, for his part, was in favour of strong government and maintained that the Emperor was on a slippery slope with his concessions.6
‘Just remember ’89,’7 he said. ‘It was the nobility who made the Revolution possible by their complicity and their taste for the latest intellectual fashions…Well, it’s the same today with the bourgeoisie. They’re playing the same foolish game with this passion for liberalism and this crazy desire to destroy how things were, and all this sucking up to the people…Yes, you’re just sharpening the monster’s teeth so it can devour us faster. And devour us it will, make no mistake!’
The ladies bid him be quiet and tried to change the subject by asking him for news of his daughters. Lucie was at Marchiennes, singing with a friend; Jeanne was painting the portrait of an old beggar. He told them all this with a distracted air, his eyes fixed on M. Hennebeau, who was engrossed in his telegrams and oblivious of his guests. Beyond those thin sheets of paper he sensed Paris and the Board of Directors. Their orders would determine the outcome of the strike, and so he could not help coming back to the subject that preoccupied him.
‘Well, what will you do?’ he asked abruptly.
M. Hennebeau gave a start and then passed the matter off with a non-committal reply:
‘We shall see.’
‘No doubt you will,’ said Deneulin, as he began to think aloud. ‘You’re strong enough, you can afford to wait. But it’ll be the ruin of me if the strike spreads to Vandame. It was all very well my modernizing Jean-Bart, but I can’t survive on only one pit unless I can keep the production going uninterrupted…At any rate, I can’t see myself making a fortune, that’s for sure.’
This involuntary admission seemed to strike a chord in M. Hennebeau. As he listened, a plan was forming in his mind: if the strike should get worse, why not use the situation and let things get so bad that his neighbour was eventually ruined, and then he could buy back the concession at a knock-down price. That was the one sure way to get back into favour with the Board of Directors, who had been dreaming for years of one day getting their hands on Vandame.
‘If Jean-Bart’s such a weight round your neck,’ he laughed, ‘why not let us have it?’
But already Deneulin regretted what he had said.
‘Not on your life!’ he cried.
Everyone was amused by this vehemence, and they had forgotten about the strike by the time the dessert appeared. An apple charlotte topped with meringue received wide acclaim. Then the ladies started discussing a recipe, on account of the pineapple, which which was judged to be equally delicious. A dish of fruit – grapes and pears – added a final touch to that sense of happy surrender which comes at the end of copious meals. Everyone had become rather emotional, and they were all talking at once as Hippolyte went round pouring them some hock, rather than champagne, which was considered common.
And the marriage between Paul and Cécile came a step nearer thanks to the warm sympathies fostered during this dessert. Paul’s aunt had been looking at Négrel so imploringly that he became his charming self once more, and with his winning ways he soon renewed his conquest of a Grégoire family still crushed by his talk of looting. For a moment, seeing this close understanding between his wife and nephew, M. Hennebeau again had a horrible suspicion, as if he had witnessed not an exchange of glances but a squeeze of the hand. But once more he was reassured by the spectacle of this marriage being planned here in front of his very eyes.
Hippolyte was serving the coffee, when the maid rushed in looking terrified:
‘Sir! Sir! They’re here!’
It was the deputation. Doors banged, and the panic could be heard passing from room to room.
‘Show them into the drawing-room,’ said M. Hennbeau.
Round the table the guests had exchanged uneasy looks. There was silence. Then they tried to make light of it again, pretending to put the remainder of the sugar in their pockets and talking about hiding the cutlery. But when M. Hennebeau continued to look serious, the laughter ceased, and their voices dropped to a whisper as they listened to the heavy tread of the deputation entering the drawing-room next door and tramping across the carpet.
Mme Hennebeau said softly to her husband:
‘I trust you have time for your coffee.’
‘No doubt. They can wait.’
He was tense, apparently preoccupied by his coffee-cup but with his ear cocked for any sound he could make out.
Paul and Cécile had just got up from the table, and he dared her to peep through the keyhole. They were trying not to laugh and busily whispering to each other:
‘Can you see them?’
‘Yes…There’s a big one, and two other little ones behind.’
‘And pretty horrible they look, too, I expect?’
‘No, not at all, they look perfectly sweet.’
Abruptly M. Hennebeau left the table, saying his coffee was too hot and that he would drink it afterwards. As he left the room, he placed a finger to his lips urging them to caution. Everyone had sat down again at the table, and there they r
emained without a word, not daring to move but straining to hear, unnerved by the loud voices of these men.
II
The day before, during a meeting held at Rasseneur’s, Étienne and some of his comrades had together chosen the members of the deputation who were to meet management the following day. When La Maheude discovered that evening that Maheu was one of them, her heart sank, and she asked him if he really wanted them all turned out on to the street. Maheu himself had not accepted without a certain reluctance. Now that the moment to act had come, and despite the injustice of their poverty, they both lapsed back into their habitual state of inbred acquiescence, fearful of the morrow and still preferring to toe the line. Usually Maheu let his wife make all the key decisions in the running of their lives, for she had good judgement. This time, however, he ended up losing his temper, largely because he secretly shared her fears.
‘Leave me bloody well be,’ he said as he got into bed and rolled over on to his side. ‘A fine thing it would be to let my comrades down!…I’m doing what I have to do.’
She in turn got into bed. Neither of them spoke. Then, after a long silence, she said:
‘Very well, you win. The only trouble is, my poor love, we’re done for already.’
It was midday when they sat down to eat, because they were due to meet at the Advantage at one o’clock prior to going on from there to M. Hennebeau’s. The meal was one of potatoes. As there was only a tiny portion of butter left, nobody touched it. They would save it and have it on bread come the evening.
‘We’re counting on you to do the talking, you know,’ Étienne said suddenly to Maheu.
Maheu was taken aback, unable to speak in the emotion of the moment.
‘No, that does it!’ cried La Maheude. ‘He can go if he wants to, but I’m not having him be the leader…And why him, anyway? Why not somebody else?’
Then Étienne explained, with his usual vehemence. Maheu was the best worker in the pit, the most popular and the most respected, the person everyone cited as a model of good sense. Which meant that the miners’ demands would carry more weight coming from him. Originally Étienne was going to do it; but he had been at Montsou for only such a short time. They would listen more to a local. In short, the men were entrusting their interests to the worthiest man among them: he simply couldn’t refuse, he’d be a coward if he did.
La Maheude gestured despairingly.
‘Off you go, my love, go and get yourself killed for everybody else’s sake. Go on, be my guest.’
‘But I c-couldn’t,’ Maheu stuttered. ‘I’d say something daft.’
Étienne patted him on the shoulder, delighted to have convinced him.
‘You’ll say what you feel, and that’ll be just fine.’
Old Bonnemort, whose swollen legs were getting better, listened with his mouth full, shaking his head. There was silence. Whenever they had potatoes, the children tucked in and were very well behaved. When the old man had swallowed his mouthful, he said slowly:
‘You can say whatever comes into your head, but it’ll make no difference…Oh, I’ve been here before, I can tell you! Forty years ago they threw us out of the manager’s office, and at sabre-point what’s more! These days they might agree to see you, but they won’t listen to you any more than this wall’ll listen to you…What do you expect? They’ve got the money, so what the hell do they care?’
There was another silence: Maheu and Étienne got up and left the family sitting gloomily in front of their empty plates. On their way out they collected Pierron and Levaque, and then the four of them headed for Rasseneur’s, where the delegates from the surrounding villages were arriving in small groups. When the twenty members of the deputation had gathered there, they agreed on the conditions they were going to state to the Company; and off they set for Montsou. The bitter north-east wind was sweeping across the road. Two o’clock struck as they arrived.
At first Hippolyte told them to wait, and then shut the door in their faces. When he returned, he showed them into the drawing-room and opened the outer curtains. Soft daylight filtered through the lace behind. Having been left alone in the room, the miners were afraid to sit down, and waited awkwardly, all clean and scrubbed, with their yellow hair and moustaches, for they had shaved that morning and put on their best clothes. As they stood nervously fingering their caps, they threw sideways glances at the furniture. Many different styles were represented, with that eclecticism which the taste for antiques has made fashionable: Henri II armchairs, some Louis XV occasional chairs, a seventeenth-century Italian cabinet, a fifteenth-century contador,1 an altar-front, which hung as a valance from the mantelpiece, and embroidered panels taken from old chasubles and stitched on to the door-curtains. All this ecclesiastical finery of antique gold and old fawn-coloured silks had filled them with uneasy respect, and the thick wool pile of the Oriental carpets seemed to wind itself round their feet. But what felt most overwhelming of all was the heat, this extraordinary enveloping heat provided by the central-heating system, which brought a glow to cheeks still frozen from the icy wind along the road. Five minutes went by. And their awkwardness grew, amid the sumptuous ease of a room so comfortably insulated from the world.
Finally M. Hennebeau came in, with his frock-coat buttoned up in the military manner, and wearing the trim little rosette of his decoration in his lapel. He spoke first:
‘So here you are!…And up in arms, it appears.’
And he broke off to add, with stiff courtesy:
‘Be seated. I like nothing better than to talk.’
The miners looked round for somewhere to sit. Some ventured to occupy a chair, but the rest were put off by the embroidered silk and preferred to stand.
There was a further silence. M. Hennebeau had rolled his armchair across in front of the fireplace and now quickly took stock, trying to recall their faces. He had just recognized Pierron hiding in the back row; and now his eyes came to rest on Étienne, sitting opposite him.
‘So,’ he began, ‘and what have you come to tell me?’
He was expecting the young man to speak and was so surprised to see Maheu step forward that he could not help adding:
‘What! You? Such a good worker, and always so reasonable, one of Montsou’s old guard, whose family’s been working down the mine since the first coal was cut!…Oh, this is not good, not good at all. I don’t like seeing you here at the head of these troublemakers!’
Maheu listened, his eyes on the floor. Then he began, quiet and hesitant at first:
‘Sir, that’s exactly why the men have chosen me, because I’m a peaceful man and I’ve never done anyone any harm. Surely that must prove to you this isn’t just a matter of a few hotheads wanting a fight, or people with the wrong ideas trying to stir up trouble. We only want what’s fair. We’ve had enough of starving to death, and it seems to us high time that we came to some arrangement, so that at least we can have enough bread to live on each day.’
His voice grew firmer. He looked up and continued, with his eyes fixed on M. Hennebeau:
‘You know very well we can’t accept your new system…They say we’re not doing the timbering right. And it’s true. We don’t give it the time we should. But if we did, our day’s pay would be even less, and since we don’t earn enough to live on as it is, that would be the final straw, you might as well say goodbye to the lot of us. But pay us more and we’ll do better timbering. We’ll put in the proper time it should take, instead of trying to hew as much coal as we can just because that’s the only work that earns money. No other system’s possible. If you want the job doing, you’ve got to pay for it…But no, what do you come up with instead? Really, it just beggars belief! You lower the rate per tub and then pretend to make up the reduction by paying for the timbering separately. If that was actually true, you’d still be robbing us because timbering always takes longer. But what really makes us angry is that it isn’t even true. The Company’s not compensating us at all, it’s simply pocketing two centimes for every tu
b of coal. It’s as simple as that!’
‘Yes, that’s right, that’s right,’ the other delegates muttered when they saw M. Hennebeau about to interrupt with a curt wave of the hand.
But in any case Maheu was not about to stop. Now that he was launched, the words came automatically. Occasionally he would listen to himself in astonishment, as though he were a stranger talking. These were things that had been building up inside him, things he didn’t even know were there, and that now came pouring out of him, straight from the heart. He described their poverty, the hard work, the animal existence, the wife and children at home crying out with hunger. He referred to the recent disastrous pay-days and the derisory pay that was eaten into by fines and temporary lay-offs. How were they supposed to take that home to a family in tears? Had the Company decided to finish them off once and for all?
‘Because we came to tell you, sir,’ he said finally, ‘that if it’s a question of dying, we’d rather die doing nothing. That way, at least, we spare ourselves the exhaustion…We’ve left the pits, and we’ll only go down again if the Company accepts our conditions. It wants to reduce the rate per tub and pay for the timbering separately. Well, we want the system we had before, and on top of that we want five centimes more per tub…And now it’s up to you to decide whether you believe in justice and the value of work.’
Some of the miners could be heard saying:
‘That’s it…That’s what we all think…We only want what’s right.’
Others nodded silently in agreement. The sumptuous room had melted away, with its gilt and its embroidered silks and its mysterious assembly of old things; and they weren’t even conscious of the carpet any more, crushed beneath their heavy shoes.