Fruitfulness

by Émile Zola

She did not speak. He simply said: "They made the plunge, they are both dead—like Blaise."

Then, though she still said nothing, she looked at him. For a moment their eyes met. And in her glance he read everything: the murder was begun afresh, effected, consummated. Over yonder lay the bodies, dead, one atop of the other.

"Wretched woman, to what monstrous perversity have you fallen! And how much blood there is upon you!"

By an effort of supreme pride Constance was able to draw herself up and even increase her stature, still wishing to conquer, and cry aloud that she was indeed the murderess, that she had always thwarted him, and would ever do so. But Mathieu was already overwhelming her with a final revelation.

"You don't know, then, that that ruffian, Alexandre, was one of the murderers of your friend, Madame Angelin, the poor woman who was robbed and strangled one winter afternoon. I compassionately hid that from you. But he would now be at the galleys had I spoken out! And if I were to speak to-day you would be there too!"

That was the hatchet-stroke. She did not speak, but dropped, all of a lump, upon the carpet, like a tree which has been felled. This time her defeat was complete; destiny, which she awaited, had turned against her and thrown her to the ground. A mother the less, perverted by the love which she had set on her one child, a mother duped, robbed, and maddened, who had glided into murder amid the dementia born of inconsolable motherliness! And now she lay there, stretched out, scraggy and withered, poisoned by the affection which she had been unable to bestow.

Mathieu became anxious, and summoned the old servant, who, after procuring assistance, carried her mistress to her bed and then undressed her. Meantime, as Constance gave no sign of life, seized as she was by one of those fainting fits which often left her quite breathless, Mathieu himself went for Boutan, and meeting him just as he was returning home for dinner, was luckily able to bring him back at once.

Boutan, who was now nearly seventy-two, and was quietly spending his last years in serene cheerfulness, born of his hope in life, had virtually ceased practising, only attending a very few old patients, his friends. However, he did not refuse Mathieu's request. When he had examined Constance he made a gesture of hopelessness, the meaning of which was so plain that Mathieu, his anxiety increasing, bethought himself of trying to find Beauchêne in order that the latter might, at least, be present if his wife should die. But the old servant, on being questioned, began by raising her arms to heaven. She did not know where Monsieur might be, Monsieur never left any address. At last, feeling frightened herself, she made up her mind to hasten to the abode of the two women, aunt and niece, with whom Beauchêne spent the greater part of his time. She knew their address perfectly well, as her mistress had even sent her thither in pressing emergencies. But she learnt that the ladies had gone with Monsieur to Nice for a holiday; whereupon, not desiring to return without some member of the family, she was seized on her way back with the fine idea of calling on Monsieur's sister, the Baroness de Lowicz, whom she brought, almost by force, in her cab.

It was in vain that Boutan attempted treatment. When Constance opened her eyes again, she looked at him fixedly, recognized him, no doubt, and then lowered her eyelids. And from that moment she obstinately refused to reply to any question that was put to her. She must have heard and have known that people were there, trying to succor her. But she would have none of their succor, she was stubbornly intent on dying, on giving no further sign of life. Neither did she raise her eyelids, nor did her lips part again. It was as if she had already quitted the world amid the mute agony of her defeat.

That evening Séraphine's manner was extremely strange. She reeked of ether, for she drank ether now. When she heard of the two-fold "accident," the death of Morange and that of Alexandre, which had brought on Constance's cardiacal attack, she simply gave an insane grin, a kind of involuntary snigger, and stammered: "Ah! that's funny."