She still hesitated, not knowing where to enter. A broken fence opened a passage which seemed to lead through the heaps of rubbish from some buildings recently pulled down. Two planks had been thrown across a large puddle of muddy water that barred the way. She ended by venturing along them, turned to the left and found herself lost in the depths of a strange forest of old carts, standing on end with their shafts in the air, and of hovels in ruins, the wood-work of which was still standing. Toward the back, stabbing through the half-light of sundown, a flame gleamed red. The clamor of the hammers had ceased. She was advancing carefully when a workman, his face blackened with coal-dust and wearing a goatee passed near her, casting a side-glance with his pale eyes.
“Sir,” asked she, “it’s here is it not that a boy named Etienne works? He’s my son.”
“Etienne, Etienne,” repeated the workman in a hoarse voice as he twisted himself about. “Etienne; no I don’t know him.”
An alcoholic reek like that from old brandy casks issued from his mouth. Meeting a woman in this dark corner seemed to be giving the fellow ideas, and so Gervaise drew back saying:
“But yet it’s here that Monsieur Goujet works, isn’t it?”
“Ah! Goujet, yes!” said the workman; “I know Goujet! If you come for Goujet, go right to the end.”
And turning round he called out at the top of his voice, which had a sound of cracked brass:
“I say Golden-Mug, here’s a lady wants you!”
But a clanging of iron drowned the cry! Gervaise went to the end. She reached a door and stretching out her neck looked in. At first she could distinguish nothing. The forge had died down, but there was still a little glow which held back the advancing shadows from its corner. Great shadows seemed to float in the air. At times black shapes passed before the fire, shutting off this last bit of brightness, silhouettes of men so strangely magnified that their arms and legs were indistinct. Gervaise, not daring to venture in, called from the doorway in a faint voice:
“Monsieur Goujet! Monsieur Goujet!”