Octave took her hand and squeezed it tightly; he was choking with impotent rage. What was to be done? he could not show himself and force those women to leave off. The foul words continued, words which the young woman had never heard before, all the overflow of a sewer which every morning found an outlet there, close to her, and of which she had never had the least suspicion. Their love, so carefully hidden as they thought, was now being dragged amidst the vegetable parings and the kitchen slops. These women knew all, without any one having spoken. Lisa related how Saturnin held the candle. Victoire was highly amused by the husband’s headaches, and said that he would do well to get himself another eye and have it placed somewhere; even Adèle had a fling at her mistress’ young lady, whose ailments, private habits, and toilet secrets she ruthlessly exposed. And a filthy chaff soiled all that remained that was good and tender in their love.
“Look out below!” suddenly exclaimed Victoire; “here’s some of yesterday’s carrots which stink enough to poison one! They’ll do for that crapulous old Gourd!”
The servants, out of spite, threw all the filth they could into the inner courtyard, so that the doorkeeper should have it to sweep up.
“And here’s a bit of moldy kidney!” said Adèle in her turn.
All the scrapings of the saucepans, all the muck from the washing-up basins, found their way there, whilst Lisa continued to pull Berthe and Octave to pieces. The pair remained standing, hand-in-hand, face to face, unable to turn away their eyes; and their hands became as cold as ice, and their looks acknowledged the impurity of their intimacy. This was what their love had come to, this fornication beneath a downpour of putrid meat and stale vegetables!
“And you know,” said Hippolyte, “the young gentleman doesn’t care for the missis. He merely took her to help him along in the world. Oh! he’s a miser at heart in spite of his airs, an unscrupulous fellow, who, with his pretensions of loving women, is not above slapping them!”
Berthe, her eyes on Octave, saw him turn pale, his face so upset, so changed, that he frightened her.
“On my word! the two make a nice pair,” resumed Lisa. “I wouldn’t give much for her skin either. Badly brought up, with a heart as hard as a stone, caring for nothing except her own pleasure, and sleeping with fellows for the sake of their money, yes, for their money! for I know the sort of woman.”
The tears streamed from Berthe’s eyes. Octave beheld her features all distorted. It was as if they had been flayed before each other, laid utterly bare, without any possibility of protesting. Then the young woman, suffocated by this open cesspool which discharged its exhalations full in her face, wished to fly. He did not detain her, for disgust with themselves made their presence a torture, and they longed for the relief of no longer seeing each other.
“You promise to come, next Tuesday, to my room?”