“It is necessary, and I will go,” said the priest, at length.
The Josserands had been expecting the proposal for days. Valérie must have spoken of it, all the tenants were discussing the affair: were they so hard up as to be forced to keep their daughter? would they be able to obtain the fifty thousand francs to get rid of her? Since the question had reached this point, Madame Josserand had been in a constant rage. What! after having had such trouble to marry Berthe at first, she now had to marry her a second time! Everything was upset, the dowry was again demanded, all the money worries were going to commence afresh! Never before had a mother had such a task to go through twice over. And all owing to the fault of that silly fool, whose stupidity went so far as to make her forget her duty.
The house was becoming a hell upon earth; Berthe suffered a continual torture, for even her sister Hortense, furious at no longer sleeping alone, never uttered a sentence without introducing some insulting allusion into it. She was even reproached with the food she ate. When one had a husband somewhere, it was all the same very funny that one should go and share one’s parents’ meals, which were already too sparing. Then the young woman, in despair, would sob in corners, accusing herself of being a coward, but unable to pick up sufficient courage to go down-stairs and throw herself at Auguste’s feet, and say:
“Here! beat me, I cannot be more unhappy than I am.”
Monsieur Josserand alone showed some affection for his child. But that child’s faults and tears were killing him; he was dying through the cruelties of the family, with an unlimited holiday from business, spent mostly in bed. Doctor Juillerat, who attended him, talked of a decomposition of the blood: it was a dissolution of the entire system, during which each organ was attacked, one after the other.
“When you have made your father die of grief, perhaps you will be satisfied!” cried the mother.
And Berthe scarcely dared enter the invalid’s room. Directly the father and daughter met, they wept together, and did each other a great deal of harm.
At length, Madame Josserand came to a grand decision: she invited uncle Bachelard, resolved to humiliate herself once more. She would have given the fifty thousand francs out of her own pocket, if she had possessed them, so as not to have to keep that big married girl, whose presence dishonored her Tuesday receptions. But she had learnt some shocking things about the uncle, and, if he did not do as she wished, she intended, once for all, to give him a bit of her mind.
During dinner, Bachelard behaved in a most abominable manner. He had arrived in an advanced state of intoxication; for, since he had left Fifi, he had fallen into the lowest depths of vice.
“Narcisse,” said Madame Josserand, “the situation is a grave one——”