'Ah! you are mistaken! If he chooses, he can lead the old quarter of the town and a great number of villages to the poll. He is mad, it is true, but that is a recommendation. I myself consider him still a very sensible person, for a Republican.'
This attempt at wit met with distinct success. Monsieur Rastoil's daughters broke out into school-girl laughs and the presiding judge himself nodded his head in approval. He threw off his serious expression, and, without looking at the sub-prefect, he said:
'Lagrifoul has not rendered us, perhaps, the services we had a right to expect, but a shoemaker would be really too disgraceful for Plassans!'
Then, as though he wanted to prevent any further remarks on the subject, he added quickly: 'Why, it is half-past one o'clock! This is quite an orgie we are having, my dear sub-prefect; we are all very much obliged to you.'
Madame de Condamin wrapped her shawl round her shoulders and contrived to have the last word.
'Well,' she said, 'we really must not let the election be controlled by a man who goes and kneels down in the middle of a bed of lettuces after twelve o'clock at night.'
That night became quite historical, and Monsieur de Condamin derived much amusement from relating the details of what had occurred to Monsieur de Bourdeu, Monsieur Maffre, and the priests, who had not seen Mouret with his candle. Three days later all the neighbourhood was asserting that the madman who beat his wife had been seen walking about with his head enveloped in a sheet. Meantime, the afternoon assemblies under the arbour were much exercised by the possible candidature of Mouret's radical shoemaker. They laughed as they studied each other's demeanour. It was a sort of political pulse-feeling. Certain confidential statements of his friend the presiding judge induced Monsieur de Bourdeu to believe that a tacit understanding might be arrived at between the Sub-Prefecture and the moderate opposition to promote the candidature of himself, and thus inflict a crushing defeat upon the Republicans. Possessed by this idea, he waxed more and more sarcastic against the Marquis de Lagrifoul, and made the most of the latter's blunders in the Chamber. Monsieur Delangre, who only called at long intervals, alleging the pressure of his municipal duties as an excuse for his infrequent appearance, smiled softly at each fresh sally of the ex-prefect.
'You've only got to bury the marquis, now, your reverence,' he said one day in Abbé Faujas's ear.
Madame de Condamin, who heard him, turned her head and laid her finger upon her lips with a pretty look of mischief.
Abbé Faujas now allowed politics to be mentioned in his presence. He even occasionally expressed an opinion in favour of the union of all honest and religious men. Thereupon all present, Monsieur Péqueur des Saulaies, Monsieur Rastoil, Monsieur de Bourdeu, and even Monsieur Maffre, grew quite warm in their expressions of desire for such an agreement. It would be so very easy, they said, for men with a stake in the country to come to an understanding together to work for the firm establishment of the great principles without which no society could hold together. Then the conversation turned upon property, and family and religion. Sometimes Mouret's name was mentioned, and Monsieur de Condamin once said: