“You see they are quite at home,” said Mouret, who pointed with a broad gesture to the multitude of women with which the departments were overflowing.
Just at that moment Madame Desforges, after having nearly had her mantle carried away in the crowd, at last came in and crossed the first hall. Then, on reaching the principal gallery, she raised her eyes. It was like a railway span, surrounded by the balustrades of the two storeys, intersected by hanging staircases, crossed by flying bridges. The iron staircases developed bold curves, multiplying the landings; the iron bridges suspended in space, ran straight along, very high up; and all this iron formed, beneath the white light of the windows, an excessively light architecture, a complicated lace-work through which the daylight penetrated, the modern realisation of a dreamed-of palace, of a Babel-like heaping up of the storeys, enlarging the rooms, opening up glimpses on to other floors and into other rooms without end. In fact, iron reigned everywhere; the young architect had had the honesty and courage not to disguise it under a coating of paint imitating stone or wood. Down below, in order not to outshine the goods, the decoration was sober, with large regular spaces in neutral tints; then as the metallic work ascended, the capitals of the columns became richer, the rivets formed ornaments, the shoulder-pieces and corbels were loaded with sculptured work; up above, there was a mass of painting, green and red, amidst a prodigality of gold, floods of gold, heaps of gold, even to the glazed-work, the glass of which was enamelled and inlaid with gold. Under the covered galleries, the bare brick-work of the arches was also decorated in bright colours. Mosaics and earthenware also formed part of the decoration, enlivening the friezes, lighting up with their fresh notes the severity of the whole; whilst the stairs, with their red velvet covered hand-rails, were edged with a band of curved polished iron, which shone like the steel of a piece of armour.
Although she had already seen the new establishment
Madame Desforges stood still, struck by the ardent life which was this day animating the immense nave. Below, around her, continued the eddying of the crowd, of which the double current of those entering and those going out made itself felt as far as the silk department; a crowd still very mixed in its elements, though the afternoon was bringing a greater number of ladies amongst the shopkeepers and house-wives; a great many women in mourning, with their flowing veils, and the inevitable wet nurses straying about, protecting their babies with their outstretched arms. And this sea of faces, these many-coloured hats, these bare heads, both dark and light, rolled from one end of the gallery to the other, confused and discoloured amidst the loud glare of the stuffs. Madame Desforges could see nothing but large price tickets bearing enormous figures everywhere, their white patches standing out on the bright printed cottons, the shining silks, and the sombre woollens. Piles of ribbons curtailed the heads, a wall of flannel threw out a promontory; on all sides the mirrors carried the departments back into infinite space, reflecting the displays with portions of the public, faces reversed, and halves of shoulders and arms; whilst to the right and to the left the lateral galleries opened up other vistas, the snowy background of the linen department, the speckled depth of the hosiery one, distant views illuminated by the rays of light from some glazed bay, and in which the crowd appeared nothing but a mass of human dust. Then, when Madame Desforges raised her eyes, she saw, along the staircases, on the flying bridges, around the balustrade of each storey, a continual humming ascent, an entire population in the air, travelling in the cuttings of the enormous ironwork construction, casting black shadows on the diffused light of the enamelled windows. Large gilded lustres hung from the ceiling; a decoration of rugs, embroidered silks, stuffs worked with gold, hung down, draping the balustrade with gorgeous banners; and, from one end to the other, there were clouds of lace, palpitations of muslin, trophies of silks, apotheoses of half-dressed dummies; and right at the top, above all this confusion, the bedding department, suspended as it were, displayed little iron bedsteads with their mattresses, hung with their white curtains, a sort of school dormitory sleeping amidst the stamping of the customers, rarer and rarer as the departments ascended.
“Does madame require a cheap pair of garters?” asked a salesman of Madame Desforges, seeing her standing still “All silk, twenty-nine sous.”
She did not deign to answer. Things were being offered around her more feverishly than ever. She wanted, however, to find out where she was. Albert Lhomme's pay-desk was on her left; he knew her by sight and ventured to give her an amiable smile, not in the least hurry in the midst of the heaps of bills by which he was besieged; whilst, behind him, Joseph, struggling with the string-box, could not pack up the articles fast enough. She then saw where she was; the silk department must be in front of her. But it took her ten minutes to get there, the crowd was becoming so immense. Up in the air, at the end of their invisible strings, the red air-balls had become more numerous than ever; they now formed clouds of purple, gently blowing towards the doors, continuing to scatter themselves over Paris; and she had to bow her head beneath the flight of air-balls, when very young children held them, the string rolled round their little fingers.
“What! you have ventured here, madame?” exclaimed Bouthemont gaily, as soon as he caught sight of Madame Desforges.
The manager of the silk department, introduced to her by Mouret himself, was now in the habit of sometimes calling on her at her five o'clock tea. She thought him common, but very amiable, of a fine sanguine temper, which surprised and amused her. Besides, about two days before he had openly related to her the affair between Mouret and Clara, without any calculation, out of stupidity, like a fellow who loves a joke; and, stung with jealousy, concealing her wounded feelings beneath an appearance of disdain, she had come to try and discover her rival, a young lady in the dress department he had merely said, refusing to name her.
“Do you require anything to-day?” he asked her.
“Of course, or else I should not have come. Have you any silk for morning gowns?”