Then, thoroughly worn out, he sat down on a chair, mopping his forehead with a mechanical gesture and puffing like a man who has just finished some hard work. A pause ensued, but at last he said to Denise: "You'll see her presently. When she is sleeping, she seems to us to be all right again."
Again did silence fall. Face to face, the father and mother stood looking at one another. Then, in a low voice he went over his grief again, though without naming any one or addressing any one directly: "With my head on the block, I wouldn't have believed it! He was the last one, I had brought him up as a son. If any one had come and said to me, 'They'll take him away from you as well; you'll see him fall,' I should have replied, 'It's impossible, that can't happen as long as there's a God on high.' But he has fallen all the same! Ah! the poor fellow, he who was so well up in the business, who had all my ideas! And all through a young she-ape, a mere dummy fit for a window! No! really, it's enough to drive one mad!"
He shook his head, with his half-closed eyes cast upon the damp floor which the tread of generations of customers had worn. Then he continued in a lower voice, "Shall I tell you? Well, there are moments when I feel myself the most culpable of all in our misfortune. Yes, it's my fault if our poor girl is lying upstairs devoured by fever. Ought I not to have married them at once, without yielding to my stupid pride, my obstinacy in refusing to leave them the business in a less prosperous state than it had been before? Had I done that she would now have the man she loved, and perhaps their youthful strength united would have accomplished the miracle that I have failed to work. But I am an old fool, and saw through nothing; I didn't know that people fell ill over such things. Really, he was an extraordinary fellow: he had such a gift for business, and such probity, such simplicity of conduct, he was so orderly in every way—in short, my pupil."
He raised his head, still defending his ideas, in the person of the shopman who had betrayed him. Denise, however, could not bear to hear him accuse himself, and carried away by her emotion, on seeing him so humble, with his eyes full of tears, he who used formerly to reign there as an absolute and scolding master, she told him everything.
"Uncle, pray don't excuse him," said she. "He never loved Geneviève, he would have run away sooner if you had tried to hasten the marriage. I have spoken to him myself about it; he was perfectly well aware that my poor cousin was suffering on his account, and yet you see that did not prevent him from leaving. Ask aunt."
Without opening her lips, Madame Baudu confirmed these words by a nod. The draper turned paler still, blinded by his tears. And then he stammered out: "It must have been in the blood, his father died last year through having led a dissolute life."
And once more he looked round the dim shop, his eyes wandering from the empty counters to the full shelves and then resting on Madame Baudu, who was still sitting erect at the pay-desk, waiting in vain for the customers who did not come.
"Well," said he, "it's all over. They've ruined our business, and now one of their hussies is killing our daughter."
No one spoke. The rolling of passing vehicles, which occasionally shook the floor, seemed like a funereal beating of drums in the still air, so stuffy under the low ceiling. But suddenly, amidst this gloomy sadness peculiar to old expiring shops, several dull knocks were heard proceeding from somewhere in the house. It was Geneviève, who had just awoke, and was knocking with a stick they had left beside her.
"Let's go up at once," said Baudu, rising with a start. "And try to be cheerful, she mustn't know."