Work [Travail]

by Émile Zola

'That's true; Louis has the best of health,' the other replied. 'The sons are not much like the fathers, now that the times have changed. Just see how he dances! He will never know cold and hunger.'

Thereupon Madame Mitaine, in her good-natured way, resolved to promote the happiness of the young couple who were smiling at each other so lovingly whilst they danced before her. She brought the two mothers, Madame Fauchard and Madame Dacheux, together, and made them sit down side by side, and then she moved the butcher's widow and convinced her that she ought to consent to her daughter's marriage. It was solitude that made the poor old creature suffer; she needed grandchildren to climb up on her knees and put all troublesome phantoms to flight.

'Ah, mon Dieu!' she ended by exclaiming, 'I'm agreeable all the same, on condition that I'm not left alone. I myself never said no to anybody. It was he who wouldn't have it. But if you all wish it, and promise to defend me, then do, do as you like.'

When Louis and Julienne learnt that their mothers consented to their wedding, they hastened to them and fell in their arms with tears and laughter. And thus amidst the general joy fresh joy was born.

'How could you think of parting these young people?' Madame Mitaine repeated; 'they seem to have grown up one for the other. I've given my Évariste to Olympe Lenfant, whom I remember as quite a little girl, when she used to come to my shop and my boy gave her cakes. It's the same with Louis Fauchard. How many times have I not seen him prowling near your shop, Madame Dacheux, and playing with your Julienne! The Laboques, the Bourrons, the Lenfants and the Yvonnots, whose marriages are now being celebrated, why, they all grew up together, at the very time when their parents were attacking one another, and now you see their harvest time has come.'

She laughed yet more loudly as she recalled the past, while an expression of infinite kindness spread over her face. And joy was rising around her. People came to say that other betrothals had just taken place—that of Sébastien Bourron with Agathe Fauchard, and that of Nicolas Yvonnot with Zoé Bonnaire. Love, sovereign love, was incessantly perfecting the reconciliation, blending all classes together. And the fête lasted until night-time, until the stars came out, whilst love thus triumphed, bringing heart nearer to heart and merging one into another, amidst the dances and songs of those joyous people marching towards future unity and harmony.

Amidst the growing fraternity, however, there was one man, one of the old ones, Master-smelter Morfain, who remained apart from all the rest, mute and wild, unable and unwilling to understand. He still dwelt, like one of the prehistoric Vulcans, in the rocky cavity near the smeltery under his charge, and now he was quite alone there, like a solitaire who had broken off all intercourse with the rising generations. When his daughter Ma-Bleue had gone off to realise her dream of love with Achille Gourier, the Prince Charming of her blue nights, Morfain had already felt that the new times were robbing him of the best part of himself. Then another love affair had carried away his son Petit-Da, that tall young fellow who had become so passionately enamoured of Honorine, a quick, alert little brunette, daughter of Caffiaux, the grocer and taverner. Morfain had at first peremptorily refused to consent to their marriage, full of contempt as he was for that shady family of poisoners, the Caffiaux, who on their side returned his disdain with interest, and in their vanity were by no means inclined to allow their daughter to marry a worker. Nevertheless, Caffiaux was the first to give way, for he was of a supple and crafty nature. After closing his tavern he had secured a very comfortable post as chief guardian at the general stores of La Crêcherie, and the nasty stories once told of him were being forgotten; whilst for his part he feigned too much devotion to the principles of solidarity to cling obstinately to a decision which might have harmed him. Thus Petit-Da, carried away by his passion, took no further notice of his father's opposition, and the result was that a terrible quarrel, a frightful rupture, between the two men ensued. From that time forward the master-smelter no longer spoke, save to direct the furnace work, but shut himself up in his cavern like some fierce and motionless spectre of the dead ages.

Though years and years went by Morfain did not appear to age. He was always the same old-time conqueror of fire, a colossus with a huge head, a nose like an eagle's beak, and flaming eyes set between cheeks which a flow of lava seemed to have ravaged. His twisted lips, now seldom parted, retained their tawny redness suggestive of burns. And it seemed as if no human considerations would again weigh with him in the depths of the implacable solitude in which he had shut himself on perceiving that his daughter and his son had joined the party of to-morrow. Ma-Bleue had presented Achille with a sweet little girl, Léonie, who was growing up all grace and tenderness. And Petit-Da's wife, Honorine, had given birth to a strong and charming boy, Raymond, now an intelligent young man who would soon be old enough to marry. But the children's grandfather did not soften—he repulsed them, shrank even from seeing them.

On the other hand, however, amidst the collapse of his affection for his kin, the species of paternal passion which he had always evinced for his furnace seemed to increase. That growling monster ever afire, whose flaming digestion he controlled both day and night, was seemingly regarded by him as some child. The slightest disturbance in its work threw him into anguish; he spent sleepless nights in watching over the working of the twyers, displaying all the devotion of a young lover amidst the embers whose heat his skin no longer feared. Luc, rendered anxious by Morfain's great age, had spoken of pensioning him off, but renounced the idea at the sight of the quivering rebellion, the inconsolable grief which was displayed by that hero of toil, who was so proud of having exhausted, consumed his muscles in pursuing the conquest of fire. However, the hour for retirement would come forcibly from the inevitable march of progress, and Luc indulgently decided to wait awhile.

Morfain had already felt that he was threatened. He was aware of the researches which Jordan was making with the view of replacing the old, slow, barbarous smeltery by batteries of electrical furnaces. The idea that one might extinguish and demolish the giant pile which flamed during seven and eight years at a stretch, quite distracted the master-smelter, and he became seriously alarmed when Jordan effected a first improvement by burning coal at the mouth of the pit from which it was extracted, and bringing electricity without loss to La Crêcherie by cable. However, as the cost price still remained too high for electricity to be employed for smelting ore, Morfain was able to rejoice over the futility of Jordan's victory. During the ensuing ten years each fresh defeat which fell on Jordan delighted him. He indulged in covert irony, feeling convinced that fire would never suffer itself to be conquered by that strange new power, that mysterious thunder, whose flashes were not even visible. He longed for his master's defeat, the annihilation of the new appliances which were ever being constructed and improved. But all at once the position became very threatening, a rumour spread that Jordan had at last completed his great work, having discovered a means of transforming calorical energy direct into electrical energy, without the help of mechanical energy being required. That is, the steam engine, that cumbersome and costly intermediary, was suppressed. And in thiswise the problem was solved, the cost of electricity would be lowered by one-half, and it would be possible to employ it for the smelting of ore. A first battery of electrical furnaces was indeed already being fitted up, and Morfain, full of despair, prowled fiercely around his blast-furnace, as if anxious to defend it.