The farmer moved away from his creditor, with death in his heart and despair on his face. But, before joining his family, he tried to dissemble his suffering to some extent in order not to increase his wife’s grief. Luckily for the poor people, little Claudine came running toward them, followed by her cousin Poucette. And the child, pointing to Honorine and Agathe, who had stopped a short distance away, said:
“Don’t cry any more, mamma; there’s Poucette’s two mistresses; they’ve come with us and they’re very kind; they’re sorry for us.”
“Yes,” chimed in Poucette. “Don’t cry, aunt. My mistress told me to tell you that everything she bought would be for you; and she’ll buy all she can!”
The farmer’s wife felt as if she were coming to life again; she started to rise, to go with her husband to thank the lady who was so kindly disposed to them; but Poucette detained her.
“Madame don’t want you to say anything to her now,” she said; “for if anyone should guess she was doing it for you, the dealers are so mean, they’re quite capable of bidding against her and making her pay more for everything; you mustn’t look as if you knew anything about it; you can thank her afterward.”
Meanwhile the notables of the neighborhood, those who are commonly called the bourgeois in the country, began to arrive for the sale. The slightest novelty is an event which one is careful not to miss when one lives in a small village.
Moreover, Monsieur Jarnouillard, being interested in the success of the sale, had not failed to say to all his acquaintances:
“It’s always well to go to a sale; you often find something you need and that you had forgotten about; there are sure to be good opportunities; and you should seize opportunities; they don’t come twice.”
The Droguet family soon appeared on the scene, in the person of its tall, bulky mistress, who leaned familiarly on the arm of friend Luminot, the jovial dealer in wines. Little Monsieur Droguet walked behind his wife, taking measured steps, almost in rhythm.
Madame Jarnouillard came next, arm-in-arm with Madame Remplumé, a tall, machine-like person, as long and thin as a bean-pole, who, you would have sworn, was a man dressed as a woman. Behind them came a little man with a limp, Monsieur Remplumé, who never spoke, but who coughed, spat, took snuff, sneezed and blew his nose incessantly, which made him a very unpleasant neighbor; so that there was soon a vacant space about him. Lastly, Doctor Antoine Beaubichon appeared, some little distance behind this party.