Bouvard and Pecuchet Part 52

"It is true, gentlemen--it is true!"

Then the company broke up.

But Coulon, drawing them aside, told them in a paternal tone that he was no devotee certainly, and that he even hated the Jesuits. However, he did not go as far as they did. Oh, no! certainly not. And at the corner of the green they pa.s.sed in front of the captain, who, as he lighted his pipe, growled:

"All the same, I do what I like, by G.o.d!"

Bouvard and Pecuchet gave utterance on other occasions to their scandalous paradoxes. They threw doubt on the honesty of men, the chast.i.ty of women, the intelligence of government, the good sense of the people--in short, they sapped the foundations of everything.

Foureau was provoked by their behaviour, and threatened them with imprisonment if they went on with such discourses.

The evidence of their own superiority caused them pain. As they maintained immoral propositions, they must needs be immoral: calumnies were invented about them. Then a pitiable faculty developed itself in their minds, that of observing stupidity and no longer tolerating it.

Trifling things made them feel sad: the advertis.e.m.e.nts in the newspapers, the profile of a shopkeeper, an idiotic remark overheard by chance. Thinking over what was said in their own village, and on the fact that there were even as far as the Antipodes other Coulons, other Marescots, other Foureaus, they felt, as it were, the heaviness of all the earth weighing down upon them.

They no longer went out of doors, and received no visitors.

One afternoon a dialogue arose, outside the front entrance, between Marcel and a gentleman who wore dark spectacles and a hat with a large brim. It was the academician Larsoneur. He observed a curtain half-opening and doors being shut. This step on his part was an attempt at reconciliation; and he went away in a rage, directing the man-servant to tell his masters that he regarded them as a pair of common fellows.

Bouvard and Pecuchet did not care about this. The world was diminishing in importance, and they saw it as if through a cloud that had descended from their brains over their eyes.

Is it not, moreover, an illusion, a bad dream? Perhaps, on the whole, prosperity and misfortune are equally balanced. But the welfare of the species does not console the individual.

"And what do others matter to me?" said Pecuchet.

His despair afflicted Bouvard. It was he who had brought his friend to this pa.s.s, and the ruinous condition of their house kept their grief fresh by daily irritations.

In order to revive their spirits they tried discussions, and prescribed tasks for themselves, but speedily fell back into greater sluggishness, into more profound discouragement.

At the end of each meal they would remain with their elbows on the table groaning with a lugubrious air.

Marcel would give them a scared look, and then go back to his kitchen, where he stuffed himself in solitude.

About the middle of midsummer they received a circular announcing the marriage of Dumouchel with Madame Olympe-Zulma Poulet, a widow.

"G.o.d bless him!"

And they recalled the time when they were happy.

Why were they no longer following the harvesters? Where were the days when they went through the different farm-houses looking everywhere for antiquities? Nothing now gave them such hours of delight as those which were occupied with the distillery and with literature. A gulf lay between them and that time. It was irrevocable.

They thought of taking a walk as of yore through the fields, wandered too far, and got lost. The sky was dotted with little fleecy clouds, the wind was shaking the tiny bells of the oats; a stream was purling along through a meadow--and then, all at once, an infectious odour made them halt, and they saw on the pebbles between the thorn trees the putrid carca.s.s of a dog.

The four limbs were dried up. The grinning jaws disclosed teeth of ivory under the bluish lips; in place of the stomach there was a ma.s.s of earth-coloured flesh which seemed to be palpitating with the vermin that swarmed all over it. It writhed, with the sun's rays falling on it, under the gnawing of so many mouths, in this intolerable stench--a stench which was fierce and, as it were, devouring.

Yet wrinkles gathered on Bouvard's forehead, and his eyes filled with tears.

Pecuchet said in a stoical fashion, "One day we shall be like that."

The idea of death had taken hold of them. They talked about it on their way back.

After all, it has no existence. We pa.s.s away into the dew, into the breeze, into the stars. We become part of the sap of trees, the brilliance of precious stones, the plumage of birds. We give back to Nature what she lent to each of us, and the nothingness before us is not a bit more frightful than the nothingness behind us.

They tried to picture it to themselves under the form of an intense night, a bottomless pit, a continual swoon. Anything would be better than such an existence--monotonous, absurd, and hopeless.

They enumerated their unsatisfied wants. Bouvard had always wished for horses, equipages, a big supply of Burgundy, and lovely women ready to accommodate him in a splendid habitation. Pecuchet's ambition was philosophical knowledge. Now, the vastest of problems, that which contains all others, can be solved in one minute. When would it come, then? "As well to make an end of it at once."

"Just as you like," said Bouvard.

And they investigated the question of suicide.

Where is the evil of casting aside a burden which is crushing you? and of doing an act harmful to n.o.body? If it offended G.o.d, should we have this power? It is not cowardice, though people say so, and to scoff at human pride is a fine thing, even at the price of injury to oneself--the thing that men regard most highly.

They deliberated as to the different kinds of death. Poison makes you suffer. In order to cut your throat you require too much courage. In the case of asphyxia, people often fail to effect their object.

Finally, Pecuchet carried up to the garret two ropes belonging to their gymnastic apparatus. Then, having fastened them to the same cross-beam of the roof, he let a slip-knot hang down from the end of each, and drew two chairs underneath to reach the ropes.

This method was the one they selected.

They asked themselves what impression it would cause in the district, what would become of their library, their papers, their collections. The thought of death made them feel tenderly about themselves. However, they did not abandon their project, and by dint of talking about it they grew accustomed to the idea.

On the evening of the 24th of December, between ten and eleven o'clock, they sat thinking in the museum, both differently attired. Bouvard wore a blouse over his knitted waistcoat, and Pecuchet, through economy, had not left off his monk's habit for the past three months.

As they were very hungry (for Marcel, having gone out at daybreak, had not reappeared), Bouvard thought it would be a healthful thing for him to drink a quart bottle of brandy, and for Pecuchet to take some tea.

While he was lifting up the kettle he spilled some water on the floor.

"Awkward!" exclaimed Bouvard.

Then, thinking the infusion too small, he wanted to strengthen it with two additional spoonfuls.

"This will be execrable," said Pecuchet.

"Not at all."

And while each of them was trying to draw the work-box closer to himself, the tray upset and fell down. One of the cups was smashed--the last of their fine porcelain tea-service.

Bouvard turned pale.

"Go on! Confusion! Don't put yourself about!"

"Truly, a great misfortune! I attribute it to my father."

"Your natural father," corrected Pecuchet, with a sneer.

"Ha! you insult me!"

"No; but I am tiring you out! I see it plainly! Confess it!"

And Pecuchet was seized with anger, or rather with madness. So was Bouvard. The pair began shrieking, the one excited by hunger, the other by alcohol. Pecuchet's throat at length emitted no sound save a rattling.