“Two years passed without my hearing a word
from them. Then I received a letter from New
York. She was married and wrote to tell me.
And since then we write to each other every year,
on New Year’s Day. She tells me about her
life, talks of her children, her sisters, never of
her husband! Why? Ah! why? And as for
me, I only talk of the Marie Joseph. That was
perhaps the only woman I have ever loved—no—that
I ever should have loved. Ah, well! who can tell?
Circumstances rule one. And then—and
then—all passes. She must be old now;
I should not know her. Ah! she of the bygone
time, she of the wreck! What a creature!
Divine! She writes me her hair is white.
That caused me terrible pain. Ah! her yellow
hair. No, my English girl exists no longer.
How sad it all is!”
When Sabot entered the inn at Martinville it was a
signal for laughter. What a rogue he was, this
Sabot! There was a man who did not like priests,
for instance! Oh, no, oh, no! He did not
spare them, the scamp.
Sabot (Theodule), a master carpenter, represented
liberal thought in Martinville. He was a tall,
thin, than, with gray, cunning eyes, and thin lips,
and wore his hair plastered down on his temples.
When he said: “Our holy father, the pope”
in a certain manner, everyone laughed. He made
a point of working on Sunday during the hour of mass.
He killed his pig each year on Monday in Holy Week
in order to have enough black pudding to last till
Easter, and when the priest passed by, he always said
by way of a joke: “There goes one who has
just swallowed his God off a salver.”
The priest, a stout man and also very tall, dreaded
him on account of his boastful talk which attracted
followers. The Abbe Maritime was a politic man,
and believed in being diplomatic. There had been
a rivalry between them for ten years, a secret, intense,
incessant rivalry. Sabot was municipal councillor,
and they thought he would become mayor, which would
inevitably mean the final overthrow of the church.
The elections were about to take place. The church
party was shaking in its shoes in Martinville.
One morning the cure set out for Rouen, telling his
servant that he was going to see the archbishop.
He returned in two days with a joyous, triumphant
air. And everyone knew the following day that
the chancel of the church was going to be renovated.
A sum of six hundred francs had been contributed by
the archbishop out of his private fund. All the
old pine pews were to be removed, and replaced by
new pews made of oak. It would be a big carpentering
job, and they talked about it that very evening in
all the houses in the village.
Theodule Sabot was not laughing.
When he went through the village the following morning,
the neighbors, friends and enemies, all asked him,
jokingly:
“Are you going to do the work on the chancel
of the church?”
