“I have an incessant restless, distressing longing
to see him, and the sight of him causes me intense
suffering, as I look down from my window and watch
him for hours removing and carting the horse manure,
saying to myself: ‘That is my son.’
“And I sometimes feel an irresistible longing
to embrace him. I have never even touched his
dirty hand.”
The academician was silent. His companion, a
tactful man, murmured: “Yes, indeed, we
ought to take a closer interest in children who have
no father.”
A gust of wind passing through the tree shook its
yellow clusters, enveloping in a fragrant and delicate
mist the two old men, who inhaled in the fragrance
with deep breaths.
The senator added: “It is good to be twenty-five
and even to have children like that.”
“Here, my friend,” I said to Labarbe,
“you have just repeated those five words, that
pig of a Morin. Why on earth do I never hear Morin’s
name mentioned without his being called a pig?”
Labarbe, who is a deputy, looked at me with his owl-like
eyes and said: “Do you mean to say that
you do not know Morin’s story and you come from
La Rochelle?” I was obliged to declare that I
did not know Morin’s story, so Labarbe rubbed
his hands and began his recital.
“You knew Morin, did you not, and you remember
his large linen-draper’s shop on the Quai de
la Rochelle?”
“Yes, perfectly.”
“Well, then. You must know that in 1862
or ’63 Morin went to spend a fortnight in Paris
for pleasure; or for his pleasures, but under the
pretext of renewing his stock, and you also know what
a fortnight in Paris means to a country shopkeeper;
it fires his blood. The theatre every evening,
women’s dresses rustling up against you and continual
excitement; one goes almost mad with it. One sees
nothing but dancers in tights, actresses in very low
dresses, round legs, fat shoulders, all nearly within
reach of one’s hands, without daring, or being
able, to touch them, and one scarcely tastes food.
When one leaves the city one’s heart is still
all in a flutter and one’s mind still exhilarated
by a sort of longing for kisses which tickles one’s
lips.
“Morin was in that condition when he took his
ticket for La Rochelle by the eight-forty night express.
As he was walking up and down the waiting-room at
the station he stopped suddenly in front of a young
lady who was kissing an old one. She had her
veil up, and Morin murmured with delight: ‘By
Jove what a pretty woman!’
“When she had said ‘good-by’ to
the old lady she went into the waiting-room, and Morin
followed her; then she went on the platform and Morin
still followed her; then she got into an empty carriage,
and he again followed her. There were very few
travellers on the express. The engine whistled
and the train started. They were alone. Morin
devoured her with his eyes. She appeared to be
about nineteen or twenty and was fair, tall, with
a bold look. She wrapped a railway rug round her
and stretched herself on the seat to sleep.
