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ALONG
ALL THE ROADS around Goderville the peasants and their wives were coming toward the burgh because it was market day. The men
were proceeding with slow steps, the whole body bent forward at each movement of their long twisted legs; deformed by their
hard work, by the weight on the plow which, at the same time, raised the left shoulder and swerved the figure, by the reaping
of the wheat which made the knees spread to make a firm "purchase," by all the slow and painful labors of the country. Their
blouses, blue, "stiff-starched," shining as if varnished, ornamented with a little design in white at the neck and wrists,
puffed about their bony bodies, seemed like balloons ready to carry them off. From each of them two feet protruded.
Some
led a cow or a calf by a cord, and their wives, walking behind the animal, whipped its haunches with a leafy branch to hasten
its progress. They carried large baskets on their arms from which, in some cases, chickens and, in others, ducks thrust out
their heads. And they walked with a quicker, livelier step than their husbands. Their spare straight figures were wrapped
in a scanty little shawl pinned over their flat bosoms, and their heads were enveloped in a white cloth glued to the hair
and surmounted by a cap.
Then a wagon passed at the jerky trot of a nag, shaking strangely, two men seated side by
side and a woman in the bottom of the vehicle, the latter holding onto the sides to lessen the hard jolts.
In the public
square of Goderville there was a crowd, a throng of human beings and animals mixed together. The horns of the cattle, the
tall hats, with long nap, of the rich peasant and the headgear of the peasant women rose above the surface of the assembly.
And the clamorous, shrill, screaming voices made a continuous and savage din which sometimes was dominated by the robust lungs
of some countryman's laugh or the long lowing of a cow tied to the wall of a house.
All that smacked of the stable,
the dairy and the dirt heap, hay and sweat, giving forth that unpleasant odor, human and animal, peculiar to the people of
the field.
Symbolism Maître Hauchecome of Breaute had just arrived at Goderville, and he was directing his steps toward the public square when
he perceived upon the ground a little piece of string. Maître Hauchecome, economical like a true Norman, thought that everything
useful ought to be picked up, and he bent painfully, for he suffered from rheumatism. He took the bit of thin cord from the
ground and began to roll it carefully when he noticed Maître Malandain, the harness maker, on the threshold of his door, looking
at him. They had heretofore had business together on the subject of a halter, and they were on bad terms, both being good
haters. Maître Hauchecome was seized with a sort of shame to be seen thus by his enemy, picking a bit of a head. two arms
and string out of the dirt. He concealed his "find" quickly under his blouse, then in his trousers' pocket; then he pretended
to be still looking on the ground for something which he did not find, and he went toward the market, his head forward, bent
double by his pains.
Inciting Incident He was soon lost in the noisy and slowly moving crowd which was busy with interminable bargainings. The peasants milked, went
and came, perplexed, always in fear of being cheated, not daring to decide, watching the vender's eye, ever trying to find
the trick in the man and the flaw in the beast.
The women, having placed their great baskets at their feet, had taken out the poultry which lay upon the ground,
tied together by the feet, with terrified eyes and scarlet crests.
They heard offers, stated their prices with a dry
air and impassive face, or perhaps, suddenly deciding on some proposed reduction, shouted to the customer who was slowly going
away: "All right, Maître Authirne, I'll give it to you for that."
Then lime by lime the square was deserted, and the
Angelus ringing at noon, those who had stayed too long scattered to their shops.
At Jourdain's the great room was full
of people eating, as the big court was full of vehicles of all kinds, carts, gigs, wagons, dumpcarts, yellow with dirt, mended
and patched, raising their shafts to the sky like two arms or perhaps with their shafts in the ground and their backs in the
air.
Just opposite the diners seated at the table the immense fireplace, filled with bright flames, cast a lively heat
on the backs of the row on the right. Three spits were turning on which were chickens, pigeons and legs of mutton, and an
appetizing odor of roast beef and gravy dripping over the nicely browned skin rose from the hearth, increased the jovialness
and made everybody's mouth water.
All the aristocracy of the plow ate there at Maître Jourdain's, tavern keeper and
horse dealer, a rascal who had money.
The dishes were passed and emptied, as were the jugs of yellow cider. Everyone
told his affairs, his purchases and sales. They discussed the crops. The weather was favorable for the green things but not
for the wheat.
Exposition Suddenly the drum beat in the court before the house. Everybody rose, except a few indifferent persons, and ran to the door
or to the windows, their mouths still full and napkins in their hands.
After the public crier had ceased his drumbeating
he called out in a jerky voice, speaking his phrases irregularly:
"It is hereby made known to the inhabitants of Goderville,
and in general to all persons present at the market, that there was lost this morning on the road to Benzeville, between nine
and ten o'clock, a black leather pocketbook containing five hundred francs and some business papers. The finder is requested
to return same with all haste to the mayor's office or to Maître Fortune Houlbreque of Manneville; there will be twenty francs
reward."
Then the man went away. The heavy roll of the drum and the crier's voice were again heard at a distance.
Then
they began to talk of this event, discussing the chances that Maître Houlbreque had of finding or not finding his pocketbook.
And
the meal concluded. They were finishing their coffee when a chief of the gendarmes appeared upon the threshold.
He inquired:
Rising Action "Is Maître Hauchecome of Breaute here?"
Maître Hauchecome, seated at the other end of the table, replied:
"Here
I am."
And the officer resumed:
"Maître Hauchecome, will you have the goodness to accompany me to the mayor's
office? The mayor would like to talk to you."
The peasant, surprised and disturbed, swallowed at a draught his tiny
glass of brandy, rose and, even more bent than in the morning, for the first steps after each rest were specially difficult,
set out, repeating: "Here I am, here I am."
The mayor was awaiting him, seated on an armchair. He was the notary of
the vicinity, a stout, serious man with pompous phrases.
"Maître Hauchecome," said he, "you were seen this morning
to pick up, on the road to Benzeville, the pocketbook lost by Maître Houlbreque of Manneville."
The countryman, astounded,
looked at the mayor, already terrified by this suspicion resting on him without his knowing why.
"Me? Me? Me pick up
the pocketbook?"
"Yes, you yourself."
"Word of honor, I never heard of it."
"But you were seen."
"I
was seen, me? Who says he saw me?"
"Monsieur Malandain, the harness maker."
The old man remembered, understood
and flushed with anger.
"Ah, he saw me, the clodhopper, he saw me pick up this string here, M'sieu the Mayor." And
rummaging in his pocket, he drew out the little piece of string.
But the mayor, incredulous, shook his head.
"You
will not make me believe, Maître Hauchecome, that Monsieur Malandain, who is a man worthy of credence, mistook this cord for
a pocketbook."
The peasant, furious, lifted his hand, spat at one side to attest his honor, repeating:
"It is
nevertheless the truth of the good God, the sacred truth, M'sieu the Mayor. I repeat it on my soul and my salvation."
The
mayor resumed:
"After picking up the object you stood like a stilt, looking a long while in the mud to see if any piece
of money had fallen out."
The good old man choked with indignation and fear.
"How anyone can tell--how anyone
can tell--such lies to take away an honest man's reputation! How can anyone---"
There was no use in his protesting;
nobody believed him. He was con.
fronted with Monsieur Malandain, who repeated and maintained his affirmation. They
abused each other for an hour. At his own request Maître Hauchecome was searched; nothing was found on him.
Finally
the mayor, very much perplexed, discharged him with the warning that he would consult the public prosecutor and ask for further
orders.
The news had spread. As he left the mayor's office the old man was sun rounded and questioned with a serious
or bantering curiosity in which there was no indignation. He began to tell the story of the string. No one believed him. They
laughed at him.
He went along, stopping his friends, beginning endlessly his statement and his protestations, showing
his pockets turned inside out to prove that he had nothing.
They said:
"Old rascal, get out!"
And he
grew angry, becoming exasperated, hot and distressed at not
being believed, not knowing what to do and always repeating
himself.
Night came. He must depart. He started on his way with three neighbors to whom he pointed out the place where
he had picked up the bit of string, and all along the road he spoke of his adventure.
In the evening he took a turn
in the village of Breaute in order to tell it to everybody. He only met with incredulity.
It made him ill at night.
Climax The next day about one o'clock in the afternoon Marius Paumelle, a hired man in the employ of Maître Breton, husbandman at
Ymanville, returned the pocketbook and its contents to Maître Houlbreque of Manneville.
This man claimed to have found
the object in the road, but not knowing how to read, he had carried it to the house and given it to his employer.
The
news spread through the neighborhood. Maître Hauchecome was informed of it. He immediately went the circuit and began to recount
his story completed by the happy climax. He was in triumph.
Falling Action "What grieved me so much was not the thing itself as the lying. There is nothing so shameful as to be placed under a cloud
on account of a lie."
He talked of his adventure all day long; he told it on the highway to people who were passing
by, in the wineshop to people who were drinking there and to persons coming out of church the following Sunday. He stopped
strangers to tell them about it. He was calm now, and yet something disturbed him without his knowing exactly what it was.
People had the air of joking while they listened. They did not seem convinced. He seemed to feel that remarks were being made
behind his back.
On Tuesday of the next week he went to the market at Goderville, urged solely by the necessity he
felt of discussing the case.
Malandain, standing at his door, began to laugh on seeing him pass. Why?
He approached
a farmer from Crequetot who did not let him finish and, giving him a thump in the stomach, said to his face:
"You big
rascal."
Then he turned his back on him.
Maître Hauchecome was confused; why was he called a big rascal?
When
he was seated at the table in Jourdain's tavern he commenced to explain "the affair."
A horse dealer from Monvilliers
called to him:
"Come, come, old sharper, that's an old trick; I know all about your piece of string!"
Hauchecome
stammered:
"But since the pocketbook was found."
But the other man replied:
"Shut up, papa, there is
one that finds and there is one that reports. At any rate you are mixed with it."
The peasant stood choking. He understood.
They accused him of having had the pocketbook returned by a confederate, by an accomplice.
He tried to protest. All
the table began to laugh.
He could not finish his dinner and went away in the midst of jeers.
He went home ashamed
and indignant, choking with anger and confusion, the more dejected that he was capable, with his Norman cunning, of doing
what they had accused him of and ever boasting of it as of a good turn. His innocence to him, in a confused way, was impossible
to prove, as his sharpness was known. And he was stricken to the heart by the injustice of the suspicion.
Then he began
to recount the adventures again, prolonging his history every day, adding each time new reasons, more energetic protestations,
more solemn oaths which he imagined and prepared in his hours of solitude, his whole mind given up to the story of the string.
He was believed so much the less as his defense was more complicated and his arguing more subtile.
"Those are lying
excuses," they said behind his back.
He felt it, consumed his heart over it and wore himself out with useless efforts.
He wasted away before their very eyes.
Allusion The wags now made him tell about the string to amuse them, as they make a soldier who has been on a campaign tell about his
battles. His mind, touched to the depth, began to weaken.
Resolution Toward the end of December he took to his bed.
He died in the first days of January, and in the delirium of his death
struggles he kept claiming his innocence, reiterating:
"A piece of string, a piece of string--look--here it is, M'sieu
the Mayor."
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