![Truth [Vérité] - Emile Zola](/cover_862278.jpg "Truth [Vérité] - Emile Zola")
people no doubt, but none the less a mass of lead, which weighed the nation down to the ground, incapable as they were of leading a better life, of becoming free, just, and truly happy, because they were steeped in ignorance and poison.
As Marc went slowly towards the school to acquaint his friend Simon with the sad result of his visits, he suddenly remembered that he had not yet called on the Mesdames Milhomme, the stationers of the Rue Courte; and although he anticipated no better result with them than with the others he resolved to fulfil his commission to the very end.
The Milhommes, the ladies' husbands, had been two brothers, born at Maillebois. Edouard, the elder, had inherited a little stationery business from an uncle, and, being of a stay-at-home and unaspiring disposition, had made a shift to live on it with his wife; while his younger, more active, and ambitious brother Alexandre laid the foundations of a fortune while hurrying about the country as a commercial traveller. But death swooped down on both: the elder brother was the first to die, as the result of a tragic accident, a fall into a cellar; the second succumbing six months later to an attack of pulmonary congestion while he was at the other end of France. Their widows remained—one with her humble shop, the other with a capital of some twenty thousand francs, the first savings on which her husband had hoped to rear a fortune. It was to Madame Edouard, a woman of decision and diplomatic skill, that the idea occurred of inducing her sister-in-law, Madame Alexandre, to enter into a partnership, and invest her twenty thousand francs in the little business at Maillebois, which might be increased by selling books, stationery, and other articles for the schools. Each of the two widows had a son, and from that time forward the Mesdames Milhomme, as they were called, Madame Edouard with her little Victor, and Madame Alexandre with her little Sébastien, had kept house together, living in the close intimacy which their interests required, although their natures were radically different.
Madame Edouard followed the observances of the Church, but this did not mean that her faith was firm. She simply placed the requirements of her business before everything else. Her customers were chiefly pious folk whom she did not wish to displease. Madame Alexandre, on the contrary, had given up church-going at the time of her marriage, for her husband had been a gay companion and freethinker, and she refused to take up religion again. It was Madame Edouard, the clever diplomatist, who ingeniously indicated that these divergencies might become a source of profit. Their business was spreading; their shop, situated midway between the Brothers' school and the Communal school, supplied articles suitable for both—lesson books, copybooks, diagrams, and drawing copies, without speaking of pens, pencils, and similar things. Thus it was decided that each of the two women should retain her views and ways, the one with the priests, the other with the freethinkers, in such wise as to satisfy both sides. And in order that nobody might remain ignorant of the understanding, Sébastien was sent to the secular Communal school, where Simon the Jew was master, while Victor remained at the Brothers' school. Matters being thus settled, engineered with superior skill, the partnership prospered, and Mesdames Milhomme now owned one of the most thriving shops in Maillebois.
Marc, on reaching the Rue Courte, in which there were only two houses, the Milhommes' and the parsonage, slackened his steps, and for a moment examined the windows of the stationery shop, in which religious prints were mingled with school pictures glorifying the Republic, whilst illustrated newspapers, hanging from strings, almost barred the doorway. He was about to enter when Madame Alexandre—a tall and gentle-looking blonde, whose face, faded already, though she was only thirty, was still lighted by a faint smile—appeared upon the threshold. Close beside her was her little Sébastien, of whom she was very fond: a child of seven, fair and gentle like his mother, very handsome also, with blue eyes, a delicately shaped nose, and a mouth bespeaking amiability.
Madame Alexandre was acquainted with Marc, and she at once referred to the abominable crime which seemed to haunt her. 'How dreadful, Monsieur Froment!' said she. 'To think also that it occurred so near to us! I frequently saw poor little Zéphirin go by, either on his way to school or returning home. And he often came here to buy copybooks and pens. I can no longer sleep since I saw him dead!'
Then she spoke compassionately of Simon and his grief. She considered him to be very kind-hearted and upright, particularly as he took a great interest in her little Sébastien, who was one of his most intelligent and docile pupils. Whatever other people might say, she would never be able to think the master capable of such a frightful deed as that crime. As for the copy-slip of which people talked so much, nothing would have been proved even if similar ones had been found in the school.
'We sell such slips, you know, Monsieur Froment,' she continued, 'and I have already searched through those which we have in stock. It is true that none bear those particular words, "Love one another"——'
At this moment Sébastien, who had been listening attentively, raised his head. 'I saw one like that,' said he. 'My cousin Victor brought one home from the Brothers' school—there were those words on it!'
His mother appeared stupefied: 'What are you saying?' she exclaimed. 'You never mentioned that to me!'
'But you did not ask. Besides, Victor forbade me to tell, because it's forbidden to take the copy-slips from school.'
'Then where is that one?'
'Ah! I don't know. Victor hid it somewhere, so that he might not be scolded.'
Marc was following the scene, astonished, delighted, his heart beating fast with hope. Was the truth about to come forth from the mouth of that child? Perchance this would prove the feeble ray which spreads little by little until it finally expands into a great blaze of light. And the young man was already putting precise and decisive questions to Sébastien, when Madame Edouard, accompanied by Victor, appeared upon the scene. She was returning from a visit which she had just made to Brother Fulgence, under the pretext of applying for the payment of a stationery account.
Taller than her sister-in-law, Madame Edouard was dark, with a massive square-shaped face and a masculine appearance. Her gestures were quick, her speech was loud. A good and honest woman in her way, she would not have wronged her partner of a sou, though she never hesitated to domineer over her. She indeed was the man in the household, and the other as a means of defence only possessed her force of inertia, her very gentleness, of which she availed herself at times for weeks and months together, thereby often securing the victory. As for Victor, Madame Edouard's son, he was a sturdy, squarely-set lad, nine years of age, with a big dark head and massive face, quite a contrast indeed to his cousin Sébastien.
Directly Madame Edouard was apprised of the situation, she looked at her son severely: 'What! a copy? You stole a copy from the Brothers and brought it here?'
Victor had already turned a glance of despair and fury upon Sébastien. 'No, no, mamma,' he answered.
'But you did, for your cousin saw it. He does not usually tell falsehoods.'
The boy ceased answering, but he still cast terrible glances at his cousin. And the latter was by no means at his ease, for he well knew the physical strength of his playmate, and commonly represented the vanquished, beaten enemy whenever they had a game at war together. Under the elder's guidance, there were endless noisy gallops through the house; the younger, so gentle by nature, letting himself be led into them with a kind of rapturous terror.
'No doubt he did not steal it,' Madame Alexandre observed indulgently. 'Perhaps he only brought it home by mistake.'
In order that his cousin might the more readily forgive his indiscretion, Sébastien at once confirmed this suggestion: 'Of course, it was like that. I did not say he stole it.'
Madame Edouard, having now calmed down, ceased to exact an immediate answer from Victor, who remained silent as if stubbornly resolved upon making no confession. His mother, for her part, doubtless reflected that it would be scarcely
