Chapter Chapter 4 · A FATHER AND A SON

. A FATHER AND A SON

E sara mia colpa

Se cosi è?

--_Machiavelli_.

"My wife really has a head on her shoulders," said the mayor of

Verrières at six o'clock the following morning, as he went down to the

saw-mill of Father Sorel. "It had never occurred to me that if I do not

take little Abbé Sorel, who, they say, knows Latin like an angel, that

restless spirit, the director of the workhouse, might have the same

idea and snatch him away from me, though of course I told her that it

had, in order to preserve my proper superiority. And how smugly, to be

sure, would he talk about his children's tutor!... The question is,

once the tutor's mine, shall he wear the cassock?"

M. de Rênal was absorbed in this problem when he saw a peasant in the

distance, a man nearly six feet tall, who since dawn had apparently

been occupied in measuring some pieces of wood which had been put

down alongside the Doubs on the towing-path. The peasant did not look

particularly pleased when he saw M. the Mayor approach, as these pieces

of wood obstructed the road, and had been placed there in breach of the

rules.

Father Sorel (for it was he) was very surprised, and even more pleased

at the singular offer which M. de Rênal made him for his son Julien.

None the less, he listened to it with that air of sulky discontent and

apathy which the subtle inhabitants of these mountains know so well

how to assume. Slaves as they have been since the time of the Spanish

Conquest, they still preserve this feature, which is also found in the

character of the Egyptian fellah.

Sorel's answer was at first simply a long-winded recitation of

all the formulas of respect which he knew by heart. While he was

repeating these empty words with an uneasy smile, which accentuated

all the natural disingenuousness, if not, indeed, knavishness of his

physiognomy, the active mind of the old peasant tried to discover what

reason could induce so important a man to take into his house his

good-for-nothing of a son. He was very dissatisfied with Julien, and

it was for Julien that M. de Rênal offered the undreamt-of salary of

300 fcs. a year, with board and even clothing. This latter claim, which

Father Sorel had had the genius to spring upon the mayor, had been

granted with equal suddenness by M. de Rênal.

This demand made an impression on the mayor. It is clear, he said to

himself, that since Sorel is not beside himself with delight over my

proposal, as in the ordinary way he ought to be, he must have had

offers made to him elsewhere, and whom could they have come from, if

not from Valenod. It was in vain that M. de Rênal pressed Sorel to

clinch the matter then and there. The old peasant, astute man that

he was, stubbornly refused to do so. He wanted, he said, to consult

his son, as if in the provinces, forsooth, a rich father consulted a

penniless son for any other reason than as a mere matter of form.

A water saw-mill consists of a shed by the side of a stream. The roof

is supported by a framework resting on four large timber pillars. A

saw can be seen going up and down at a height of eight to ten feet in

the middle of the shed, while a piece of wood is propelled against

this saw by a very simple mechanism. It is a wheel whose motive-power

is supplied by the stream, which sets in motion this double piece of

mechanism, the mechanism of the saw which goes up and down, and the

mechanism which gently pushes the piece of wood towards the saw, which

cuts it up into planks.

Approaching his workshop, Father Sorel called Julien in his stentorian

voice; nobody answered. He only saw his giant elder sons, who, armed

with heavy axes, were cutting up the pine planks which they had to

carry to the saw. They were engrossed in following exactly the black

mark traced on each piece of wood, from which every blow of their axes

threw off enormous shavings. They did not hear their father's voice.

The latter made his way towards the shed. He entered it and looked in

vain for Julien in the place where he ought to have been by the side of

the saw. He saw him five or six feet higher up, sitting astride one of

the rafters of the roof. Instead of watching attentively the action of

the machinery, Julien was reading. Nothing was more anti-pathetic to

old Sorel. He might possibly have forgiven Julien his puny physique,

ill adapted as it was to manual labour, and different as it was from

that of his elder brothers; but he hated this reading mania. He could

not read himself.

It was in vain that he called Julien two or three times. It was the

young man's concentration on his book, rather than the din made by the

saw, which prevented him from hearing his father's terrible voice. At

last the latter, in spite of his age, jumped nimbly on to the tree

that was undergoing the action of the saw, and from there on to the

cross-bar that supported the roof. A violent blow made the book which

Julien held, go flying into the stream; a second blow on the head,

equally violent, which took the form of a box on the ears, made him

lose his balance. He was on the point of falling twelve or fifteen feet

lower down into the middle of the levers of the running machinery which

would have cut him to pieces, but his father caught him as he fell, in

his left hand.

"So that's it, is it, lazy bones! always going to read your damned

books are you, when you're keeping watch on the saw? You read them in

the evening if you want to, when you go to play the fool at the curé's,

that's the proper time."

Although stunned by the force of the blow and bleeding profusely,

Julien went back to his official post by the side of the saw. He had

tears in his eyes, less by reason of the physical pain than on account

of the loss of his beloved book.

"Get down, you beast, when I am talking to you," the noise of the

machinery prevented Julien from hearing this order. His father, who had

gone down did not wish to give himself the trouble of climbing up on to

the machinery again, and went to fetch a long fork used for bringing

down nuts, with which he struck him on the shoulder. Julien had

scarcely reached the ground, when old Sorel chased him roughly in front

of him and pushed him roughly towards the house. "God knows what he is

going to do with me," said the young man to himself. As he passed, he

looked sorrowfully into the stream into which his book had fallen, it

was the one that he held dearest of all, the _Memorial of St. Helena_.

He had purple cheeks and downcast eyes. He was a young man of eighteen

to nineteen years old, and of puny appearance, with irregular but

delicate features, and an aquiline nose. The big black eyes which

betokened in their tranquil moments a temperament at once fiery and

reflective were at the present moment animated by an expression of

the most ferocious hate. Dark chestnut hair, which came low down over

his brow, made his forehead appear small and gave him a sinister look

during his angry moods. It is doubtful if any face out of all the

innumerable varieties of the human physiognomy was ever distinguished

by a more arresting individuality.

A supple well-knit figure, indicated agility rather than strength. His

air of extreme pensiveness and his great pallor had given his father

the idea that he would not live, or that if he did, it would only be to

be a burden to his family. The butt of the whole house, he hated his

brothers and his father. He was regularly beaten in the Sunday sports

in the public square.

A little less than a year ago his pretty face had begun to win him some

sympathy among the young girls. Universally despised as a weakling,

Julien had adored that old Surgeon-Major, who had one day dared to talk

to the mayor on the subject of the plane trees.

This Surgeon had sometimes paid Father Sorel for taking his son for

a day, and had taught him Latin and History, that is to say the 1796

Campaign in Italy which was all the history he knew. When he died, he

had bequeathed his Cross of the Legion of Honour, his arrears of half

pay, and thirty or forty volumes, of which the most precious had just

fallen into the public stream, which had been diverted owing to the

influence of M. the Mayor.

Scarcely had he entered the house, when Julien felt his shoulder

gripped by his father's powerful hand; he trembled, expecting some

blows.

"Answer me without lying," cried the harsh voice of the old peasant in

his ears, while his hand turned him round and round, like a child's

hand turns round a lead soldier. The big black eyes of Julien filled

with tears, and were confronted by the small grey eyes of the old

carpenter, who looked as if he meant to read to the very bottom of his

soul.