LITTLE BY LITTLE, AFTER LOUISE’S DEPARTURE, THE DAY, TOO, began to slip away. On the other side of the Riotor, smoke from the chimneys of The Pardal and the Uderan tenant farm delicately wafted up into the calm sky; after stretching out for an instant, it turned and climbed over the oak forest that overshadowed the village.
The dinner hour was approaching, and Sunday ended at the very moment when the men went in and didn’t come back out. Louise still hadn’t returned, even though vespers had been over for a long time.
Maud wondered what this gentleness that arose with the evening was, so hard on her heart. Without really seeing it, she looked at this landscape where her childhood had unfolded: the majestic pinewood with its stringent layout, as high as a church nave; the Riotor that sank down into the lower prairies like a blade. One could hear its rapid, muffled babbling fill the valley right up to the edge.
Maud thought about the fact that her mother and brothers would soon be coming back from The Pardal. But she was too far away to see them go by. She heard Mrs. Rivière’s door close and the shutters being folded in. The woman didn’t call, but Maud guessed that she came from time to time to the threshold of the door to check the road from The Pardal. She didn’t see Maud, who was waiting in the field behind the house, down below.
How had Maud’s story become common knowledge? Despite what Louise had said, Maud thought it was the Pecresse woman who had been spreading it around. She felt such repugnance for this woman that her own family suddenly appeared gifted with unexpected qualities in comparison. She was sure they hadn’t said anything. Jacques himself remained discreet when it came to his family. They were united by a secret solidarity that made them a real family…
And she herself was part of this clan, no matter what she did. She was tempted to go back, to bring an end to her stupid, wandering attempt to run away. But stubbornness fastened her to the ground. Even more important, she didn’t see what she could do to find her place again in the midst of her family, or how to hold her own beside Jacques and her mother.
What would become of her? Without the daily problems she encountered living at home, she would have difficulty getting used to a peaceful existence. Their general condemnation didn’t frighten her. On the contrary, she believed it to be justified. People who were indifferent and fickle now scared her more.
Her isolation had a greater impact on her than her brother’s meanness, or the unflattering treatment she received from Taneran, whose verbal attacks she could easily ward off. She would have come back to her mother, but Jacques, a formidable opponent, was probably standing guard against the new enemy, emboldened by her mistake.
Disgust kept her from returning, disgust for her brother and for the legitimate grievance he now had against her. What place did this man have in their familiar world, exercising more control every day! Since they had left Paris, he no longer inspired terror in her, because she judged him in a more detached way. It was hard to imagine how this aging child could ever leave his mother and the family that defined him, or the care and honor that surrounded him there. Elsewhere, he lacked boldness, letting himself be terrorized by other people.
It was difficult for Maud to think about Jacques without still feeling a sudden surge of horror. She couldn’t remember being able to look him once in the eyes or daring to confront him alone without trembling. He failed to perceive the repulsion his sister felt for him. Once his anger passed, he always willingly returned to her. This disarming forgetfulness, this self-satisfaction that nothing could disturb, exasperated Maud even more than his insults.
Since the death of his wife, their mutual animosity had worsened to the point that, in a way, their lives were simplified. The memory of the loan Jacques had never repaid and that Maud never talked about irritated Jacques like an unpardonable fault on his part. The night before, lacking in valid arguments, he had used this pretext, unable to countenance the idea that Maud could claim to have anything at all against him.
Until then, no excuse had seemed enough to justify the explosion of a hatred that grew more violent every day. What excuses would have been powerful enough to justify a resentment that had no need of motives? Jacques’s bitterness had become partially unreal or imaginary for them, and they had been ready to accept it, as one does in adopting dreadful but convenient hypotheses that leave one feeling comfortable if they are not examined too closely.
Maud was somewhat unhappy with her own futile behavior, which troubled the peace formerly existing between Jacques and herself.
Louise came back alone from The Pardal, and Maud understood by her demeanor that something upsetting had taken place. She walked toward Maud, cynical and determined. Louise’s eyes were swollen, and her face, bathed now in tears, was changed into a startlingly angry mask, bearing little resemblance to her normal appearance. All radiance had disappeared, suggesting that the glow that usually transfigured her was due only to the feverish expectation of pleasure.
“He didn’t even look at me!” Louise cried out. “He only had eyes for that big, silly goose, the Dedde girl, who was with him and your mother…” Louise’s pronouncement tore Maud from her daydream, obliging her to look at Louise and opine on what had just happened.
“Sit down a moment,” Maud finally said. “You can’t go in looking like that. You were saying that he was with the Dedde girl?”
Louise confirmed her account, shamelessly exhibiting her disappointment. It wasn’t her first letdown. The young people mocked her, and she sought in vain ways to get back at them. “Still, nobody has done that to me. He turned his eyes toward me, yet he didn’t even seem to see me. I didn’t dare approach him, because of your mother.” Maud guessed that Mrs. Dedde, the tenant farmer’s wife, had sent her daughter to inform Jacques and Mrs. Taneran of Maud’s visit. As to Jacques’s uncouthness, it had long ceased to amaze her.
“Don’t cry,” Maud said. “He’ll soon be tired of the Dedde girl and won’t be long in coming back to you. In two or three days at the most, if that’s what you want.” But Louise stood up. “You make me sick!” she screamed. “Maybe you would accept that! Of course you would, because you run around with Durieux, who’s had all the girls in the region after him. Oh, you people have no dignity, you’re just trash…”
On that note, Louise left. Any other words would have surprised Maud, but the sincerity, violence, and spontaneity of this way of talking satisfied her.
After Louise’s departure, solitude once again filled the narrow prairie invaded by shadows. In reality night was slow in coming, but for Maud its onslaught was brutal and decisive. She felt she was suddenly waking up in the dark. Lights shone in the distance on the horizon. The birds had stopped their chorus, but from the surrounding thickets came the chirping of crickets and mysterious sounds of flight. She heard a train whistle in the distance: the last train from Bordeaux, the one that left at nine o’clock. In her childhood, it was usually from a warm kitchen or during a peaceful evening that she heard the call of the engine. It whistled several times at regular intervals, separated by veritable gulfs of silence, at the bottom of which obscure dangers and muffled threats seemed to lurk. The train cars descended the slope of the plateau toward Semoic with the infernal screeching of metal. The curve was dangerous, as it was always enveloped in fog and hidden by the alders of Uderan. One could imagine the sudden appearance of this locomotive monster born of the mist and the woods.
Durieux’s house was reasonably far from where Maud found herself. To reach it she was obliged to descend and then go back up the pastures of the Riotor. She then took the sunken road along the flat part, cut across the fields of alfalfa, and crossed the village.