Free The Drinking Den by Émile Zola Page B

noise from the buckets, which, emptied out at full force, sounded like a lock opening on a canal. The ground was awash and the two women were paddling around up to their ankles. Then Virginie tried a dirty trick: suddenly catching hold of a bucket of boiling washing, which one of her neighbours had ordered, she threw it. There was a shout. Everyone thought Gervaise had been badly scalded, but only her left foot was slightly burned. But, with all her strength, maddened by the pain, without even filling it this time, she threw a bucket between Virginie’s legs, and the other woman fell.
    All the washerwomen started to speak at once.
    â€˜She’s broken her leg!’
    â€˜So what? The other one wanted to boil her alive!’
    â€˜If you ask me, the blonde’s in the right – after all, if they took her man away from her…’
    Mme Boche raised her arms heavenwards, with loud exclamations. She had sensibly found a place between two tubs, where the children, Claude and Etienne, were weeping and gasping for breath, horrified, hanging on to her dress, with their unceasing cry, ‘Mum! Mum!’ stifled by sobs. When she saw Virginie fall, Mme Boche ran up and started pulling Gervaise away by her skirt, saying over and over: ‘Now, now!Come on, let’s go! Be reasonable. I’ve come over quite faint, I swear I have! Did you ever see such a massacre?’
    However, she moved back and took refuge again with the children, between the two tubs. Virginie had just pounced on Gervaise and got her by the neck: she was wringing her throat, trying to strangle her. Gervaise gave a violent heave and shook herself free, then grasped Virginie’s hair, hanging on to it as though trying to pull off her head. Battle resumed, in silence, without a cry or a curse. They did not wrestle body to body, but went for one another’s faces with open hands and hooked fingers, pinching and scratching whatever they could grasp. The tall girl’s red ribbon and blue chenille band were torn off and her bodice ripped at the neck, revealing a whole naked shoulder, while the blonde Gervaise, dishevelled, missing one sleeve of her white shift (though she didn’t know how), had a tear in her chemise that revealed the cleavage of her bosom. Torn shreds of cloth were flying in all directions. Virginie was the first to draw blood, leaving three long scratches on Gervaise’s face from the mouth to below the chin, and Gervaise was protecting her eyes, shutting them at each slap, for fear of being blinded. Virginie was not bleeding yet. Gervaise aimed for her ears, furious at not being able to take hold of them, until finally she grabbed an earring, a yellow glass pendant. She pulled and split the ear; the blood flowed.
    â€˜They’re killing each other! Pull them apart, the bitches!’ several voices exclaimed.
    The washerwomen had drawn closer, and divided into two camps: one lot was urging the two women on, like fighting dogs; the others, more timid, shaking all over, turned their heads away: they had had enough and kept saying that for sure they would be ill if it continued. A general battle was about to break out. The two sides called each other heartless or good-for-nothing, and bare arms were waved; three slaps rang out.
    But Mme Boche was looking round for the boy: ‘Charles! Charles! Where on earth has he got to?’
    She found him in the front row, watching with folded arms. He was a big lad, with a great thick neck. He was laughing, enjoying the sight of the bits of flesh that the two women had left displayed. The littleblonde was plump as a quail: it would be a laugh if her shift was torn off.
    â€˜I say,’ he mumbled, with a wink. ‘She’s got a birthmark under her arm.’
    â€˜What! So this is where you are!’ Mme Boche exclaimed when she saw him. ‘And why aren’t you helping to separate them? You could do it, if you wanted…’
    â€˜No, thank you!