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I had read the "Assommoir," and had been much impressed by its pyramid size, strength, height, and decorative grandeur, and also by the immense harmonic development of the idea; and the fugal treatment of the different scenes had seemed to me astonishingly new the washhouse, for example: the fight motive is indicated, then follows the development of side issues, then comes the fight motive explained; it is broken off short, it flutters through a web of progressive detail, the fight motive is again taken up, and now it is worked out in all its fulness; it is worked up to crescendo, another side issue is introduced, and again the theme is given forth.
"It won't be me then," answered Bibi. "I wash my hands of them all. No more masters for me, I tell you! But I dare say Mes-Bottes would be glad of the offer." And as they reached the Assommoir they saw Mes-Bottes within. Notwithstanding the fact that it was daylight, the gas was blazing in the Assommoir. Lantier remained outside and told Coupeau to make haste, as they had only ten minutes.
And Gervaise took this slender creature for example, whose eyes alone told the story of her misery and hardships, for in the Coupeau family the vitriol of the Assommoir was doing its work of destruction. Gervaise had seen a whip. Gervaise had learned to dread it, and this dread inspired her with tenderest pity for Lalie.
This went on for a week, and at last Gervaise went to the Assommoir to make inquiries. Yes, he had been there a number of times, but no one knew where he was just then. Gervaise picked up the bag of tools and carried them home. Lantier, seeing that Gervaise was out of spirits, proposed that she should go with him to a cafe concert.
I had read a few chapters of the "Assommoir," as it appeared in La République des Lettres; I had cried, "ridiculous, abominable," only because it is characteristic of me to instantly form an opinion and assume at once a violent attitude. But now I bought up the back numbers of the Voltaire, and I looked forward to the weekly exposition of the new faith with febrile eagerness.
Coupeau told her they could go to the circus another time, and she felt she had best stay where she was. It did not rain in the Assommoir, and she had come to look upon the scene as rather amusing. She was comfortable and sleepy. She took a third glass and then put her head on her folded arms, supporting them on the table, and listened to her husband and his friends as they talked.
It is Mes-Bottes, a comrade of mine." The Assommoir was now crowded with boisterous men. Two glasses rang with the energy with which they brought down their fists on the counter. They stood in rows, with their hands crossed over their stomachs or folded behind their backs, waiting their turn to be served by Father Colombe. "Hallo!" cried Mes-Bottes, giving Coupeau a rough slap on the shoulders.
When Gervaise leaned a little more toward the window she saw still another shop, also crowded, from which issued a steady stream of children holding in their hands, wrapped in paper, a breaded cutlet or a sausage, still warm. A group formed around the door of the Assommoir. "Say, Bibi-la-Grillade," asked a voice, "will you stand a drink all around?"
Coupeau was behaving very badly at this time, and one evening as she passed the Assommoir she was certain she saw him drinking with Mes-Bottes. She hurried on lest she should seem to be watching him. But as she hastened she looked over her shoulder. Yes, it was Coupeau who was tossing down a glass of liquor with an air as if it were no new thing. He had lied to her then; he did drink brandy.
Thus, losing the faculty of admiring beauty indiscriminately under whatever form it was presented, he preferred Flaubert's Tentation de saint Antoine to his Education sentimentale; Goncourt's Faustin to his Germinie Lacerteux; Zola's Faute de l'abbe Mouret to his Assommoir.
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