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Updated: June 6, 2025
From time to time, Gervaise would turn her head a little to smile brightly at Coupeau, who was rather uncomfortable under the hot sun in his new clothes. Though they walked very slowly, they arrived at the mayor's quite half an hour too soon. And as the mayor was late, their turn was not reached till close upon eleven o'clock.
They burst into applause even before the end. "Now, Pere Bru, it's your turn!" said mother Coupeau. "Sing your song. The old ones are the best any day!" And everybody turned towards the old man, pressing him and encouraging him. He, in a state of torpor, with his immovable mask of tanned skin, looked at them without appearing to understand. They asked him if he knew the "Five Vowels."
Gervaise, though without a sou, said she would have given a hundred francs to anybody who would have come and taken mother Coupeau away three hours sooner. No, one may love people, but they are too great a weight when they are dead; and the more one has loved them, the sooner one would like to be rid of their bodies. The morning of a funeral is, fortunately, full of diversions.
"Ah," said Gervaise, drawing a long breath when they stood on the sidewalk, "here one can breathe again. Good-by, Monsieur Coupeau, and many thanks for your politeness. I must hasten now!" She moved on, but he took her hand and held it fast. "Go a little way with me. It will not be much farther for you. I must stop at my sister's before I go back to the shop."
"Ah! it's you," growled Madame Lorilleux, without even asking her to sit down. "What do you want?" Gervaise did not answer for a moment. She had recently been on fairly good terms with the Lorilleuxs, but she saw Boche sitting by the stove. He seemed very much at home, telling funny stories. "What do you want?" repeated Lorilleux. "You haven't seen Coupeau?" Gervaise finally stammered at last.
Nana, stretched on her back, was breathing gently between her pouting lips. And Gervaise, holding down the lamp which caused big shadows to dance about the room, cast the light on mother Coupeau's face, and beheld it all white, the head lying on the shoulder, the eyes wide open. Mother Coupeau was dead.
Her husband must have become suspicious already because for the last few days, at night, he would swear to himself and bang the wall with his fists. The mere thought that the two men might destroy each other because of her made her shudder. She knew that Coupeau was jealous enough to attack Lantier with his shears.
She got up from her seat, and went and talked for a minute while standing behind the little ones' chairs. Children did not reason; they would eat all day long without refusing a single thing; and then she herself helped them to some chicken, a little of the breast. But mother Coupeau said they might, just for once in a while, risk an attack of indigestion.
"She is crazy!" said Coupeau when he saw her. "I tell you, she is crazy!" He and all his friends shrieked with laughter, but no one condescended to say what it was that was so very droll. Gervaise stood still, a little bewildered by this unexpected reception. Coupeau was so amiable that she said: "Come, you know it is not too late to see something."
When people came and asked for Coupeau it was Lantier who appeared in his shirt sleeves with the air of the man of the house who is needlessly disturbed. He answered for Coupeau, said it was one and the same thing. Gervaise did not find this life always smooth and agreeable. She had no reason to complain of her health. She had become very stout.
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