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  Souvarine had put out the remains of a cigarette that continued to cling to his lips and was already lifting Poland gently under the belly to set her down on the floor. Rasseneur began to lock up. Then they all went their separate ways in silence, their ears buzzing and their heads filled to bursting with the weighty matters they had just been debating.

  And every evening, here in this bare room, they had further conversations of this kind, gathered round the single beer that it took Étienne an hour to drink. A whole store of half-conscious thoughts that had lain dormant in Étienne’s mind now began to stir and develop. Though preoccupied above all by a need for greater knowledge, he had nevertheless hesitated for a long time before asking his fellow-lodger if he could borrow some of his books, most of which unfortunately were in either German or Russian. Eventually he had borrowed a French book about co-operative societies5 (more nonsense, Souvarine said); and he also regularly read a news-sheet which Souvarine subscribed to, Le Combat, an anarchist paper published in Geneva. Otherwise, despite their daily contact, he continued to find Souvarine as uncommunicative as ever, like someone who was merely camping out in life without interests or feelings or belongings of any sort.

  It was towards the beginning of July that Étienne’s situation took a turn for the better. A chance occurrence had interrupted the endless, monotonous routine of life down the mine: the teams working the Guillaume seam had come across a so-called jumbling, a disturbance in the rock stratum, which meant that they were certainly nearing a fault; and, sure enough, they soon discovered the fault itself, which the engineers had had no inkling of despite their extensive knowledge of the terrain. The life of the mine was turned upside down, and people talked about nothing else but how the seam had vanished, with the section beyond the fault having no doubt settled lower in the earth. The old hands were already beginning to sniff the air like clever dogs at the prospect of a hunt for new coal. But the mining teams couldn’t just stand around doing nothing while they waited for it to be found, and already notices had gone up announcing that the Company would be auctioning off new contracts.6

  One day, at the end of the shift, Maheu walked along with Étienne and offered him a place in his team as a hewer, to replace Levaque, who was joining another team. It had all been agreed with the engineer and the overman, who had said they were very pleased with the young man’s work. For Étienne it was simply a matter of accepting this rapid promotion, and he was gratified by Maheu’s growing respect for him.

  That evening they both went back to the pit to study the notices. The contracts being put up for auction were in the Filonnière seam, off Le Voreux’s north roadway. They did not seem very attractive propositions, and Maheu shook his head as Étienne read out the conditions of sale to him. When they were below ground the next day, Maheu duly took him to the seam to show him how far it was from pit-bottom and to point out the crumbling rock, the thinness of the seam, and the hardness of the coal. Still, if you wanted to eat, you had to work. So on the following Sunday they attended the auction, which took place in the changing-room and, in the absence of the divisional engineer, was presided over by the pit engineer and the overman. Five or six hundred colliers were there, facing the small platform that had been set up in one corner; and the contracts were sold off at such a speed that all they could hear was a dull roar of people talking and of bids being shouted and drowned out by further bids.

  For a moment Maheu was afraid he wouldn’t get any of the forty contracts being offered by the Company. All his rivals were bidding lower and lower rates of pay for themselves: they were rattled by the rumours of an impending crisis and panicking at the prospect of being out of a job. The engineer, Négrel, took his time in the face of this fierce bidding in order to allow the offers to fall as low as possible, while Dansaert tried to hurry things along by lying to everyone about what excellent deals they had just made. In order to secure fifty metres of seam, Maheu was obliged to compete with a comrade who was every bit as determined as he was. One after the other each of them reduced his bid by one centime per tub; and if Maheu eventually emerged the victor, it was only by reducing his men’s pay to such a level that Richomme, the deputy, who was standing behind him muttering angrily under his breath, nudged him with his elbow and complained crossly that at that price he’d never be able to make ends meet.

  As they left, Étienne was swearing and cursing. He exploded when he saw Chaval on his way back from the cornfields with Catherine, calmly sauntering along and happy to leave it to Catherine’s father to deal with the serious matters.

  ‘Christ Almighty!’ Étienne exclaimed. ‘It’s a complete bloody massacre. Now they’re setting the workers at each other’s throats!’

  Chaval lost his temper. Never! He’d never have lowered his price like that! And when Zacharie wandered up to see what was going on, he said it was disgusting. But Étienne shut them up with a gesture of sullen violence:

  ‘It’s got to stop. One day we will be the masters!’

  Maheu, who had been silent since the auction, seemed to rouse himself, and he repeated after Étienne:

  ‘The masters!…Yes, and about bloody time, too!’

  II

  It was the last Sunday in July, the day of the ducasse1 at Montsou. On the previous evening, throughout the village, all good housewives had given their parlour a thorough clean, sluicing their walls and flagstone floors with bucket after bucket of water; and their floors were still wet despite the white sand they had strewn on it, an expensive luxury on a pauper’s budget. Meanwhile the day looked as though it was going to be swelteringly hot. The atmosphere was heavy with a gathering storm, and an oppressive, airless heat smothered the bare, flat expanses of the seemingly boundless countryside of the Département du Nord.

  Sunday always disrupted the early-morning routine in the Maheu household. While it infuriated Maheu to have to stay in bed any later than five, when he preferred to get up and dress as usual, the children would have a long lie-in till nine o’clock. That particular day Maheu went into the garden to smoke a pipe before eventually returning indoors to eat a slice of bread and butter on his own, as he waited for everyone else to get up. He spent the rest of the morning pottering about in a similar manner: he mended a leak in the bath-tub, and beneath the cuckoo clock he put up a picture of the Prince Imperial,2 which someone had given to the little ones. In due course, one by one, the others came downstairs. Old Bonnemort had taken a chair outside to sit in the sunshine; La Maheude and Alzire had immediately set to with the cooking. Then Catherine appeared, ushering Lénore and Henri ahead of her, having just dressed them; and by the time Zacharie and Jeanlin came down last of all, bleary-eyed and still yawning, it was eleven o’clock and the house was already filled with the smell of rabbit and potatoes.

  The whole village was in a state of great excitement, relishing the prospect of the fair and eager to have their dinner and be off to Montsou one and all. Gaggles of children were rushing all over the place, while men in shirtsleeves sauntered about aimlessly with that easy slouch which comes with days off. The fine weather meant that every door and window had been flung open, revealing parlour after parlour all crammed to bursting with the teeming life of vociferous, gesticulating families. And from one end of a row to the other the rich smell of rabbit vied that day with the persistent reek of fried onion.

  The Maheus dined at twelve noon precisely. They made very little noise compared with the constant chatter and bustle going on outside as women hailed or answered their neighbours from doorstep to doorstep, lending things, chasing their kids outside or ordering them back indoors with a smack. In any case the Maheus had not been on speaking terms with their own neighbours, the Levaques, for the past three weeks on account of Zacharie and Philomène getting married. The men were still talking, but the women pretended not to know each other any more. The quarrel had brought each household closer to La Pierronne. But she had gone off early that morning, leaving her mother to look after Pierron and Lydie, and was spending
the day with a cousin in Marchiennes; and everybody joked about how they knew this cousin, and how she had a moustache and was an overman at Le Voreux. La Maheude declared that it was just not right abandoning one’s family like that on the Sunday of the ducasse.

  As well as the rabbit and potatoes (they had been fattening the rabbit in the shed for the past month), the Maheus had broth and some beef. The fortnightly pay-day had fallen the day before. They could not remember when they had last had such a spread. Even on St Barbe’s Day, when the miners are allowed a three-day holiday, the rabbit had been neither as plump nor as tender. Accordingly ten sets of jaws, from little Estelle, who was just getting her first teeth, to old Bonnemort, who was in the process of losing his, were all chomping away so merrily that not even the bones were left. It was good having meat like this, but indigestible too because they ate it so rarely. They consumed the lot, and only a small quantity of boiled beef was left for the evening, when they could have some bread and butter as well if they were still hungry.

  Jeanlin was the first to slip off. Bébert was waiting for him behind the school. They had to prowl about for a long time before they could entice Lydie away with them, because La Brûlé had decided not to go out and wanted to keep her at home. When she discovered that the child had gone, she screamed and waved her skinny arms about, while Pierron, irritated by the racket, quietly took himself off for a stroll with the air of a husband unabashedly having his own little bit of fun in the full knowledge that his wife is having hers.

  Old Bonnemort was the next to leave, and Maheu decided that he, too, would get a breath of air, having first asked La Maheude if she would join him later at the fair. No, how could she, it was such a problem with the little ones; but, well, maybe she would all the same, she’d think about it, they’d always find each other anyway. Once outside he hesitated, then went into his neighbours’ to see if Levaque was ready to go. But instead he found Zacharie waiting for Philomène, and La Levaque, who had just raised the eternal topic of their marriage, shouting her head off about how no one gave a damn about her in all this and how she was going to have the whole thing out, once and for all, with La Maheude. What sort of a life was it, eh, looking after her daughter’s fatherless children while the daughter herself was always off somewhere rolling in the hay with her man? Philomène having calmly put on her bonnet, Zacharie escorted her out of the door, saying that as far he was concerned he had no objection if his mother agreed. In fact Levaque had already made himself scarce, so Maheu sent La Levaque round to see his wife and beat a hasty retreat. Bouteloup, who was sitting with his elbows on the table finishing off a piece of cheese, stubbornly refused Maheu’s friendly offer of a beer. He intended to stay at home, as though he were the devoted husband.

  Meanwhile the village was gradually emptying; the men were all setting out now, one group after another, while the girls watched them from their doorsteps and then made off in the opposite direction, each on the arm of her sweetheart. As her father turned the corner by the church, Catherine caught sight of Chaval and hurried to join him for the walk along the road to Montsou. La Maheude, left alone amid the chaos of her children, and without the strength to get up from her chair, poured herself a second glass of scalding coffee, which she proceeded to sip. Throughout the village only the women were left, and they invited each other in to sit round tables that were still warm and greasy from their dinner and to finish off the contents of their coffee-pots.

  Maheu had an idea that Levaque would be at the Advantage, and he walked slowly down to Rasseneur’s. Sure enough, there in the narrow, hedge-lined garden behind the house was Levaque playing a game of skittles with some comrades. Standing beside them, though not actually playing, Grandpa Bonnemort and old Mouque were watching the progress of the game so closely that they quite forgot to nudge each other in their usual way. The blazing sun was beating straight down and there was only one thin strip of shade, running the length of the building; and this was where Étienne was sitting at a table, drinking his beer, rather put out that Souvarine had gone up to his room and left him on his own. Almost every Sunday he shut himself away like this to write or read.

  ‘Fancy a game?’ Levaque asked Maheu.

  But the latter refused. It was too hot, he was already dying of thirst.

  ‘Rasseneur!’ shouted Étienne. ‘Bring us another beer.’

  And turning towards Maheu he said:

  ‘On me, you understand.’

  They all knew each other well by now. Rasseneur seemed to be in no hurry, and they had to call him three times. Eventually it was Mme Rasseneur who brought them some warm beer. Étienne dropped his voice as he began to complain about the place; nice enough people no doubt, and they had the right ideas about things; but the beer wasn’t worth drinking, and the soup they served was revolting. Ten times or more he’d have changed lodgings by now if Montsou hadn’t been quite so far away. One of these days he’d look for digs with one of the families in the village.

  ‘Quite right, quite right,’ Maheu said slowly. ‘You’d be better off with a family.’

  Just then a shout went up, Levaque had knocked over all the skittles with one shot. Amid the uproar Mouque and Bonnemort stood staring at the ground, deep in appreciative silence. The general delight at the shot gave rise to various jokes, especially when the participants caught sight of La Mouquette’s beaming face looking over the hedge. Having been wandering about outside for the past hour, she had finally plucked up the courage to approach when she heard the laughter.

  ‘What, all on your own?’ shouted Levaque. ‘Where have all your boyfriends gone, then?’

  ‘I’ve chucked them all,’ she replied with brazen cheerfulness. ‘And I’m looking for a new one.’

  Everyone volunteered and chatted her up with improper suggestions. She shook her head and laughed even louder, pretending coyly to resist. In any case her father was present throughout this exchange of banter, even if he was still gazing at the fallen skittles.

  ‘Go on with you!’ Levaque persisted, glancing at Étienne, ‘We all know who you’re after, my girl!…But you’ll have to take him by force.’

  Étienne now joined in the fun. It was indeed him that the putter had her eye on. But he said no; she was good fun, all right, but he didn’t fancy her in the slightest. For a few minutes longer she stood there by the hedge, staring at him with her big eyes; then slowly she departed, with a serious expression on her face all of a sudden as though she were finding the hot sunshine too much to bear.

  Étienne had now resumed his conversation with Maheu, lowering his voice and explaining to him at length about how the Montsou colliers needed to set up a provident fund.

  ‘The Company says it wouldn’t stop us,’ he insisted, ‘so what is there to be afraid of? All we’ve got is the pension they give us, and since we don’t contribute to it, they can dish them out just as they feel like it. Well, their grace and favour’s all very fine, but it would be sensible to back it up it with a mutual aid association which we could at least count on in cases of urgent need.’

  He went into the details and explained how it would be organized, promising to do all the hard work himself.

  ‘Well, all right, I’m in favour,’ Maheu said at length, now persuaded. ‘But it’s the others…You’ll have to convince the others.’

  Levaque had won, and they abandoned the skittles to down their beer. But Maheu refused a second: later maybe, the day was still young. He had just remembered Pierron. Where could he be? At Lenfant’s bar in all likelihood. Having persuaded Étienne and Levaque to join him, the three of them set off for Montsou just as a new group of people came and took over the skittle-alley at the Advantage.

  As they made their way along the road, they had to call in at Casimir’s bar first and then at the Progress. Comrades hailed them through the open doors: how could they say no! Each stop meant having a beer, two if they returned the round. They would stay for ten minutes, exchange a few words, and then begin again further on, always pe
rfectly well behaved, knowing just how much beer they could take and only sorry that they had to piss it out as fast they took it in, as clear as the water from a spring. At Lenfant’s they ran straight into Pierron, who was just finishing his second beer and who then drank a third rather than refuse to have one with them. Naturally they had one themselves. There were four of them now, and they set off to see if Zacharie might perhaps be at Tison’s. The place was empty, so they ordered a beer and waited to see if he would turn up. Next they thought of the Saint-Éloi, where Richomme the deputy bought them a round, and then they drifted on from bar to bar with no particular aim in view other than to have a bit of a wander.

  ‘Let’s go to the Volcano!’ Levaque said suddenly, now thoroughly well oiled.

  The others laughed, unsure whether to agree, but then followed their comrade through the growing crowds who had come for the ducasse. In the long, narrow room at the Volcano, on a platform of wooden planks that had been erected at the far end, five singers – the worst that the prostitute population of Lille could provide – were busy parading themselves, monstrously grotesque in their gestures and their décolletage; and the customers paid ten sous whenever they fancied having one of them behind the platform. They were mostly putter lads and banksmen, but there were pit-boys of fourteen too; in short the entire youth of the pits, and all of them drinking more gin than beer. A few older miners tried their luck also, these being the local womanizers whose home life was not quite what it might be.

  Once their party was seated round a small table, Étienne buttonholed Levaque to explain his idea about the provident fund. He had all the proselytizing zeal of the newly converted who believe they are on a mission.

  ‘Each member could easily afford to contribute twenty sous a month,’ he repeated. ‘Once all those twenty sous had mounted up over four or five years, we’d have a sizeable sum; and when you’ve got money, you can do anything, can’t you? Whatever the circumstances…Eh? What do you say?’