The Ladies' Paradise

No one had ever called upon her till one afternoon when she was surprised by a knock. It was Colomban. She received him standing. For his part he seemed greatly embarrassed and began stammering, asking how she was getting on, and speaking of The Old Elbeuf. Perhaps, thought she, it was Uncle Baudu who had sent him, regretting his rigour; for he continued to pass her without taking any notice of her, although he was well aware of her miserable position. However, when she plainly questioned her visitor, he appeared more embarrassed than ever. No, no, it was not the governor who had sent him; and he finished by naming Clara – he simply wanted to talk about Clara. Then little by little he grew bolder, and asked Denise's advice, imagining no doubt that she might be willing to play the part of a go-between. And it was in vain that she tried to dishearten him, by reproaching him with the pain he was causing Geneviève for such a heartless girl. He came up another day, indeed got into the habit of coming to see her. This seemed to suffice for his timid passion; he continually began the same conversation afresh, unable to resist the impulse and trembling with joy at finding himself with one who had approached Clara. And all this caused Denise to live more than ever at The Ladies' Paradise.

Towards the end of September the poor girl experienced the blackest misery. Pépé had fallen ill, having caught a severe cold. He ought to have had plenty of good broth, and she had not even a piece of bread to give him. One evening, completely conquered, she was sobbing, in one of those despairing straits which drive women on to the streets, or into the Seine, when old Bourras gently knocked at the door. He had brought with him a loaf, and a milk-can full of broth.

"There! there's something for the youngster," said he in his abrupt way. "Don't cry like that; it annoys my lodgers." And as she thanked him with a fresh outburst of tears, he resumed: "Do keep quiet! Come and see me to-morrow. I've some work for you."

Since the terrible blow which The Ladies' Paradise had dealt him by opening an umbrella department, Bourras had ceased to employ any workwomen. In order to save expenses he did everything himself, cleaning, mending, and sewing. His trade moreover was diminishing to such a point that he sometimes remained without work. And so he was obliged to invent some occupation on the following day when he installed Denise in a corner of his shop. He felt, however, that he could not allow any one to die of hunger in his house.

"You'll have two francs a day," said he. "When you find something better, you can leave me."

She was afraid of him, and did the work so quickly that he was embarrassed to find her more. He had given her some silk to stitch, some lace to repair. During the first few days she did not dare to raise her head, uneasy at feeling him near her, with his lion-like mane, hooked nose, and piercing eyes, shaded by bushy brows. His voice was harsh, his gestures were extravagant, and the mothers of the neighbourhood often frightened their youngsters by threatening to send for him, as they would for a policeman. However, the boys never passed his door without calling out some insulting words, which he did not even seem to hear. All his maniacal anger was directed against the scoundrels who dishonoured his trade by selling cheap trashy articles, which dogs, said he, would not consent to use.

Denise trembled whenever he burst out thus: "Art is done for, I tell you! There's not a single respectable handle made nowadays. They make sticks, but as for handles, it's all up! Bring me a proper handle, and I'll give you twenty francs!"

He had a real artist's pride; not a workman in Paris was capable of turning out a handle like his, as light and as strong. He carved the knobs with charming ingenuity, continually inventing fresh designs, flowers, fruit, animals, and heads, all executed in a free and life-like style. A little pocket-knife sufficed him and, with his spectacles on his nose he would spend whole days in chipping bits of boxwood and ebony.

"A pack of ignorant beggars," said he, "who are satisfied with sticking a certain quantity of silk on so much whalebone! They buy their handles by the gross, handles ready-made. And they sell just what they like! I tell you, art is done for!"

At last Denise began to feel easier. He had desired that Pépé should come down into the shop to play, for he was wonderfully fond of children. When the little one was crawling about on all-fours, neither of them had room to move. She sat in her corner doing the mending, he near the window, carving away with his little knife. Every day now brought round the same work and the same conversation. Whilst working, he would continually assail The Ladies' Paradise; never weary of explaining how affairs stood in the terrible duel between that bazaar and himself. He had occupied his house since 1845, and had a thirty years' lease of it at a rent of eighteen hundred francs a year; and, as he made a thousand francs out of his four furnished rooms, he only paid eight hundred for the shop. It was a mere trifle, he had no expenses, and could thus hold out for a long time still. To hear him, there was no doubt about his eventual triumph; he would certainly swallow up the monster. Then suddenly he would break off to ask:

"Have they got any dog's heads like that?"

And he would blink his eyes behind his glasses, whilst judging the dog's head which he was carving, with its lip turned up and its fangs displayed, in a life-like growl. Pépé delighted with the dog, would thereupon get up, resting his two little arms on the old man's knee.

"As long as I make both ends meet I don't care a hang about the rest," the latter resumed, whilst delicately shaping the dog's tongue with the point of his knife. "The scoundrels have taken away my profits; but if I'm making nothing I'm not losing anything yet, or at least only a trifle. And, you see, I'm ready to sacrifice everything rather than yield."

Thereupon he would brandish his knife, and his white hair would blow about in a storm of anger.

"But if they made you a reasonable offer," Denise would mildly observe, without raising her eyes from her needle, "it would be wiser to accept it."

This suggestion, however, only produced an outburst of ferocious obstinacy. "Never! If my head were under the knife I should still say no, by heavens I would! I've another ten years' lease, and they shan't have the house before then, even if I should have to die of hunger within the four bare walls. Twice already they've tried to get over me. They offered me twelve thousand francs for my good-will, and eighteen thousand francs for the last ten years of my lease; in all thirty thousand. But no, no – not for fifty thousand even! I have them in my power, and intend to see them licking the dust before me!"

"Thirty thousand francs! it's a good sum," thereupon resumed Denise. "You could go and establish yourself elsewhere. And suppose they were to buy the house?"

Bourras, now putting the finishing touches to his dog's tongue, appeared absorbed for a moment, a childish laugh pervading his venerable, prophet's face. Then he continued: "The house, no fear! They spoke of buying it last year, and offered eighty thousand francs, twice as much as it's worth. But the landlord, a retired fruiterer, as big a scoundrel as they, wanted to make them shell out more. Besides, they are suspicious about me; they know I should then be even less inclined to give way. No! no! here I am, and here I intend to stay. The emperor with all his cannon could not turn me out."

Denise did not dare to say any more, but went on with her work, whilst the old man continued to vent short sentences, between two cuts of his knife; now muttering something to the effect that the game had hardly begun; and then that they would see wonderful things later on, for he had certain plans which would sweep their umbrella counter away; and, deeply blended with his obstinacy, you detected the personal revolt of the skilled manufacturer against the growing invasion of commonplace rubbish. Pépé, however, at last climbed on his knees, and impatiently stretched out his hands towards the dog's head.

"Give it me, sir."

"Presently, youngster," the old man replied in a voice that suddenly became softer. "He hasn't any eyes as yet; we must make his eyes now." And whilst carving the eyes he continued talking to Denise. "Do you hear them? Isn't there a roar next door? That's what exasperates me more than anything, my word of honour! to have them always on my back like this with their infernal locomotive-like noise."

It made his little table tremble, he asserted. The whole shop was shaken, and he would spend the entire afternoon without a customer of his own but amidst all the trepidation of the jostling multitude in The Ladies' Paradise. From morning to night this was a subject for eternal grumbling. Another good day's work; they were knocking against the wall, the silk department must have cleared ten thousand francs; or else he made merry, not a sound came from behind the wall, a showery day had killed the receipts. And the slightest stir, the faintest vibration, thus furnished him with matter for endless comment.

"Did you hear? some one has slipped down! Ah, if they could only all fall and break their backs! – That, my dear, is a dispute between some ladies. So much the better! So much the better! – Ah! you hear the parcels falling into the basement? What a row they make. It's disgusting!"

It did not do for Denise to discuss his remarks, for he bitterly retorted by reminding her of the shameful way in which she had been dismissed. For the hundredth time she was obliged to relate her life in the jacket and mantle department, the hardships she had at first endured, the small unhealthy bedrooms, the bad food, and the continual battle between the salesmen; and thus they would talk about the shop from morning to night, absorbing it hourly in the very air they breathed.

But with eager, outstretched hands Pépé repeated: "Give it me, sir, give it me!"

The dog's head was finished and Bourras held it at a distance, then examined it closely with noisy glee. "Take care, it will bite you!" he said, "there, go and play, and don't break it, if you can help it." Then speedily reverting to his fixed idea, he shook his fist at the wall. "You may do all you can to knock the house down," he exclaimed. "You shan't have it, even if you invade the whole street!"

Denise now had something to eat each day, and she was extremely grateful to the old umbrella-dealer, realizing that he had a good heart beneath his strange, violent ways. Nevertheless she felt a strong desire to find some work elsewhere, for she often saw him inventing some trifle for her to do and fully understood that he did not require a workwoman in the present collapse of his business, and was merely employing her out of charity. Six months had passed thus, and the dull winter season having again returned, she was despairing of finding a situation before March, when, one evening in January, Deloche, who was watching for her in a doorway, gave her a bit of advice. Why did she not call on Robineau; perhaps he might want some one?

During the previous September, Robineau, though fearing to jeopardize his wife's sixty thousand francs, had made up his mind to buy Vinçard's silk-business. He had paid forty thousand for the good-will and stock, and was starting with the remaining twenty thousand. It was not much, but he had Gaujean behind him to back him up with any amount of credit. Gaujean ever since his quarrel with The Ladies' Paradise had been longing to stir up competitors against the colossus; and he thought victory certain, by creating special shops in the neighbourhood, where the public would find a large and varied choice of articles. Only the very rich Lyons manufacturers, such as Dumonteil, could accept the big shops' terms, satisfied to keep their looms going with them, and seeking their profits in their sales to less important establishments. But Gaujean was far from having the solidity and staying power possessed by Dumonteil. For a long time a mere commission agent, it was only during the last five or six years that he had possessed looms of his own, and he still had a lot of his work done by piece-workers, furnishing them with the raw material and paying them by the yard. It was precisely this system which, increasing his manufacturing expenses, had prevented him from competing with Dumonteil for the supply of the Paris Delight. This had filled him with rancour, and he saw in Robineau the instrument of a decisive battle with those drapery bazaars which he accused of ruining French manufactures.

When Denise called she found Madame Robineau alone. Daughter of an overseer in the Highways and Bridges Service, entirely ignorant of business matters, the young wife still retained the charming awkwardness of a girl educated in a convent. She was dark, very pretty, with a gentle, cheerful manner, which made her extremely charming. Moreover she adored her husband, living solely by his love. Just as Denise was about to leave her name Robineau himself came in, and at once engaged her, one of his two saleswomen having left him on the previous day to go to The Ladies' Paradise.

"They don't leave us a single good hand," said he. "However, I shall feel quite easy with you, for you are like me, you can't be very fond of them. Come to-morrow."

In the evening Denise hardly knew how to announce her departure to Bourras. In fact, he called her an ungrateful girl, and lost his temper. And when, with tears in her eyes, she tried to defend herself by intimating that she could see through his charitable conduct, he softened down, stammered that he had plenty of work, that she was leaving him indeed just as he was about to bring out a new umbrella of his invention.

"And Pépé?" he asked.

This was Denise's great trouble; she dared not take him back to Madame Gras, and could not leave him alone in the bedroom, shut up from morning to night.

"Very good, I'll keep him," said the old man; "he'll be all right in my shop. We'll do the cooking together." And then as she refused the offer fearing that it might inconvenience him, he thundered out: "Great heavens! have you no confidence in me? I shan't eat your child!"

Denise was much happier at Robineau's. He only paid her sixty francs a month, with her board, without giving her any commission on the sales, that not being the rule in the old-fashioned houses; but she was treated with great kindness, especially by Madame Robineau who was always smiling at her counter. He, nervous and worried, was sometimes rather abrupt. At the expiration of the first month, Denise had become quite one of the family, like the other saleswoman, a silent, consumptive, little body. The Robineaus were not at all particular before them, but freely talked of the business whilst at table in the back-shop, which looked on to a large yard. And it was there they decided one evening to start the campaign against The Ladies' Paradise. Gaujean had come to dinner and, after the roast leg of mutton, had broached the subject in his Lyonese voice, thickened by the Rhône fogs.

"It's getting unbearable," said he. "They go to Dumonteil, purchase the sole right to a design, and take three hundred pieces straight off, insisting on a reduction of half a franc a yard; and, as they pay ready money, they also secure the profit of eighteen per cent. discount. Very often Dumonteil barely makes four sous a yard out of it. He simply works to keep his looms going, for a loom that stands still is a dead loss. Under these circumstances how can you expect that we, with our limited plant, and our piece-workers, can keep up the struggle?"

Robineau, pensive, forgot his dinner. "Three hundred pieces!" he murmured. "I tremble when I take a dozen, and at ninety days too. They can sell at a franc or two francs cheaper than we can. I have calculated that their catalogued articles are offered at fifteen per cent. less than our own prices. That's what kills the small Houses."

He was passing through a period of discouragement. His wife, full of anxiety, looked at him with a loving air. She understood very little about the business, all these figures confused her; she could not understand why people worried over things so much, when it was so easy to be gay and love one another. However, it sufficed that her husband desired to conquer, and she became as impassioned as he himself, and would have stood to her counter till death.

"But why don't all the manufacturers come to an understanding together?" resumed Robineau, violently. "They could then lay down the law, instead of submitting to it."

Gaujean, who had asked for another slice of mutton, was slowly chewing. "Ah! why, why? The looms must be kept going, I tell you. When you have weavers a little bit everywhere, in the neighbourhood of Lyons, in the Gard, in the Isère, you can't stand still a day without an enormous loss. Then we who sometimes employ piece-workers with ten or fifteen looms of their own are better able to control our output, whereas the big manufacturers are obliged to have continual outlets, the quickest and most extensive possible. And so they are on their knees before the big shops. I know three or four who out-bid each other, and who would sooner work at a loss than not obtain the orders. But they make up for it with the small establishments like yours. Yes, if they manage to live through the big places, they make their profit out of you little fellows. Heaven knows how the crisis will end!"

"It's odious!" exclaimed Robineau, relieved by this cry of anger.

Denise was quietly listening. With her instinctive love of logic and life she was secretly in favour of the big shops.

They had relapsed into silence, and were eating some preserved French beans, when at last she ventured to remark in a cheerful tone: "The public does not complain."

At this Madame Robineau could not restrain a little laugh, which annoyed both her husband and Gaujean. No doubt the customer was satisfied, for, in the end, it was the customer who profited by the fall in prices. But everybody must live; where would they all be if, under the pretext of conducing to the general welfare, the consumer was fattened at the expense of the producer? And then began a long discussion. Denise affected to be joking, though all the while producing solid arguments. By the new system the middle-men disappeared, and this greatly contributed to cheapen the articles; besides, the manufacturers could no longer live without the big shops, for as soon as one of them lost their custom, failure became a certainty; in short, it was a natural commercial evolution. It would be impossible to prevent things from going on as they ought to, when everybody was working towards that result, whether they liked it or not.

"So you are for those who turned you out into the street?" thereupon asked Gaujean.

Denise became very red. She herself was surprised at the vivacity of her defence. What had she at heart, that such a flame should have risen in her breast?

"Dear me, no!" she replied. "Perhaps I'm wrong, for you are more competent to judge than I. I simply express my opinion. The prices, instead of being settled by fifty houses as they formerly used to be, are now fixed by four or five, which have lowered them, thanks to the power of their capital, and the strength of their immense custom. So much the better for the public, that's all!"

Robineau was not angry, but had become grave, and had fixed his eyes on the table-cloth. He had often felt the force of the new style of business, the evolution which the young girl spoke about; and in his clear, quiet moments he would ask himself why he should try to resist such a powerful current, which must carry everything before it. Madame Robineau herself, on seeing her husband deep in thought, glanced with approval at Denise, who had modestly resumed her silent attitude.

"Come," resumed Gaujean, to cut short the argument, "all that is simply theory. Let's talk of our matter."

After the cheese, the servant brought in some jam and some pears. He took some jam, and ate it with a spoon, with the unconscious greediness of a big man very fond sweet things.