PARIS
BY
EMILE ZOLA
TRANSLATED BY ERNEST A. VIZETELLY
ON the Wednesday preceding the mid-Lent Thursday, a great charity bazaarwas held at the Duvillard mansion, for the benefit of the Asylum of theInvalids of Labour. The ground-floor reception rooms, three spaciousLouis Seize salons, whose windows overlooked the bare and solemncourtyard, were given up to the swarm of purchasers, five thousandadmission cards having been distributed among all sections of Parisiansociety. And the opening of the bombarded mansion in this wise tothousands of visitors was regarded as quite an event, a realmanifestation, although some people whispered that the RueGodot-de-Mauroy and the adjacent streets were guarded by quite an army ofpolice agents.
The idea of the bazaar had come from Duvillard himself, and at hisbidding his wife had resigned herself to all this worry for the benefitof the enterprise over which she presided with such distinguishednonchalance. On the previous day the "Globe" newspaper, inspired by itsdirector Fonsegue, who was also the general manager of the asylum, hadpublished a very fine article, announcing the bazaar, and pointing outhow noble, and touching, and generous was the initiative of the Baroness,who still gave her time, her money, and even her home to charity, inspite of the abominable crime which had almost reduced that home toashes. Was not this the magnanimous answer of the spheres above to thehateful passions of the spheres below? And was it not also a peremptoryanswer to those who accused the capitalists of doing nothing for thewage-earners, the disabled and broken-down sons of toil?
The drawing-room doors were to be opened at two o'clock, and would onlyclose at seven, so that there would be five full hours for the sales. Andat noon, when nothing was as yet ready downstairs, when workmen and womenwere still decorating the stalls, and sorting the goods amidst a finalscramble, there was, as usual, a little friendly dejeuner, to which afew guests had been invited, in the private rooms on the first floor.However, a scarcely expected incident had given a finishing touch to thegeneral excitement of the house: that very morning Sagnier had resumedhis campaign of denunciation in the matter of the African Railway Lines.In a virulent article in the "Voix du Peuple," he had inquired if it werethe intention of the authorities to beguile the public much longer withthe story of that bomb and that Anarchist whom the police did not arrest.And this time, while undertaking to publish the names of the thirty-twocorrupt senators and deputies in a very early issue, he had boldly namedMinister Barroux as one who had pocketed a sum of 200,000 francs. Megewould therefore certainly revive his interpellation, which might becomedangerous, now that Paris had been thrown into such a distracted state byterror of the Anarchists. At the same time it was said that Vignon andhis party had resolved to turn circumstances to account, with the objectof overthrowing the ministry. Thus a redoubtable crisis was inevitably athand. Fortunately, the Chamber did not meet that Wednesday; in fact, ithad adjourned until the Friday, with the view of making mid-Lent aholiday. And so forty-eight hours were left one to prepare for theonslaught.
Eve, that morning, seemed more gentle and languid than ever, rather paletoo, with an expression of sorrowful anxiety