The Greatest Works of Gustave Flaubert. Gustave Flaubert

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ of accepting some breakfast.

      He sent quickly to the “Lion d’Or” for some pigeons; to the butcher’s for all the cutlets that were to be had; to Tuvache for cream; and to Lestiboudois for eggs; and the druggist himself aided in the preparations, while Madame Homais was saying as she pulled together the strings of her jacket —

      “You must excuse us, sir, for in this poor place, when one hasn’t been told the night before — ”

      “Wine glasses!” whispered Homais.

      “If only we were in town, we could fall back upon stuffed trotters.”

      “Be quiet! Sit down, doctor!”

      He thought fit, after the first few mouthfuls, to give some details as to the catastrophe.

      “We first had a feeling of siccity in the pharynx, then intolerable pains at the epigastrium, super purgation, coma.”

      “But how did she poison herself?”

      “I don’t know, doctor, and I don’t even know where she can have procured the arsenious acid.”

      Justin, who was just bringing in a pile of plates, began to tremble.

      “What’s the matter?” said the chemist.

      At this question the young man dropped the whole lot on the ground with a crash.

      “Imbecile!” cried Homais, “awkward lout! blockhead! confounded ass!”

      But suddenly controlling himself —

      “I wished, doctor, to make an analysis, and primo I delicately introduced a tube — ”

      “You would have done better,” said the physician, “to introduce your fingers into her throat.”

      His colleague was silent, having just before privately received a severe lecture about his emetic, so that this good Canivet, so arrogant and so verbose at the time of the clubfoot, was to-day very modest. He smiled without ceasing in an approving manner.

      Homais dilated in Amphytrionic pride, and the affecting thought of Bovary vaguely contributed to his pleasure by a kind of egotistic reflex upon himself. Then the presence of the doctor transported him. He displayed his erudition, cited pellmell cantharides, upas, the manchineel, vipers.

      “I have even read that various persons have found themselves under toxicological symptoms, and, as it were, thunderstricken by black-pudding that had been subjected to a too vehement fumigation. At least, this was stated in a very fine report drawn up by one of our pharmaceutical chiefs, one of our masters, the illustrious Cadet de Gassicourt!”

      Madame Homais reappeared, carrying one of those shaky machines that are heated with spirits of wine; for Homais liked to make his coffee at table, having, moreover, torrefied it, pulverised it, and mixed it himself.

      “Saccharum, doctor?” said he, offering the sugar.

      Then he had all his children brought down, anxious to have the physician’s opinion on their constitutions.

      At last Monsieur Lariviere was about to leave, when Madame Homais asked for a consultation about her husband. He was making his blood too thick by going to sleep every evening after dinner.

      “Oh, it isn’t his blood that’s too thick,” said the physician.

      And, smiling a little at his unnoticed joke, the doctor opened the door. But the chemist’s shop was full of people; he had the greatest difficulty in getting rid of Monsieur Tuvache, who feared his spouse would get inflammation of the lungs, because she was in the habit of spitting on the ashes; then of Monsieur Binet, who sometimes experienced sudden attacks of great hunger; and of Madame Caron, who suffered from tinglings; of Lheureux, who had vertigo; of Lestiboudois, who had rheumatism; and of Madame Lefrancois, who had heartburn. At last the three horses started; and it was the general opinion that he had not shown himself at all obliging.

      Public attention was distracted by the appearance of Monsieur Bournisien, who was going across the market with the holy oil.

      Homais, as was due to his principles, compared priests to ravens attracted by the odour of death. The sight of an ecclesiastic was personally disagreeable to him, for the cassock made him think of the shroud, and he detested the one from some fear of the other.

      Nevertheless, not shrinking from what he called his mission, he returned to Bovary’s in company with Canivet whom Monsieur Lariviere, before leaving, had strongly urged to make this visit; and he would, but for his wife’s objections, have taken his two sons with him, in order to accustom them to great occasions; that this might be a lesson, an example, a solemn picture, that should remain in their heads later on.

      The room when they went in was full of mournful solemnity. On the work-table, covered over with a white cloth, there were five or six small balls of cotton in a silver dish, near a large crucifix between two lighted candles.

      Emma, her chin sunken upon her breast, had her eyes inordinately wide open, and her poor hands wandered over the sheets with that hideous and soft movement of the dying, that seems as if they wanted already to cover themselves with the shroud. Pale as a statue and with eyes red as fire, Charles, not weeping, stood opposite her at the foot of the bed, while the priest, bending one knee, was muttering words in a low voice.

      She turned her face slowly, and seemed filled with joy on seeing suddenly the violet stole, no doubt finding again, in the midst of a temporary lull in her pain, the lost voluptuousness of her first mystical transports, with the visions of eternal beatitude that were beginning.

      The priest rose to take the crucifix; then she stretched forward her neck as one who is athirst, and glueing her lips to the body of the Man-God, she pressed upon it with all her expiring strength the fullest kiss of love that she had ever given. Then he recited the Misereatur and the Indulgentiam, dipped his right thumb in the oil, and began to give extreme unction. First upon the eyes, that had so coveted all worldly pomp; then upon the nostrils, that had been greedy of the warm breeze and amorous odours; then upon the mouth, that had uttered lies, that had curled with pride and cried out in lewdness; then upon the hands that had delighted in sensual touches; and finally upon the soles of the feet, so swift of yore, when she was running to satisfy her desires, and that would now walk no more.

      The cure wiped his fingers, threw the bit of cotton dipped in oil into the fire, and came and sat down by the dying woman, to tell her that she must now blend her sufferings with those of Jesus Christ and abandon herself to the divine mercy.

      Finishing his exhortations, he tried to place in her hand a blessed candle, symbol of the celestial glory with which she was soon to be surrounded. Emma, too weak, could not close her fingers, and the taper, but for Monsieur Bournisien would have fallen to the ground.

      However, she was not quite so pale, and her face had an expression of serenity as if the sacrament had cured her.

      The priest did not fail to point this out; he even explained to Bovary that the Lord sometimes prolonged the life of persons when he thought it meet for their salvation; and Charles remembered the day when, so near death, she had received the communion. Perhaps there was no need to despair, he thought.

      In fact, she looked around her slowly, as one awakening from a dream; then in a distinct voice she asked for her looking-glass, and remained some time bending over СКАЧАТЬ