The Fat and the Thin | Page 7

the man seemed inclined to refuse her offer, she pushed him
up with her stout arms, and bundled him down upon the turnips and
carrots.
"Come, now, don't give us any more trouble," she cried angrily. "You

are quite enough to provoke one, my good fellow. Don't I tell you that
I'm going to the markets? Sleep away up there. I'll wake you when we
arrive."
She herself then clambered into the cart again, and settled herself with
her back against the board, grasping the reins of Balthazar, who started
off drowsily, swaying his ears once more. The other waggons followed,
and the procession resumed its lazy march through the darkness, whilst
the rhythmical jolting of the wheels again awoke the echoes of the
sleepy house fronts, and the waggoners, wrapped in their cloaks, dozed
off afresh. The one who had called to Madame Francois growled out as
he lay down: "As if we'd nothing better to do than pick up every
drunken sot we come across! You're a scorcher, old woman!"
The waggons rumbled on, and the horses picked their own way, with
drooping heads. The stranger whom Madame Francois had befriended
was lying on his stomach, with his long legs lost amongst the turnips
which filled the back part of the cart, whilst his face was buried amidst
the spreading piles of carrot bunches. With weary, extended arms he
clutched hold of his vegetable couch in fear of being thrown to the
ground by one of the waggon's jolts, and his eyes were fixed on the two
long lines of gas lamps which stretched away in front of him till they
mingled with a swarm of other lights in the distance atop of the slope.
Far away on the horizon floated a spreading, whitish vapour, showing
where Paris slept amidst the luminous haze of all those flamelets.
"I come from Nanterre, and my name's Madame Francois," said the
market gardener presently. "Since my poor man died I go to the
markets every morning myself. It's a hard life, as you may guess. And
who are you?"
"My name's Florent, I come from a distance," replied the stranger, with
embarrassment. "Please excuse me, but I'm really so tired that it is
painful to me to talk."
He was evidently unwilling to say anything more, and so Madame
Francois relapsed into silence, and allowed the reins to fall loosely on
the back of Balthazar, who went his way like an animal acquainted with

every stone of the road.
Meantime, with his eyes still fixed upon the far-spreading glare of Paris,
Florent was pondering over the story which he had refused to
communicate to Madame Francois. After making his escape from
Cayenne, whither he had been transported for his participation in the
resistance to Louis Napoleon's Coup d'Etat, he had wandered about
Dutch Guiana for a couple of years, burning to return to France, yet
dreading the Imperial police. At last, however, he once more saw
before him the beloved and mighty city which he had so keenly
regretted and so ardently longed for. He would hide himself there, he
told himself, and again lead the quiet, peaceable life that he had lived
years ago. The police would never be any the wiser; and everyone
would imagine, indeed, that he had died over yonder, across the sea.
Then he thought of his arrival at Havre, where he had landed with only
some fifteen francs tied up in a corner of his handkerchief. He had been
able to pay for a seat in the coach as far as Rouen, but from that point
he had been forced to continue his journey on foot, as he had scarcely
thirty sous left of his little store. At Vernon his last copper had gone in
bread. After that he had no clear recollection of anything. He fancied
that he could remember having slept for several hours in a ditch, and
having shown the papers with which he had provided himself to a
gendarme; however, he had only a very confused idea of what had
happened. He had left Vernon without any breakfast, seized every now
and then with hopeless despair and raging pangs which had driven him
to munch the leaves of the hedges as he tramped along. A prey to
cramp and fright, his body bent, his sight dimmed, and his feet sore, he
had continued his weary march, ever drawn onwards in a
semi-unconscious state by a vision of Paris, which, far, far away,
beyond the horizon, seemed to be summoning him and waiting for him.
When he at length reached Courbevoie, the night was very dark. Paris,
looking like a patch of star-sprent sky that had fallen upon the black
earth, seemed to him to wear a forbidding aspect, as though angry at his