Fire in the Blood by Irène Némirovsky Read Free Book Online Page B

. . she didn't have an ounce of wickedness in her. No, the girl she took in was a charity case. Took her as a maid and then got attached to her, adopted her. Madame Declos isn't stupid."
    "No, not stupid at all. Just look at how she got her way with the old man . . . Dresses and perfume from Paris, holidays. Anything she wanted. She knows what she's doing. And not only in that way either. You've got to be fair. She knows about farming. Her tenants say you can't fool her. And she's nice to everyone."
    "She is. She may be proud of the way she dresses but she's not proud when she talks to you."
    "Still, people around here criticise her. She'd do well to be careful."
    Suddenly, Ohnet looks up. "Be careful about what?" he asks.
    Another silence. The men pull in their chairs, bringing them closer together and at the same time further away from Marc, to demonstrate their disapproval of everything they've guessed is going on, or think they've guessed.
    "Careful about her behaviour."
    "I think," says Marc, turning his empty glass between his fingers, "I think she couldn't care less about how people see her."
    "Be reasonable, Monsieur Marc, be reasonable . . . Her land is hereabouts. She's got to live in these parts. It wouldn't do for people to be pointing their finger at her."
    "She could sell her land and leave," one of the farmers says suddenly.
    It's old Gonin; his land is right next to Declos's estate. On his patient face appears the harsh, stubborn expression that betrays the men around here when they covet their neighbour's possessions. The others say nothing. I know the game; they've tried it on me. They use it against anyone who isn't from the area, or who's left it, or anyone whom, for some reason or another, they consider undesirable. They didn't like me either. I'd abandoned my heritage. I'd preferred other places to where I'd been born. As a result, everything I wished to buy automatically doubled in price; everything I wanted to sell was undervalued. Even in the smallest things I was aware of a malicious intent that was extraordinarily vigilant, always ready to pounce, calculated to make my life unbearable and force me out. I held my ground. I didn't leave. But my land, well, that they did get. I see Simon de Saint-Arraud sitting near me, the one who got my meadows, his large dirty hands resting on his knees, and Charles des Roches, who has my farms; while the house where I was born now belongs to the fat farmer with rosy cheeks and a tranquil, sleepy expression who says, with a smile, "Madame Declos would definitely be better off selling. She might know a fair bit about farming, but there's some things a woman can't do."
    "She's young; she'll get married again," Marc replies defiantly.
    They've all stood up now. One of them opens his big umbrella. Another puts on his clogs and ties a scarf around his neck. When they are at the door, a voice calls out with feigned indifference, "So you think she'll get married again, Monsieur Marc?"
    They're all watching him, their eyes wrinkling to hide mocking laughter.
    As for Marc, he looks from one to the other, as if he's trying to guess what they're thinking, what they're not saying, as if he's getting ready for a fight. He ends up shrugging his shoulders and saying wearily, with half-closed eyes, "How should I know?"
    "But of course you do, Monsieur Marc. Everyone knows you and the old man were pals. Cautious and mistrustful as he was, seems he let you come round any time you wanted, day or night, and sometimes you didn't leave until midnight. You must've seen the widow once or twice since he died, eh?" "Now and again. Not often."
    "How upsetting for you, Monsieur Marc. Two houses where you were well liked and always welcome, then the man of the house dies in both."
    "Two houses?"
    "Coudray and the Moulin-Neuf."
    And, as if satisfied by the way he couldn't help but flinch (so badly that he dropped his glass on to the tiled floor wher e i t shattered), the farmers finally leave.