"After stumbling and limping along for some time, I saw a door on the left.... No, it was more a gate, an enormous, yawning gate, like a huge oven door. What a fantastic sight, my children! No one asked my name, even there at the reception area. I went through the cavernous door in batches, my brothers, just like you sinners as you go to the cabaret on Sunday night.
"I was sweating profusely, and yet frozen to the spot, I was trembling fearfully. My hair stood on end. I smelt burning, roasting flesh, something like the smell that spread around Cucugnan when Eli, the marshal, burned the hoof of an old a.s.s while shoeing it. I couldn"t breathe in that foetid, burning air; I heard a frightful clamour. There was moaning, howling, cursing.
"--You there! Are you coming in, or are you staying outside? scorned a horned devil, prodding me with his fork.
"--Me? I"m not going in. I am a friend of Almighty G.o.d.
"--So, you"re a friend of G.o.d.... Eh! You d.a.m.ned fool! What are you doing here?...
"--I have come.... Oh! don"t bother me, I can hardly stand up.... I have come ... I have come from a far away ... to humbly ask ... if ...
if, by any chance, you have someone here from Cucugnan....
"--Oh! G.o.d"s teeth! you"re playing the idiot, you; it"s as though you didn"t know that the whole of Cucugnan is here. Well, ugly crow, watch and you will see how things are here with your precious Cucugnanians...."
"And I saw, in the middle of a terrible, flaming vortex of flame:
"The lanky Coq-Galine--you all knew him, my brothers--Coq-Galine, who was regularly drunk, and so often knocked ten bells out of his poor Clairon.
"I saw Catarinet ... that little vixen ... with her nose in the air ...
who slept _alone_ in the barn.... You remember that, you rascals!...
But let"s move on, I"ve said too much already.
"I saw Pascal Doigt-de-Poix, who made his olive oil--with monsieur Julien"s olives!
"I saw Babet the gleaner, who, as she gleaned, grabbed handfuls from the stacks to make up her quota!
"I saw Master Grapasi, who oiled his wheelbarrow rather a lot, so as not to be heard!
"And Dauphine, who greatly overcharged for water from her wells.
"And le Tortillard, who, when he met me carrying the Good Lord, rushed away, with his biretta perched on his head and his pipe stuck in his mouth ... as proud as Lucifer ... as though he had come across a mangy dog.
"And Coulau with his Zette, and Jacques, and Pierre, and Toni...."
Much moved and ashen with fear, the congregation whimpered, while imagining their fathers, and their mothers and their grandmothers and their sisters, when h.e.l.l"s gates were opened....
--Your feelings don"t deceive you, brothers, the good abbot continued, you sense that this can"t go on. I am responsible for your souls, and I do want to save you from the abyss towards which you are rushing helter-skelter and head first.
"Tomorrow, at the latest, my task begins. And the work will not be in vain! This is how I am going to go about it. For it to come out well, everything must be done in an orderly way. We will proceed step by step, like at Jonquieres when there"s a dance.
"Tomorrow, Monday. I will give confession to the old men and women.
Nothing much there.
"Tuesday. The children. I"ll soon have done.
"Wednesday. The young men and women. That might take a long time.
"Thursday. The men. We"d better cut that short.
"Friday. The women. I will tell them, not to build up their parts!
"Sat.u.r.day. The miller. A day mightn"t be enough for him.
"And, if we"ve finished by Sunday, we"ll have done very well.
"Look, my children, when wheat is ripe, it must be harvested, when the wine is drawn, it must be drunk. We"ve had enough of dirty washing, what matters now is to wash it, and to wash it well.
"May you all receive G.o.d"s loving grace. _Amen!_"
He was as good as his word. The washing was duly done.
From that memorable Sunday, the sweet smell of Cucugnanian virtue was heady for many kilometres around.
And the good priest, Monsieur Martin, happy and full of joy, dreamt one night that he was followed by all his flock, as he ascended in a candle-lit, resplendent procession, clouded in fragrant incense, with choir boys chanting the Te Deum. They were all following the light to the City of G.o.d.
There you are; the story of the priest of Cucugnan, as I was told by the great colloquial writer Roumanille, who had it himself from some other good fellow.
THE OLD FOLKS
--A letter, Father Azan?
--Yes, monsieur.... It"s from Paris.
The good Father Azan was so proud that it came from Paris. Not me though. A little bird told me that this unexpected early-morning letter, which had just fallen into my lap, was going to cost me the rest of the day. I was not wrong, as you will see.
_I must ask you for a favour, friend. I want you to lock up your windmill for the day and go directly to Eyguieres. Eyguieres is a large market town a few kilometres from here--an easy walk. When you get there, ask for the convent of the orphans. The first house after the convent is a single storey house with grey shutters and a small back-garden. Don"t knock, just go in--the door is always open--and shout at the top of your voice: "h.e.l.lo, folks! I"m Maurice"s friend."
You will then see two very old folks, hold out their arms to you from the depths of their large armchairs. Give them a heartfelt hug from me as if they were your own. Then, you might like to talk to them. They will be very boring about me, though, and tell you a thousand and one tales--but do listen respectfully--no laughing. You won"t laugh will you?... They are my grandparents and I am everything in the world to them, but they haven"t seen me for ten long years. I can"t help it.
Paris keeps me busy; and they are so old, so that even if they tried to visit me they couldn"t make it. Fortunately, you will be there for them, my dear miller, and when you embrace them they will feel almost as if I were there. I have often mentioned you by name, and our special friendship which...._
To h.e.l.l with that sort of friend! It was fine weather, but certainly not walking weather; too much sun and too much mistral, a typical Provencal day to be sure. By the time this d.a.m.ned letter arrived, I had already decided on my bolt-hole for the day. It was to be in the shelter of two rocks, and I was looking forward to basking like a lizard and soaking up the Provencal light as I listened to the pines singing. Oh well, there was nothing else for it, I grumbled as I locked up the windmill, and put the key under the cat-flap. Cane, pipe, and I was on my way.
I arrived at Eyguieres at about two o"clock. The village was deserted; everybody was out in the fields. In the white dust-covered elms in the courtyard, the cicadas were singing their hearts out, just like they do in the Crau plain. An a.s.s was sunning itself in the town hall square, and a flock of pigeons were in the church fountain, but there n.o.body to direct me to the orphanage. Luckily, I came across an old fairy squatting and spinning her thread in a corner of her doorway; I told her what I was looking for, and, so powerful was she, that as she raised her distaff, the Convent of the Orphans appeared, as if by magic, before me.... It was a big, black, bleak house, proudly boasting an old red sandstone cross with a short Latin inscription above its pointed door arch. I spotted a smaller house next door with grey shutters, and a back-garden.... I recognised it immediately and went in without knocking.
The long, cool, quiet entrance hall made a life-long impression on me; with its pink painted wall, and faded flowers and violins on the panelling. I saw a small garden shaking about in the wind beyond a light coloured awning. I seemed to have come to the home of some sort of antediluvian bailiff.... At the end of the corridor on the left, the ticking of a large clock could be heard through a half opened door, and the voice of a school-age child, reading each syllable carefully. Th ... en ... Saint ... I ... re ... naeus ... cri ... ed ... I ... am ...
the ... wh ... eat ... of ... the ... Lord ... I ... mu ... st ... be ... gro ... und ... by ... the ... tee ... th ... of ... th ... ese ...
a ... ni ... mals.... I went gently over to the door and looked in.
In the quiet, and half-light of the small room, there was an old man with flushed cheeks, and wrinkled to the end of his finger tips. He was fast asleep, slumped in an armchair, with his mouth open and his hands on his knees. At his feet was a very young girl dressed all in blue--a large cape and a small bonnet--the orphanage"s uniform. She was reading the life of St. Irenaeus from a book larger than herself.... This wonderful reading had a soporific effect on the whole household; the old man sleeping in his armchair, the flies on the ceiling, and even the caged canaries in the window. The big clock was quietly grinding away. Nothing moved in the room, except from within a large band of white light, which fell from between the closed shutters, which was full of sparkling movement and microscopic waltzes.... In the midst of all this general stupor, the child continued her solemn reading: S ...
oon ... two ... lions ... jum ... ped ... on ... him ... and ... de ...