“My dear fellow, don’t lock the door, do this to oblige me,” said he to Octave, when he had helped him to take the books from the box. “You see, when the loft is open, one can hide there and wait.”
Octave, having consented to deceive Monsieur Gourd, returned with Trublot to Julie’s room. The young man had left his overcoat there. Then it was his gloves that he could not find; he shook the skirts, overturned the bed-clothes, raised such a dust and such an odour of soiled linen, that his companion, half-suffocated, opened the window. It looked on to the narrow inner courtyard, which gave light to all the kitchens. And he was stretching out his head over this damp well, which exhaled the greasy odours of dirty sinks, when a sound of voices made him hastily withdraw.
“The little morning gossip,” said Trublot on all fours under the bed, still searching. “Just listen to it.”
It was Lisa, who was leaning out of the window of the Campardons’ kitchen to speak to Julie, two storeys below her.
“It seems so,” replied Julie, raising her head. “You see, she did all she could to catch him. Hippolyte came from the drawing-room so disgusted, that he almost had an attack of indigestion.”
“If we were only to do a quarter as much!” resumed Lisa.
But she disappeared a moment, to drink some broth that Victoire brought her. They got on well together, nursing each other’s vices, the maid hiding the cook’s drunkenness, and the cook facilitating the maid’s outings, from which the latter returned quite worn out, her limbs aching, her eyelids blue.
“Ah! my children,” said Victoire leaning out in her turn, her elbows touching Lisa’s, “you’re young. When you’ve seen what I’ve seen! At old Campardon’s, there was a niece who had been well brought up, and who used to go and look at the men through the key-hole.”
“Pretty goings-on!” murmured Julie with the horrified air of a lady. “Had I been in the place of the little one of the fourth floor, I’d have boxed Monsieur Auguste’s ears, if he’d touched me in the drawing-room! He’s a fine fellow!”
At these words, a shrill laugh issued from Madame Juzeur’s kitchen. Lisa, who was opposite, searched the room with a glance, and caught sight of Louise, whose precocious fifteen years took a delight in listening to the other servants.