They were during forty years the model of a perfect match. How many of the people around them, with an irreproachable past, could boast an advantage so rare?
They were not good. They were not bad. They had neither virtues nor faults of their own from never having done or said anything except in conformity with what others were doing or saying. Never had it entered their minds to desire anything on their own initiative. Nothing had ever made them reflect upon themselves, and take a decision according to an idea, whether good or bad, that was the result of their own individuality rather than "established opinions."
He had been born into the cork business. She had seen the light of day in the Elbeuf cloth trade. The arrest of a lawyer, unable to return several millions to the people whom he had deprived of them, united their parents in a common expression of indignation against impecunious embezzlers. In court, under the eyes of the Christ who bids us forgive, and amidst the encouragements of avenging law, cork and wool came together to destroy the unfortunate lawyer whose activities were proclaimed criminal because lacking the success which would have made his reputation for integrity. The cork merchant and the cloth merchant, both of them noisy about their small losses, conceived a "high" mutual "esteem," which subsequent acquaintance converted into "friendship."
The heir to corks was twenty-three years old.
He was, as a matter of fact, soft, flabby, and spiritless.
The cloth heiress had just completed her twentieth year.
"The sweetest child!" bleated her mother.
The truth being that the girl's inertia took the impulsion of any movement near her.
They were married after magnificent promises on both sides of the house. It later appeared that the manufacturer of corks was on the verge of failure, and that the cloth business had long since gone into the hands of a partner. As the fraud was reciprocal, there could be no reproaches on either side. They remained "good friends," and from the remnants of past splendour collected a small capital with which to set up the young couple in the linen draper's business at Caen.
The two young people, who were equally well fitted to manufacture butter or deal in building stone, by scrupulously adhering to the rules and regulations established for them, made a decent income from their business. Their parents died, rather fortunately, before becoming a burden and after inculcating into them those principles of public and private morals which would enable them to reach the end of their career without disaster. They had two daughters whom they married off, one into "ribbons," the other into "hardware," while they themselves died, as they had lived, in "linen."