s?" Then in a maternal tone of voice she
added, "Now go to bed, won't you? You see we're busy; you're in our
way. That makes thirty-two handkerchiefs, Madame Bijard; and two more,
thirty-four."

But Coupeau was not sleepy. He stood there wagging his body from side
to side like the pendulum of a clock and chuckling in an obstinate and
teasing manner. Gervaise, wanting to finish with Madame Bijard, called
to Clemence to count the laundry while she made the list. Tall Clemence
made a dirty remark about every item that she touched. She commented
on the customers' misfortunes and their bedroom adventures. She had a
wash-house joke for every rip or stain that passed through her hands.
Augustine pretended that she didn't understand, but her ears were wide
open. Madame Putois compressed her lips, thinking it a disgrace to
say such things in front of Coupeau. It's not a man's business to have
anything to do with dirty linen. It's just not done among decent people.

Gervaise, serious and her mind fully occupied with what she was about,
did not seem to notice. As she wrote she gave a glance to each article
as it passed before her, so as to recognize it; and she never made a
mistake; she guessed the owner's name just by the look or the color.
Those napkins belonged to the Goujets, that was evident; they had not
been used to wipe out frying-pans. That pillow-case certainly came from
the Boches on account of the pomatum with which Madame Boche always
smeared her things. There was no need to put your nose close to the
flannel vests of Monsieur Madinier; his skin was so oily that it clogged
up his woolens.

She knew many peculiarities, the cleanliness of some, the ragged
underclothes of neighborhood ladies who appeared on the streets in silk
dresses; how many items each family soiled weekly; the way some people's
garments were always torn at the same spot. Oh, she had many tales
to tell. For instance, the chemises of Mademoiselle Remanjou provided
material for endless comments: they wore out at the top first because
the old maid had bony, sharp shoulders; and they were never really
dirty, proving that you dry up by her age, like a stick of wood out of
which it's hard to squeeze a drop of anything. It was thus that at
every sorting of the dirty linen in the shop they undressed the whole
neighborhood of the Goutte-d'Or.

"Oh, here's something luscious!" cried Clemence, opening another bundle.

Gervaise, suddenly seized with a great