ple were talking, the little goose? Anyway
it was time for her to deliver the laundry to a friend of Madame Lerat
at Les Batignolles. So Gervaise hung a basket on her arm and pushed her
toward the door. Augustine went off, sobbing and sniveling, dragging her
feet in the snow.

Meanwhile mother Coupeau, Madame Putois and Clemence were discussing the
effectiveness of hard-cooked eggs and spinach leaves. Then Virginie said
softly:

"_Mon Dieu!_ you have a fight, and then you make it up, if you have
a generous heart." She leaned toward Gervaise with a smile and added,
"Really, I don't hold any grudge against you for that business at the
wash-house. You remember it, don't you?"

This was what Gervaise had been dreading. She guessed that the subject
of Lantier and Adele would now come up.

Virginie had moved close to Gervaise so as not to be overheard by the
others. Gervaise, lulled by the excessive heat, felt so limp that she
couldn't even summon the willpower to change the subject. She foresaw
what the tall brunette would say and her heart was stirred with an
emotion which she didn't want to admit to herself.

"I hope I'm not hurting your feelings," Virginie continued. "Often I've
had it on the tip of my tongue. But since we are now on the subject,
word of honor, I don't have any grudge against you."

She stirred her remaining coffee and then took a small sip. Gervaise,
with her heart in her throat, wondered if Virginie had really forgiven
her as completely as she said, for she seemed to observe sparks in her
dark eyes.

"You see," Virginie went on, "you had an excuse. They played a really
rotten, dirty trick on you. To be fair about it, if it had been me, I'd
have taken a knife to her."

She drank another small sip, then added rapidly without a pause:

"Anyway, it didn't bring them happiness, _mon Dieu_! Not a bit of it.
They went to live over at La Glaciere, in a filthy street that was
always muddy. I went two days later to have lunch with them. I can tell
you, it was quite a trip by bus. Well, I found them already fighting.
Really, as I came in they were boxing each other's ears. Fine pair of
love birds! Adele isn't worth the rope to hang her. I say that even if
she is my own sister. It would take too long to relate all the nasty
tricks she played on me, and anyhow, it's between the two of us. As
for Lantier--well, he's no good either. He'd beat the hide off you for
anything, and with his fist closed too. They