The dirt's
still on it, you've simply smoothed it over. So now the things are not
even clean!"

She stopped whilst she counted the different articles. Then she
exclaimed:

"What! This is all you've brought? There are two pairs of stockings, six
towels, a table-cloth, and several dish-cloths short. You're regularly
trifling with me, it seems! I sent word that you were to bring me
everything, ironed or not. If your apprentice isn't here on the hour
with the rest of the things, we shall fall out, Madame Coupeau, I warn
you."

At this moment Goujet coughed in his room. Gervaise slightly started.
_Mon Dieu!_ How she was treated before him. And she remained standing
in the middle of the rooms, embarrassed and confused and waiting for the
dirty clothes; but after making up the account Madame Goujet had quietly
returned to her seat near the window, and resumed the mending of a lace
shawl.

"And the dirty things?" timidly inquired the laundress.

"No, thank you," replied the old woman, "there will be no laundry this
week."

Gervaise turned pale. She was no longer to have the washing. Then she
quite lost her head; she was obliged to sit down on a chair, for
her legs were giving way under her. She did not attempt to vindicate
herself. All that she would find to say was:

"Is Monsieur Goujet ill?"

Yes, he was not well. He had been obliged to come home instead of
returning to the forge, and he had gone to lie down on his bed to get a
rest. Madame Goujet talked gravely, wearing her black dress as usual
and her white face framed in her nun-like coif. The pay at the forge had
been cut again. It was now only seven francs a day because the machines
did so much of the work. This forced her to save money every way she
could. She would do her own washing from now on. It would naturally have
been very helpful if the Coupeaus had been able to return her the money
lent them by her son; but she was not going to set the lawyers on them,
as they were unable to pay. As she was talking about the debt, Gervaise
lowered her eyes in embarrassment.

"All the same," continued the lace-maker, "by pinching yourselves a
little you could manage to pay it off. For really now, you live very
well; and spend a great deal, I'm sure. If you were only to pay off ten
francs a month--"

She was interrupted by the sound of Goujet's voice as he called:

"Mamma! Mamma!"

And when she returned to her seat, which was almost immediately, she
changed the