Gervaise lasted in this state several months. She fell lower and lower
still, submitting to the grossest outrages and dying of starvation a
little every day. As soon as she had four sous she drank and pounded
on the walls. She was employed on all the dirty errands of the
neighborhood. Once they even bet her she wouldn't eat filth, but she did
it in order to earn ten sous. Monsieur Marescot had decided to turn her
out of her room on the sixth floor. But, as Pere Bru had just been found
dead in his cubbyhole under the staircase, the landlord had allowed her
to turn into it. Now she roosted there in the place of Pere Bru. It
was inside there, on some straw, that her teeth chattered, whilst her
stomach was empty and her bones were frozen. The earth would not have
her apparently. She was becoming idiotic. She did not even think of
making an end of herself by jumping out of the sixth floor window on
to the pavement of the courtyard below. Death had to take her little by
little, bit by bit, dragging her thus to the end through the accursed
existence she had made for herself. It was never even exactly known what
she did die of. There was some talk of a cold, but the truth was she
died of privation and of the filth and hardship of her ruined life.
Overeating and dissoluteness killed her, according to the Lorilleuxs.
One morning, as there was a bad smell in the passage, it was remembered
that she had not been seen for two days, and she was discovered already
green in her hole.

It happened to be old Bazouge who came with the pauper's coffin under
his arm to pack her up. He was again precious drunk that day, but
a jolly fellow all the same, and as lively as a cricket. When he
recognized the customer he had to deal with he uttered several
philosophical reflections, whilst performing his little business.

"Everyone has to go. There's no occasion for jostling, there's room for
everyone. And it's stupid being in a hurry that just slows you up. All
I want to do is to please everybody. Some will, others won't. What's
the result? Here's one who wouldn't, then she would. So she was made to
wait. Anyhow, it's all right now, and faith! She's earned it! Merrily,
just take it easy."

And when he took hold of Gervaise in his big, dirty hands, he was seized
with emotion, and he gently raised this woman who had had so great a
longing for his attentions. Then, as he laid her out with paternal care
at the bottom of the coffin, he stuttered bet