But by now feelings were running high; it was terrifying to see how the children, carried away by their passionate urge to strike the best possible bargain, went on haggling and swearing like crafty peasants buying a pig.

‘Eight hundred francs,’ sneered Buteau. ‘So you want to live like a fine gentleman? Eight hundred francs! It's enough for a family of four! Why don't you admit straight away that you want to eat yourself to death?’

Fouan was still able to control his temper. He considered haggling quite a natural thing and so merely stood firm against this attack, which he had anticipated; his own blood was up as well, and he now spelt out bluntly all his own demands:

‘Just a second. That's not everything. We shall keep the house and garden until we die, of course… And as we shan't be harvesting any more crops, we want a barrel of wine every year, a hundred logs of firewood as well as three gallons of milk, a dozen eggs and three cheeses every week.’

‘Oh, Father!’ Fanny moaned in tones of shocked anguish, ‘oh, Father!’

As for Buteau, he considered the discussion over. He had sprung to his feet and was walking up and down gesticulating wildly; he had even jammed his cap onto his head, all ready to leave. Jesus Christ had also stood up, anxious in case all this arguing might prevent the deal from going through. Only Delhomme remained quite unmoved, resting his finger against his nose in an attitude of deep thought and quiet exasperation.

At this point Monsieur Baillehache felt it was necessary to hasten things along a little. He shook off his torpor and, rummaging even more vigorously in his whiskers, said:

‘You know, don't you, that wine and firewood as well as the cheese and eggs are customary?’

But he was cut short by a battery of acid comment:

‘Do we drink our own wine? We sell it!’

‘Doing damn all and sitting warm and cosy is all very well while your children are tearing their guts out!’

The notary, who had heard all this before, continued placidly:

‘All that has nothing to do with it… For God's sake, Jesus Christ, can't you sit down! You're blocking the light, it's getting on my nerves! So you're all agreed, then? You'll pay those items in kind, because otherwise people will think you're being mean… So the only thing that remains to be discussed is the amount of the annuity.’

Delhomme at last indicated that he had something to say. Everyone had sat down again and they all listened attentively as he slowly spoke:

‘Excuse me, but what Father is asking seems quite fair to me. We could let him have eight hundred francs since he'd be able to let his property for that amount… But we're not calculating like that. He's not letting his land to us, he's giving it to us, and the calculation we've got to make is how much he and Mother need to live on… That and nothing more, what they need to live on.’

‘That's it,’ the notary approved, ‘that's what they usually take as a basis.’

And another long squabble ensued. The old people's style of living was laid bare, scrutinized and discussed, item by item. They weighed up the bread, the vegetables and the meat; they worked out the clothing, cutting down on the linen and wool, they even probed into the little luxuries, such as their father's pipe tobacco; his daily ration of tuppence was reduced to a penny, after endless recrimination. If you're not going to be working any more, you'll have to learn to economize! And couldn't Mother manage to do without black coffee? It was like their dog, an aged animal, twelve years old, which ate a lot and did nothing in return: it ought to have been liquidated long ago. Having made their calculations once, they went back to revise them, looking for other things to eliminate; two shirts and six handkerchieves a year, a centime off what had been set aside for sugar per day. And by paring away again and again, they reached a figure of five hundred and fifty odd francs, which left them in a state of considerable agitation because they were determined not to go above five hundred francs, in round figures.

But Fanny was becoming tired of all this talk. She was not a bad sort of girl and more compassionate than the men because neither her heart nor her skin had yet been toughened by their hard life in the open air. So having resigned herself to making concessions, she suggested calling a halt to the discussion. Jesus Christ, for his part, shrugged his shoulders. He was very easy about money matters and now that he was feeling maudlin, was even ready to offer to make up the amount out of his own share – though he would never have paid it.

‘Well, then,’ the daughter asked. ‘Are we agreed on five hundred and fifty francs?’

‘All right, all right,’ he replied. ‘They've got to have their bit of fun, the old folk.’

His mother looked at her first-born with a smile, her eyes misty with affection; while his father continued his struggle with his younger son. He had given ground only inch by inch, contesting every reduction, digging in his heels at some of the figures. But beneath his cold and stubborn exterior, inwardly his wrath was rising in the face of the savage determination of his own flesh and blood to suck him dry while still alive. He was forgetting that he had devoured his own father in the same way. His hands were beginning to tremble; he snarled:

‘What a nasty lot you are! When I think that I brought you up, and you want to take the bread out of my mouth! It's disgusting. I'm sorry I'm not stiff and cold already. So you won't do the decent thing, you'll not go above five hundred and fifty?’

He was weakening when once again his wife tugged at his sleeve and whispered:

‘No, don't accept.’

‘That's not quite all,’ Buteau said after a moment's hesitation. ‘What about the money you've saved up? After all, if you've got some money of your own, surely you're not going to accept ours.’

He glared at his father.