He thrust his fist violently into the hat as if he were expecting to pick up a boulder. When he had seized his piece of paper, he had to go to the window to read what was on it.

‘Two!’ he exclaimed, doubtless thinking that this was a particularly funny number, since he spluttered with laughter.

‘Your turn, Fanny,’ Grosbois called.

When Fanny put her hand into the hat she was in no hurry. She rummaged in the bottom, moving the papers around and lifting up one after the other.

‘You're not allowed to choose,’ exclaimed Buteau angrily, in a voice choking with emotion; his face had gone pale when he saw the number his brother had drawn.

‘Really? Why not?’ she retorted. ‘I'm not looking, there's nothing wrong in feeling.’

‘Go on,’ her father said. ‘They're all the same, there's no difference in any of them.’

She finally made her choice and rushed to the window:

‘One.’

‘Well, Buteau's got number three,’ said Fouan. ‘Go on, draw it, my boy!’

In the ever deepening gloom, it was impossible to see how contorted the face of the youngest son had become. He burst out angrily:

‘I shan't!’

‘What do you mean?’

‘If you imagine I'm going to accept that, you're mistaken! That's the third lot, isn't it? The rotten one! I've already told you lots of times that I want the sharing to be done differently. No, I won't! You'd just be making a fool of me! And anyway, do you think I can't see what you're up to? Shouldn't the youngest have drawn lots first? So I won't! I'm not going to draw because I'm being cheated!’

His father and mother watched him throwing his arms about, stamping and banging the table.

‘You poor boy, you must have taken leave of your senses,’ said Rose.

‘Oh yes, mother, I know you never loved me. You'd skin me alive to give my skin to my brother… You all want to do me down!’

Fouan harshly interrupted him.

‘Stop talking nonsense! Will you draw or not?’

‘I insist we do it all again!’

Everyone protested. Jesus Christ and Fanny clung to their pieces of paper as if someone were trying to take it away from them. Delhomme pointed out that the lots had been drawn fairly and Grosbois, highly offended, talked of leaving if his good faith was being questioned.

‘Then I want Father to add another thousand francs to my share from the money he's got hidden away.’

Completely taken aback, the old man was momentarily at a loss for words. Then he collected himself and made towards his son with a terrifying expression.

‘What's that you said? So you really want to kill me off, you swine! You wouldn't find a brass farthing even if you pulled down the whole house. Draw your lot, for Christ's sake, or else you'll get nothing!’

Buteau, pigheaded and stubborn, did not even flinch at his father's threatening gesture.

‘I won't.’

Once again an embarrassed silence fell. Now the enormous hat sat there, rebuking them and blocking the way with that single piece of paper lying inside it which nobody was willing to take. To end the discussion, the surveyor advised the old man to draw it himself and he solemnly pulled it out and went over to the window to look at it, as if he did not know what was on it.

‘Three! You've got the third lot, do you hear? The deed's drawn up and Monsieur Baillehache certainly won't change it, because what's done can't be undone… And since you're going to sleep here, I'll give you tonight to think it over!… Now that's over and done with, let's say no more.’

Plunged into gloom, Buteau made no reply. The others loudly approved and their mother decided to light a candle to lay the table.

And at that moment Jean, on his way to rejoin his friend, caught sight of two shadowy figures, huddled together, standing in the dark deserted road and trying to see what was going on at the Fouans'. From the slate-grey sky, feathery flakes of snow were beginning to fall.

‘Oh! You frightened us, Monsieur Jean,’ a voice said softly.

Then he recognized Françoise, wearing a hood over her long face with its heavy lips. She was huddled against her sister Lise with her arm round her waist. The two sisters were devoted to each other and were always to be seen together like that, with their arms round each other's necks. Lise, taller and pleasant-looking, despite her coarse features and the incipient flabbiness of her plump figure, had remained cheerful in spite of her misfortune.

‘So you're spying?’ he said with a smile.

‘Well, perhaps,’ she replied. ‘It interests me to know what's happening in there… To know if it will help Buteau make up his mind.’

Françoise had passed her other arm round her sister's bulging waist and was holding it affectionately.

‘If that's possible, the rotten pig!… Once he's got the land, perhaps he'll want a girl with more money!’

But Jean raised their hopes: the share-out must have been decided by now, all the rest would be all right. Then, when he told them that he was going to eat with the old people, Françoise said:

‘All right then, we'll meet later on, we'll come round to the evening gathering!’

He watched them disappear into the night. The snow was falling more heavily now and their clothes, merging together, were acquiring a feathery white fringe.

Chapter 5

BY seven o'clock, after supper, the Fouans, Buteau and Jean had gone over to the cowshed to join the two cows which Rose was going to sell. Tied up at the end beside their trough, these two animals filled the shed with the powerful smell and the heat of their bodies and of their litter, whereas the kitchen, with its three miserable logs of wood which had been lit for supper, was already bitterly cold from the early November frosts. So, in winter, the neighbours would gather there on the mud floor and be warm and cosy, with no further effort than bringing in a little round table and a dozen old chairs. Each neighbour provided a candle in turn; broad shadows danced along the bare walls, black with dust, up to the spiders' webs in the roof timbers; and in the background was the warm breath of the cows lying chewing the cud.

La Grande was the first to arrive with her knitting. Taking advantage of her great age, she never provided a candle herself; and she inspired such awe that her brother never dared to remind her of the normal custom. She at once took the best seat and seized the candlestick which she kept to herself because of her bad eyes. Against her chair she had leant her stick, which she never left far away. Little shining specks of snow were melting on the coarse bristles of her scrawny bird-like head.

‘Is it snowing?’ asked Rose.

‘It is,’ she answered curtly.

And compressing her thin lips, she took up her knitting after casting a sharp glance in the direction of Jean and Buteau.

Then the others appeared: first of all Fanny, who had brought along her son Nénesse, since Delhomme never came to these gatherings; then, almost at once, Lise and Françoise, laughing as they shook off the snow.