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Tome was conquered. He had to hatch eggs, he had to give up his games of dominoes and renounce movement of any sort, for the old woman angrily deprived him of food whenever he broke an egg.
He lay on his back, with eyes fixed on the ceiling, motionless, his arms raised like wings, warming against his body the rudimentary chickens enclosed in their white shells.
He spoke now only in hushed tones; as if he feared a noise as much as motion, and he took a feverish interest in the yellow hen who was accomplishing in the poultry-yard the same task as he.
“Has the yellow hen eaten her food all right?” he would ask his wife.
And the old woman went from her fowls to her husband and from her husband to her fowls, devoured by anxiety as to the welfare of the little chickens who were maturing in the bed and in the nest.
The country people who knew the story came, agog with curiosity, to ask news of Toine. They entered his room on tiptoe, as one enters a sick-chamber, and asked:
“Well! how goes it?”
“All right,” said Toine; “only it keeps me fearfully hot.”
One morning his wife entered in a state of great excitement, and declared:
“The yellow hen has seven chickens! Three of the eggs were addled.”
Toine's heart beat painfully. How many would he have?
“Will it soon be over?” he asked, with the anguish of a woman who is about to become a mother.
“It's to be hoped so!” answered the old woman crossly, haunted by fear of failure.
They waited. Friends of Toine who had got wind that his time was drawing near arrived, and filled the little room.
Nothing else was talked about in the neighboring cottages. Inquirers asked one another for news as they stood at their doors.
About three o'clock Toine fell asleep. He slumbered half his time nowadays. He was suddenly awakened by an unaccustomed tickling under his right arm. He put his left hand on the spot, and seized a little creature covered with yellow down, which fluttered in his hand.
His emotion was so great that he cried out, and let go his hold of the chicken, which ran over his chest. The bar was full of people at the time. The customers rushed to Toine's room, and made a circle round him as they would round a travelling showman; while Madame Toine picked up the chicken, which had taken refuge under her husband's beard.
No one spoke, so great was the tension. It was a warm April day. Outside the window the yellow hen could be heard calling to her newly-fledged brood.
Toine, who was perspiring with emotion and anxiety, murmured:
“I have another now—under the left arm.”
His' wife plunged her great bony hand into the bed, and pulled out a second chicken with all the care of a midwife.
The neighbors wanted to see it. It was passed from one to another, and examined as if it were a phenomenon.
For twenty minutes no more hatched out, then four emerged at the same moment from their shells.
There was a great commotion among the lookers-on. And Toine smiled with satisfaction, beginning to take pride in this unusual sort of paternity. There were not many like him! Truly, he was a remarkable specimen of humanity!
“That makes six!” he declared. “Great heavens, what a christening we'll have!”
And a loud laugh rose from all present. Newcomers filled the bar. They asked one another:
“How many are there?”
“Six.”
Toine's wife took this new family to the hen, who clucked loudly, bristled her feathers, and spread her wings wide to shelter her growing brood of little ones.
“There's one more!” cried Toine.
He was mistaken. There were three! It was an unalloyed triumph! The last chicken broke through its shell at seven o'clock in the evening. All the eggs were good! And Toine, beside himself with joy, his brood hatched out, exultant, kissed the tiny creature on the back, almost suffocating it. He wanted to keep it in his bed until morning, moved by a mother's tenderness toward the tiny being which he had brought to life, but the old woman carried it away like the others, turning a deaf ear to her husband's entreaties.
The delighted spectators went off to spread the news of the event, and Horslaville, who was the last to go, asked:
“You'll invite me when the first is cooked, won't you, Toine?”
At this idea a smile overspread the fat man's face, and he answered:
“Certainly I'll invite you, my son-in-law.”
We had just left Gisors, where I was awakened to hearing the name of the town called out by the guards, and I was dozing off again when a terrific shock threw me forward on top of a large lady who sat opposite me.
One of the wheels of the engine had broken, and the engine itself lay across the track. The tender and the baggage car were also derailed, and lay beside this mutilated engine, which rattled, groaned, hissed, puffed, sputtered, and resembled those horses that fall in the street with their flanks heaving, their breast palpitating, their nostrils steaming and their whole body trembling, but incapable of the slightest effort to rise and start off again.
There were no dead or wounded; only a few with bruises, for the train was not going at full speed. And we looked with sorrow at the great crippled iron creature that could not draw us along any more, and that blocked the track, perhaps for some time, for no doubt they would have to send to Paris for a special train to come to our aid.
It was then ten o'clock in the morning, and I at once decided to go back to Gisors for breakfast.
As I was walking along I said to myself:
“Gisors, Gisors—why, I know someone there!
“Who is it? Gisors? Let me see, I have a friend in this town.” A name suddenly came to my mind, “Albert Marambot.” He was an old school friend whom I had not seen for at least twelve years, and who was practicing medicine in Gisors. He had often written, inviting me to come and see him, and I had always promised to do so, without keeping my word. But at last I would take advantage of this opportunity.
I asked the first passer-by:
“Do you know where Dr. Marambot lives?”
He replied, without hesitation, and with the drawling accent of the Normans:
“Rue Dauphine.”
I presently saw, on the door of the house he pointed out, a large brass plate on which was engraved the name of my old chum. I rang the bell, but the servant, a yellow-haired girl who moved slowly, said with a Stupid air:
