The Guy de Maupassant MEGAPACK ®. Guy de Maupassant
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is that?” asked Sabot.
“The confiteor. If you do not remember it, repeat after me, one by one, the words I am going to say.” And the cure repeated the sacred prayer, in a slow tone, emphasizing the words which the carpenter repeated after him. Then he said:
“Now make your confession.”
But Sabot was silent, not knowing where to begin. The abbe then came to his aid.
“My child, I will ask you questions, since you don’t seem familiar with these things. We will take, one by one, the commandments of God. Listen to me and do not be disturbed. Speak very frankly and never fear that you may say too much.
“‘One God alone, thou shalt adore,
And love him perfectly.’
“Have you ever loved anything, or anybody, as well as you loved God? Have you loved him with all your soul, all your heart, all the strength of your love?”
Sabot was perspiring with the effort of thinking. He replied:
“No. Oh, no, m’sieu le cure. I love God as much as I can. That is —yes—I love him very much. To say that I do not love my children, no—I cannot say that. To say that if I had to choose between them and God, I could not be sure. To say that if I had to lose a hundred francs for the love of God, I could not say about that. But I love him well, for sure, I love him all the same.” The priest said gravely “You must love Him more than all besides.” And Sabot, meaning well, declared “I will do what I possibly can, m’sieu le cure.” The abbe resumed:
“‘God’s name in vain thou shalt not take
Nor swear by any other thing.’
“Did you ever swear?”
“No—oh, that, no! I never swear, never. Sometimes, in a moment of anger, I may say sacre nom de Dieu! But then, I never swear.”
“That is swearing,” cried the priest, and added seriously:
“Do not do it again.
“‘Thy Sundays thou shalt keep
In serving God devoutly.’
“What do you do on Sunday?”
This time Sabot scratched his ear.
“Why, I serve God as best I can, m’sieu le cure. I serve him—at home. I work on Sunday.”
The cure interrupted him, saying magnanimously:
“I know, you will do better in future. I will pass over the following commandments, certain that you have not transgressed the two first. We will take from the sixth to the ninth. I will resume:
“‘Others’ goods thou shalt not take
Nor keep what is not thine.’
“Have you ever taken in any way what belonged to another?”
But Theodule Sabot became indignant.
“Of course not, of course not! I am an honest man, m’sieu le cure, I swear it, for sure. To say that I have not sometimes charged for a few more hours of work to customers who had means, I could not say that. To say that I never add a few centimes to bills, only a few, I would not say that. But to steal, no! Oh, not that, no!”
The priest resumed severely:
“To take one single centime constitutes a theft. Do not do it again.
‘False witness thou shalt not bear,
Nor lie in any way.’
“Have you ever told a lie?”
“No, as to that, no. I am not a liar. That is my quality. To say that I have never told a big story, I would not like to say that. To say that I have never made people believe things that were not true when it was to my own interest, I would not like to say that. But as for lying, I am not a liar.”
The priest simply said:
“Watch yourself more closely.” Then he continued:
“‘The works of the flesh thou shalt not desire
Except in marriage only.’
“Did you ever desire, or live with, any other woman than your wife?”
Sabot exclaimed with sincerity:
“As to that, no; oh, as to that, no, m’sieu le Cure. My poor wife, deceive her! No, no! Not so much as the tip of a finger, either in thought or in act. That is the truth.”
They were silent a few seconds, then, in a lower tone, as though a doubt had arisen in his mind, he resumed:
“When I go to town, to say that I never go into a house, you know, one of the licensed houses, just to laugh and talk and see something different, I could not say that. But I always pay, monsieur le cure, I always pay. From the moment you pay, without anyone seeing or knowing you, no one can get you into trouble.”
The cure did not insist, and gave him absolution.
Theodule Sabot did the work on the chancel, and goes to communion every month.
THE WRONG HOUSE
Quartermaster Varajou had obtained a week’s leave to go and visit his sister, Madame Padoie. Varajou, who was in garrison at Rennes and was leading a pretty gay life, finding himself high and dry, wrote to his sister saying that he would devote a week to her. It was not that he cared particularly for Mme. Padoie, a little moralist, a devotee, and always cross; but he needed money, needed it very badly, and he remembered that, of all his relations, the Padoies were the only ones whom he had never approached on the subject.
Pere Varajou, formerly a horticulturist at Angers, but now retired from business, had closed his purse strings to his scapegrace son and had hardly seen him for two years. His daughter had married Padoie, a former treasury clerk, who had just been appointed tax collector at Vannes.
Varajou, on leaving the train, had some one direct him to the house of his brother-in-law, whom he found in his office arguing with the Breton peasants of the neighborhood. Padoie rose from his seat, held out his hand across the table littered with papers, murmured, “Take a chair. I will be at liberty in a moment,” sat down again and resumed his discussion.
The peasants did not understand his explanations, the collector did not understand their line of argument. He spoke French, they spoke Breton, and the clerk who acted as interpreter appeared not to understand either.
It lasted a long time, a very long time. Varajou looked at his brother-in-law and thought: “What a fool!” Padoie must have been almost fifty. He was tall, thin, bony, slow, hairy, with heavy arched eyebrows. He wore a velvet skull cap with a gold cord vandyke design round it. His look was gentle, like his actions. His speech, his gestures, his thoughts, all were soft. Varajou said to himself, “What a fool!”
He, himself, was one of those noisy roysterers for whom the greatest pleasures in life are the cafe and abandoned women. He understood nothing outside of these conditions of existence.
A boisterous braggart, filled with contempt for the rest of the world, he despised the entire universe from the height of his ignorance. When he said: “Nom d’un chien, what a spree!” he expressed the highest degree of admiration of which his mind was capable.
Having finally got rid of his peasants, Padoie inquired:
“How are you?”
“Pretty well, as you see. And how are you?”
“Quite well, thank you. It is very kind of you to have thought of coming to see us.”
“Oh, I have been thinking of it for some time; but, you know, in the military profession one has not much freedom.”
“Oh, I know, I know. All the same, it is very kind of you.”
“And Josephine, is she well?”
“Yes,