The prisoner Brument interrupted her statement vehemently; he declared:
“I was tipsy.”
Whereupon Cornu, turning towards his fellow criminal, pronounced in a voice as deep as the note of an organ:
“Say that I was tipsy as well and you’ll be telling no lies.”
The president, severely: “You wish us to understand that you were drunk?”
Brument: “Yes, I was tipsy all right.”
Cornu: “It might happen to anyone.”
The president, to the victim: “Proceed with your statement, Mme. Brument.”
“Well, then Brument said to me: ‘D’you want to earn five francs?’ ‘Yes,’ said I, seeing you don’t pick five francs up in every gutter. Then he says to me: ‘Keep your eyes open and do as I do,’ and then he goes and fetches the big empty barrel that stands under the spout at the corner; and then he turns it up, and then he carries it into my kitchen, and then he sets it down in the middle of the floor, and then he says to me: ‘Go and fetch enough water to fill it.’
“So then I goes to the pond with two buckets and I fetch water, and still more water for nigh on an hour, seeing that barrel’s as big as a vat, saving your honour, Mr. President.
“While I was doing it, Brument and Cornu were having a drink, and then another drink, and then another drink. They were filling themselves up together, and I said: ‘It’s you that’s full, fuller than the barrel.’ And then that Brument answers: ‘Don’t you worry, get on with your job, your turn’s coming, everyone gets what’s coming to them.’ I takes no notice of his talk, seeing he was tipsy.
“When the barrel was full to the brim, I says: ‘There, I’ve done it.’
“And then Cornu gives me five francs. Not Brument—Cornu; it was Cornu gave me them. And Brument says to me: ‘Do you want to earn another five francs?’
“ ‘Yes,’ says I, seeing I’m not used to such presents.
“Then he says to me:
“ ‘Strip.’
“ ‘You want me to strip?’
“ ‘Yes,’ he says.
“ ‘How far do you want me to strip?’
“He says to me:
“ ‘If you don’t like it, keep your chemise on, we’ve no objection to that.’
“Five francs is five francs, so I strips, but I didn’t like stripping in front of those two good-for-nothings. I takes off my bonnet, and then my bodice, and then my petticoat, and then my sabots. Brument says to me: ‘Keep your stockings on, we’re decent fellows, we are.’
“And that Cornu repeats: ‘We’re decent fellows, we are.’
“And there I am, like our mother Eve, as you might say. And they stands up, but they couldn’t stand straight, they was so drunk, saving your honour, Mr. President.
“I says to them: ‘What mischief are you up to?’
“And Brument says: ‘Are we ready?’
“Cornu says: ‘Ready it is.’
“And then they takes me, Brument by the head and Cornu by the feet, as you might say taking up a bundle of dirty clothes. I bawls, I does. And Brument says: ‘Shut up, you silly wretch.’
“And then they lifts me up in their arms, and sticks me in the barrel full of water, and they put the heart across me, and I was chilled to my very innards.
“And Brument says:
“ ‘Anything else?’
“Cornu says:
“ ‘No, that’s all.’
“Brument says:
“ ‘The head’s not in, and it counts.’
“Cornu says:
“ ‘Put her head in.’
“And then Brument pushes in my head as it might be to drown me, until the water ran up my nose and I thought I was seeing Paradise. And he gives me a push. And I went under.
“And then he must have had a fright. He pulled me out and says to me: ‘Go quick and dry yourself, you skinny wretch.’
“I rushes off and I runs to the priest’s, and he lends me a petticoat of his servant’s, seeing I’m in my skin, and he goes to fetch Mister Chicot, the village policeman, who goes to Cliquetot to fetch the gendarmes, and they come with me to the house.
“And there we find Brument and Cornu going for each other like two rams.
“Brument was bawling: ‘It’s not true, I tell you, it’s at least a cubic metre. It’s the measure that’s wrong.’
“Cornu was bawling: ‘Four buckets, that doesn’t make as much as you could call half a cubic metre. You needn’t say anything more, that’s what it is.’
“The sergeant puts his hands on their heads. That’s all I have to say.”
She sat down. There was laughter in the court. The astonished jurymen stared at each other. The president said solemnly:
“Prisoner Cornu, you appear to be the instigator of this infamous plot. Have you anything to say?”
And Cornu stood up in his turn.
“Your Worship, I was tipsy.”
The president replied gravely:
“I know you were. Go on.”
“I am going on. Well, Brument came to my place about nine o’clock, and he orders two brandies and says: ‘Have one with me, Cornu.’ And I sits down with him and drinks and I offers him another, out of politeness. Then he called for two more, and I did the same, and we went on, drinking brandy after brandy, until about twelve we were blind.
“Then Brument begins to cry. I feels very sorry for him. I asks him what’s the matter. He says: ‘I must have a thousand francs by Thursday.’ When I heard that, it turns me cold, you understand. And all of a sudden he comes out with the proposal: ‘I’ll sell you my wife.’
“I was tipsy and I’m a widower. It fairly got me, understand. I didn’t know his wife, but a wife’s a wife, isn’t she? I asks him: ‘How much will you sell her for?’
“He thinks it over, or rather he pretends to think it over. When a man’s tipsy, he’s not in his right wits, and he answers: ‘I’ll sell her by the cubic metre.’
“That doesn’t
