The old woman was greatly impressed by this reasoning, and she went off, more thoughtful than usual, and quite calmed down.
Eight days later she walked into ’Toine’s room one morning with her apron full of eggs. And she said:
“I’ve just put the yellow hen in the nest with ten eggs under her. Now here’s ten for you. See that you don’t break them.”
’Toine, completely dumbfounded, asked:
“What do you want now?”
She answered:
“I want you to hatch them—you good-for-nothing.”
He laughed at first; but when he found she was serious he got mad, he resisted, he positively objected to letting her put the eggs under his arms to be hatched.
But the old woman cried out in a passion:
“Then you shan’t have a bit of grub until you take them. Now we’ll see if you hatch them or not!”
’Toine got uneasy and didn’t answer.
When he heard the clock strike twelve, he cried out:
“Hey, mother—got the soup ready yet?”
The old woman screamed from the kitchen:
“Got no soup for you, you overgrown lazy lout.”
He thought she was only joking, and he waited awhile;—then he begged, implored, swore, took a desperate turn to the North and a desperate turn to the South, hammered the wall with his fist—but he was obliged to yield and to let her put five eggs against his left side. Then he got his soup.
When his friends came, he looked so queer and so uneasy that they thought he must be sick.
Then they proceeded to play the daily game. But ’Toine seemed to find no fun in it, and he put out his hand very slowly—with infinite precaution.
“Got your arm tied up?” asked Horslaville.
’Toine responded:
“I’ve got a sort of a numbness in my shoulder.”
Suddenly they heard somebody entering the barroom. They stopped playing.
It was the mayor and the adjutant. They asked for two glasses of fine, and began to chat about public affairs. As they were talking very low, ’Toine wanted to put his ear against the partition to hear them, and as he gave a sudden “turn to the North,” forgetting the eggs, he found himself lying upon an omelette.
At the sound of the great oath which he swore, the old woman rushed in, and suspecting the disaster, discovered it with one pull at the bedclothes. At first she did nothing;—she was too indignant, too suffocated with fury at the sight of the yellow cataplasm smeared upon her old man’s side.
Then, trembling with rage, she flung herself upon the paralytic; and began to thump him with all her might on the stomach, just as if she was beating dirty linen at the pool. Her fists came down alternately with a dull thud—rapidly as the paws of a rabbit drumming.
The three friends of ’Toine laughed to split their sides—sneezed, coughed, screeched; as the big fat man parried his wife’s attacks with great caution, for fear of breaking the five eggs on the other side.
III
’Toine was vanquished. He had to hatch; he had to give up playing dominoes; he had to give up all active existence;—for the old woman ferociously cut off his rations every time he broke an egg.
So he lived upon his back, with his eyes on the ceiling—motionless—his arms lifted up like wings—while the chicken-germs were warmed against his sides.
He only talked in whispers, as if he were as afraid of noise as he was of motion; and he began to feel an anxious sympathy for the yellow hen that followed the same occupation as himself.
He would ask his wife:
“Did the yellow one eat last night?”
And the old woman would keep running from her husband to her chickens, and from her chickens to her husband—terribly busy with the chickens that were being hatched in the nest and in the bed.
The country folk who knew the story would come, very seriously and full of curious interest to ask after ’Toine. They would enter on tiptoe as if they were coming into a sick room, and say:
“Well, how is it?”
’Toine would answer:
“Well, it’s doing good enough; but it gives me the itch to be so hot;—makes all my skin creep.”
Now, one morning his wife came in, very much excited, and said:
“The yellow one has seven. There were three bad.”
’Toine felt his heart beat. He wondered how many he was going to have.
He asked.
“How long before it’ll happen.”
The old woman would answer angrily—herself anxious through fear of a failure.
“Got to hope so.”
They waited. Friends who knew the time was approaching, became anxious.
They talked about it everywhere; folks went from house to house to ask for news.
About three o’clock in the afternoon, ’Toine fell asleep. He had got into the habit of sleeping half the day. He was suddenly awakened by a tickling under his right arm. He put down his hand and seized a little creature covered with yellow down, which moved in his fingers.
His excitement was such that he yelled, and let go the chicken which began to run all over the bedclothes. The tavern was full of people. The customers all rushed in, and thronged in a circle as if round a mountebank’s performance; and the old woman came to carefully gather up the little bird which had hidden itself under her husband’s beard.
Nobody spoke. It was a warm April day. Through the open window could be heard the clucking of the old hen, calling her chickens.
’Toine, who was sweating with excitement, constraint, and anxiety, murmured:
“I’ve another under the left arm—right now!”
His wife plunged her long thin hand under the covers, and brought forth a second chick. …
The neighbours all wanted to see it. It was passed round from hand to hand, and carefully examined like a phenomenon.
For twenty minutes there were no more births;—then four chicks got out of their shells simultaneously.
And there was a great hum through the assembly. And ’Toine smiled, delighted with his success—beginning to feel quite
