46.
Monsieur Dumarteau ate rapidly so as not to miss the hour of the auction. Like an actor, refining his expressions before entering the scene, Monsieur Dumarteau smiled. He smiled at the serving woman, and when she returned to the kitchen, he smiled at the lambchop, the carafe, or just into space. Monsieur Dumarteau understood that his smile was the secret to his success, and he practised it constantly, giving it greater power and nuance. His lunch completed, he left.
He was hurrying along the avenue toward the Ralep when Charrigou approached. "Pardon me, echcuse me, monchieur the auctioneer," he said. "I have a schkeme to echplain." Monsieur the auctioneer was not pleased to be slowed down like this, but the metal dealer was a good customer. He responded, lighting up a smile, that he would be absolutely delighted to talk, but he was running late, and would have to chat on the fly.
"That'sh fine, that'sh fine," replied Charrigou. "It'sh about the shale I want to talk. I have my eye on five of the autosh, not to drive around in, for sure" (here the jovial fellow gives a great laugh) "but for shcrap metal. Only, if my competitor Fouillade shees me bid, he'll bid too, jusht to make a farsh of it. And that'll get too eshpenshive. Sho I'm not going to the shale, I'm shending my coujin. Fouillade won't know her. You'll recognize her because she'll be dreshed like a peashant. When she looksh at you and givesh you a nod and a shmile like thish, add one hundred shous to the bid. Fouillade will shupect nothing. You like that?" "Of course, my dear Monsieur Charrigou!" "Very happy that you're agreeable."
The two separated and Monsieur Dumarteau hurried on his way. Two o'clock was ringing when he arrived at the Ralep. "Ladies and gentlemen," he said with a gentle, contrite smile. "I'm running a little behind schedule. I hope you will excuse me." The sale of the first machines passed quickly and without incident. The sixth was one of the ones that Charrigou was after. Maybe his enemy Fouillade suspected that, because he opened the bidding at a hundred francs. "One hundred francs," repeated the auctioneer. "Will anyone give me more? Make your bids, ladies and gentlemen. Going for one hundred francs." While delivering his spiel he sought out the eyes of the cousin of Charrigou.
In the third row he noticed a peasant. Judging her shy, or not well acquainted with the practices of the auction, he saluted her with a nod of the head and an engaging smile. She responded with a similar nod; her morose and wrinkled face contracted, and a sort of grimace played across her lips.
"Is that the cousin?" wondered Dumarteau, perplexed. "Was that a bid? She nodded her head, but I know smiles, and that was no smile, so that can't be the cousin. Where can the cousin be?"
47.
Seeing no other peasant, or any other person making the least sign, he was about to declare Fouillade the winner, when Bécassine made her appearance. Kept in the office by a task the chief had assigned her, she had, to her vast regret, missed the beginning of the auction. Not without stirring up some loud complaints, she made it to the first row, right in front of Monsieur Dumarteau.
Once more recognizing the friendliness that he had shown her earlier, she gave him her best smile and her deepest bow. The auctioneer was convinced that this time her had discovered the cousin. "There is a bid for one hundred and five frances," he said.
"One hundred ten!" cried Fouillade. Monsieur Dumarteau turned his perpetual smile toward Bécassine, who, not wishing to be outdone, smiled back. "One hundred fifteen," he said. "One hundred twenty," Fouillade shot back. The smiles and the bids followed in rapid sucession. At four hundred francs the metal dealer got cold feet.
"Sold at four hundred francs," pronounced Monsieur Dumarteau, "and not to Monsieur Fouillade." The dapper auctioneer was exultant. Never had a Ralep auto gone for so much. Vexed, Fouillade clenched his teeth and his fists, promising himself revenge with the next cars. But he didn't obtain a single one, the same exchange of smiles having started, keeping the auctioneer set in his error. At the end, Monsieur Dumarteau asked Bécassine her name, and then he announced, "Cars 6 to 10 are sold for a grand total of 3,722 francs plus fees, to Mademoiselle Annaïk Labornez, known as Bécassine."
"Eh? What?" she cried to the heavens, dumbfounded. "I didn't buy anything! And how am I supposed to pay? I have only 122 francs and 30 sous to my name!"
That declaration raised such a tumult as has never before been seen at public auction. The colonel, the cousin, Monsieur Dumarteau, who had now lost his smile, surrounded poor Bécassine and heaped invective on her. As she does in any moment of crisis, she burst into tears.
48.
These past few weeks, made so emotional by my change in jobs, I haven't been able to write. So I told my story to a gentleman from La Semaine de Suzette. He visited Madame de Grand-Air, who instructed him to write them up for you. Now that my nerves are calmer, I take up my Memoirs once again. I very much hope that nothing interrupts me this time. I've already written down ten lines without an ink blot -- a good sign!
We left off at the point where, unsuspecting, I bought ten old cars from the Ralep. Lady! I wasn't laughing at the thought of all that money to pay, which I didn't have, which might get me stuck in prison, or of all that scrap metal I'd let fall into my hands to entangle me. Not to mention that everyone was shouting about me, and not exactly compliments. When I get called nothing but a fool, I'd just as soon hold out for flattery.
Finally Monsieur Dumarteau regained his composure and his smile. He announced, "There has been a joke bid. We will restart the auction at the young girl's risk. If the results are lower than those for her, she will pay the difference out of her own pocket. We'll begin with auto number 9." You think my heart was pounding? So that the auctioneer couldn't take a smile or an involuntary nod of the head as a bid, I turned my back. But it was as if I had eyes and ears all over my head. I didn't miss a word or a gesture that came from the crowd. Ah well! Here's proof that you should never despair, and that things, even when they look the most catastrophic, can turn out for the best. The peasant began to make bids. Someone had told Fouillade that she was the sister of his rival Charrigou. That put him in a fury. They were enraged the one by the other. They were such fierce opponents that they drove the total price of the autos fifty francs higher than it was before.
And who do you think profitted from those fifty francs? It was your servant. Monsieur Dumarteau handed them to me with the most beautiful smile I've seen him give, and God knows I've seen him give a few! At the same time he called me his dear customer, and everyone who had badmouthed me minutes before now came to shake my hand. So take it from me ...
49.
... and don't give up hope. Happiness and sadness come at the pleasure of God.
There was still someone who didn't think too highly of me: the colonel. She seemed more spiteful and glared at me with eyes more furious than ever. Maubec told me why later: she's vain and likes to draw everyone's attention. Since everyone had been preoccupied with me and it was toward me that the auctioneer had directed all his smiles, she was in a rage.
Her face, which was ordinarily a lemon yellow, had gone orange, blood orange even, so that you would think she was coming down with jaundice. She tore her handkerchief to pieces, muttering, "A girl with nothing who buys autos! And instead of being punished, she's paid money. It's a scandal!" Then she came up to me, and, rolling her eyes and her Rs, she cried, "I rrrepeat: an auto rrunning in eight days, or, the firing squad." And she made her exit, arms waving.
Maubec was nearby. In his tranquil manner he said, "You don't need to do anything. She's crazy." And then a man I hadn't noticed until then separated from the crowd and came over to me. I recognized the vagabond I had seen before. "Have no fear, my good Bécassine," he said. "I watch. I work. Soon you and your colleagues will be free of that shrew." He moved off, giving me, just like last time, a gesture of discretion. His words, and those of Maubec, gave me cheer. It's not that I was afraid. I'm happy to be ordinary and maybe a little narrow-minded. I know that they wouldn't shoot a good-hearted girl just because an auto ran or didn't run. These aren't the days of the Huns and Iroquois. Instead of frightening me, the threats of that mean woman made me angry. I spat on the earth and raised my hand, the way we make a solemn oath in the Labornez family, in which I was born the one and only descendent. I swore, "By my faith, Bécassine, I will make an auto run."
And then I reflected on how to fulfil my oath. When I reflect, which isn't every day, it takes time and wears me out tremendously. Then I have to take a rest. First thing is to sit down.
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