Page:Germinal - Zola - 1925.djvu/140

GERMINAL to accept this rapid promotion, glad of the growing esteem in which Maheu held him.

In the evening they returned together to the pit to take note of the placards. The cuttings put up to auction were in the Filonnière seam in the north gallery of the Voreux. They did not seem very advantageous, and the miner shook his head when the young man read out the conditions. On the following day when they had gone down, he took him to see the seam, and showed him how far away it was from the pit-eye, the crumbly nature of the earth, the thinness and hardness of the coal. But if they were to eat they would have to work. So on the following Sunday they went to the auction which took place in the shed, and was presided over by the engineer of the pit, assisted by the head captain, in the absence of the divisional engineer. From five to six hundred miners were there in front of the little platform which was placed in the corner, and the fixtures went on so rapidly that one only heard a deep tumult of voices, of shouted figures drowned by other figures.

For a moment Maheu feared that he would not be able to obtain one of the forty workings offered by the Company. All the rivals went lower, disquieted by the rumours of a crisis and the panic of a lock-out. Négrel, the engineer, did not hurry in the face of this panic, and allowed the offers to fall to the lowest possible figures, while Dansaert, anxious to push matters still further, lied with regard to the quality of the workings. In order to get his fifty mètres, Maheu struggled with a comrade who was also obstinate; in turn they each took off a centime from the tram; and if he conquered in the end it was only by lowering the wage to such an extent, that the captain, Richomme, who was standing behind him muttered between his teeth, and pushed him with the elbow, growling that he could never do it at that price.

When they came out Étienne was swearing. And he broke out before Chaval who was returning from the wheat-fields in company with Catherine, amusing himself while his father-in-law was absorbed in serious business.

"By God!" he exclaimed, "it's simply slaughter! To-day it is the worker who is forced to devour the worker!"

Chaval was furious. He would never have lowered it, he wouldn't! And Zacharie who had come out of curiosity, [128]