Emile Zola - THE LADIES' PARADISE

“And you,” resumed he, familiarly, “have you slept well?”

When Mouret replied that he had not been to bed, he shook his head, murmuring: “Bad habits.”

“Why?” replied the other, gaily. “I’m not so tired as you are, my dear fellow. You are half asleep now, you lead too quiet a life. Take a little amusement, that’ll wake you up a bit.”

This was their constant friendly dispute. Bourdoncle had, at the commencement, beaten his mistresses, because, said he, they prevented him sleeping. Now he professed to hate women, having, no doubt, chance love affairs of which he said nothing, so small was the place they occupied in his life; he contented himself with encouraging the extravagance of his lady customers, feeling the greatest disdain for their frivolity, which led them to ruin themselves in stupid gewgaws. Mouret, on the contrary, affected to worship them, remained before them delighted and cajoling, continually carried away by fresh love-affairs; and this served as an advertisement for his business. One would have said that he enveloped all the women in the same caress, the better to bewilder them and keep them at his mercy.

“I saw Madame Desforges last night,” said he; “she was looking delicious at the ball.”

“But it wasn’t with her that you went to supper, was it?” asked the other.

Mouret protested. “Oh! no, she’s very virtuous, my dear fellow. I went to supper with little Heloise, of the Folly. Stupid as a donkey, but so comical!”

He took another bundle of drafts and went on signing. Bourdoncle continued to walk about. He went and took a look through the lofty plate-glass windows, into the Rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin, then returned, saying: “You know they’ll have their revenge.”

“Who?” asked Mouret, who had lost the thread of the conversation.

“Why, the women.”

At this, Mouret became merrier still, displaying, beneath his sensual, adorative manner, his really brutal character. With a shrug of the shoulders he seemed to declare he would throw them all over, like so many empty sacks, when they had finished helping him to make his fortune. Bourdoncle obstinately repeated, in his cold way: “They will have their revenge; there will be one who will avenge all the others. It’s bound to be.”

“No fear,” cried Mouret, exaggerating his Southern accent. “That one isn’t born yet, my boy. And if she comes, you know—”

He had raised his penholder, brandishing it and pointing it in the air, as if he would have liked to stab some invisible heart with a knife. Bourdoncle resumed walking, bowing as usual before the superiority of the governor, whose genius, though faulty, had always got the better of him. He, so clear-headed, logical and passionless, incapable of falling, had yet to learn the feminine character of success, Paris yielding herself with a kiss to the boldest.

A silence reigned, broken only by Mouret’s pen. Then, in reply to his brief questions, Bourdoncle gave him the particulars of the great sale of winter novelties, which was to commence the following Monday. This was an important affair, and the house was risking its fortune in it; for the rumor had some foundation, Mouret was throwing himself into speculation like a poet, with such ostentation, such a determination to attain the colossal, that everything seemed bound to give way under him. It was quite a new style of doing business, an apparent commercial recklessness which had formerly made Madame Hédouin anxious, and which even now, notwithstanding the first successes, quite dismayed those who had capital in the business. They blamed the governor in secret for going too quick; accused him of having enlarged the establishment to a dangerous extent, before making sure of a sufficient increase of custom; above all, they trembled on seeing him put all the capital into one venture, filling the place with a pile of goods without leaving a sou in the reserve fund. Thus, for this sale, after the heavy sums paid to the builders, the whole capital was out, and it was once more a question of victory or death. And he, in the midst of all this excitement, preserved a triumphant gaiety, a certainty of gaining millions, like a man worshipped by the women, and who cannot be betrayed. When Bourdoncle ventured to express certain fears with reference to the too great development given to several not very productive departments, he broke out into a laugh full of confidence, and exclaimed:

“No fear! my dear fellow, the place is too small!”

The other appeared dumbfounded, seized with a fear he no longer attempted to conceal. The house too small! a draper’s shop having nineteen departments, and four hundred and three employees!

“Of course,” resumed Mouret, “we shall be obliged to enlarge our premises before another eighteen months. I’m seriously thinking about the matter. Last night Madame Desforges promised to introduce me to someone. In short, we’ll talk it over when the idea is ripe.”

And having finished signing his drafts, he got up, and tapped his lieutenant on the shoulder in a friendly manner, but the latter could not get over his astonishment. The fright felt by the prudent people around him amused Mouret. In one of his fits of brusque frankness with which he sometimes overwhelmed his familiars, he declared he was at heart a bigger Jew than all the Jews in the world; he took after his father, whom he resembled physically and morally, a fellow who knew the value of money; and, if his mother had given him that particle of nervous fantasy, why it was, perhaps, the principal element of his luck, for he felt the invincible force of his daring reckless grace.

“You know very well that we’ll stand by you to the last,” Bourdoncle finished by saying.

Before going down into the various departments to give their usual look round, they settled certain other details. They examined the specimen of a little book of account forms, which Mouret had just invented for use at the counters. Having remarked that the old-fashioned goods, the dead stock, went off all the more rapidly when the commission given to the employees was high, he had based on this observation a new system. In future he intended to interest his people in the sale of all goods, giving them a commission on the smallest piece of stuff, the slightest article sold: a system which had caused a revolution in the drapery trade, creating between the salespeople a struggle for existence of which the proprietor reaped the benefit. This struggle formed his favorite method, the principle of organization he constantly applied. He excited his employees’ passions, pitted one against the other, allowed the strongest to swallow up the weakest, fattening on this interested struggle. The specimen book was approved of; at the top of the two forms—the one retained, and the one torn off—were the particulars of the department and the salesman’s number; then there were columns on both for the measurement, description of the articles sold, and the price; the salesman simply signed the bill before handing it to the cashier. In this way an easy account was kept, it sufficed to compare the bills delivered by the cashier’s department to the clearinghouse with the salesmen’s counterfoils. Every week the latter would receive their commission, and that without the least possibility of any error.

“We sha’n’t be robbed so much,” remarked Bourdoncle, with satisfaction. “A very good idea of yours.”

“And I thought of something else last night,” explained Mouret. “Yes, my dear fellow, at the supper. I should like to give the clearinghouse clerks a trifle for every error found in checking. You can understand that we shall then be certain they won’t pass any, for they would rather invent some.”

He began to laugh, whilst the other looked at him in admiration. This new application of the struggle for existence delighted Mouret; he had a real genius for administrative business, and dreamed of organizing the house, so as to play upon the selfish instincts of his employees, for the complete and quiet satisfaction of his own appetites. He often said that to make people do their best, and even to keep them fairly honest, it was necessary to excite their selfish desires first.