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Exposition
Suddenly the drum beat in the court before the house. Everybody rose, except a
few indifferent persons, and ran to the door or to the windows, their mouths still full and napkins in their hands.
After
the public crier had ceased his drumbeating he called out in a jerky voice, speaking his phrases irregularly:
"It is hereby
made known to the inhabitants of Goderville, and in general to all persons present at the market, that there was lost this
morning on the road to Benzeville, between nine and ten o'clock, a black leather pocketbook containing five hundred francs
and some business papers. The finder is requested to return same with all haste to the mayor's office or to Maître Fortune
Houlbreque of Manneville; there will be twenty francs reward."
Then the man went away. The heavy roll of the drum and
the crier's voice were again heard at a distance.
Then they began to talk of this event, discussing the chances that Maître
Houlbreque had of finding or not finding his pocketbook.
This segment of the story is laying
out what is going to occur in the plot and is giving background info towards what's going to happen in the future of the story
Inciting Incident
Maître Hauchecome of Breaute had just arrived at Goderville,
and he was directing his steps toward the public square when he perceived upon the ground a little piece of string. Maître
Hauchecome, economical like a true Norman, thought that everything useful ought to be picked up, and he bent painfully, for
he suffered from rheumatism. He took the bit of thin cord from the ground and began to roll it carefully when he noticed Maître
Malandain, the harness maker, on the threshold of his door, looking at him. They had heretofore had business together on the
subject of a halter, and they were on bad terms, both being good haters. Maître Hauchecome was seized with a sort of shame
to be seen thus by his enemy, picking a bit of a head. two arms and string out of the dirt. He concealed his "find" quickly
under his blouse, then in his trousers' pocket; then he pretended to be still looking on the ground for something which he
did not find, and he went toward the market, his head forward, bent double by his pains.
He was soon lost in the noisy
and slowly moving crowd which was busy with interminable bargainings. The peasants milked, went and came, perplexed, always
in fear of being cheated, not daring to decide, watching the vender's eye, ever trying to find the trick in the man and the
flaw in the beast.
This segment of the story introduces the first major conflict in the
play by finding the a little piece of string on the ground
Rising Action
He inquired:
"Is Maître Hauchecome of Breaute here?"
Maître Hauchecome, seated at the other end of the table,
replied:
"Here I am."
And the officer resumed:
"Maître Hauchecome, will you have the goodness to accompany me
to the mayor's office? The mayor would like to talk to you."
The peasant, surprised and disturbed, swallowed at a draught
his tiny glass of brandy, rose and, even more bent than in the morning, for the first steps after each rest were specially
difficult, set out, repeating: "Here I am, here I am."
The mayor was awaiting him, seated on an armchair. He was the notary
of the vicinity, a stout, serious man with pompous phrases.
"Maître Hauchecome," said he, "you were seen this morning
to pick up, on the road to Benzeville, the pocketbook lost by Maître Houlbreque of Manneville."
The countryman, astounded,
looked at the mayor, already terrified by this suspicion resting on him without his knowing why.
"Me? Me? Me pick up the
pocketbook?"
"Yes, you yourself."
"Word of honor, I never heard of it."
"But you were seen."
"I was seen,
me? Who says he saw me?"
"Monsieur Malandain, the harness maker."
The old man remembered, understood and flushed with
anger.
"Ah, he saw me, the clodhopper, he saw me pick up this string here, M'sieu the Mayor." And rummaging in his pocket,
he drew out the little piece of string.
But the mayor, incredulous, shook his head.
"You will not make me believe,
Maître Hauchecome, that Monsieur Malandain, who is a man worthy of credence, mistook this cord for a pocketbook."
The
peasant, furious, lifted his hand, spat at one side to attest his honor, repeating:
"It is nevertheless the truth of the
good God, the sacred truth, M'sieu the Mayor. I repeat it on my soul and my salvation."
The mayor resumed:
"After
picking up the object you stood like a stilt, looking a long while in the mud to see if any piece of money had fallen out."
The good old man choked with indignation and fear.
"How anyone can tell--how anyone can tell--such lies to take away
an honest man's reputation! How can anyone---"
There was no use in his protesting; nobody believed him. He was con.
fronted
with Monsieur Malandain, who repeated and maintained his affirmation. They abused each other for an hour. At his own request
Maître Hauchecome was searched; nothing was found on him.
Finally the mayor, very much perplexed, discharged him with
the warning that he would consult the public prosecutor and ask for further orders.
The news had spread. As he left the
mayor's office the old man was sun rounded and questioned with a serious or bantering curiosity in which there was no indignation.
He began to tell the story of the string. No one believed him. They laughed at him.
He went along, stopping his friends,
beginning endlessly his statement and his protestations, showing his pockets turned inside out to prove that he had nothing.
They said:
"Old rascal, get out!"
And he grew angry, becoming exasperated, hot and distressed at not
being
believed, not knowing what to do and always repeating himself.
Night came. He must depart. He started on his way with
three neighbors to whom he pointed out the place where he had picked up the bit of string, and all along the road he spoke
of his adventure.
In the evening he took a turn in the village of Breaute in order to tell it to everybody. He only met
with incredulity.
It made him ill at night
Climax
The next day about one o'clock in
the afternoon Marius Paumelle, a hired man in the employ of Maître Breton, husbandman at Ymanville, returned the pocketbook
and its contents to Maître Houlbreque of Manneville.
This man claimed to have found the object in the road, but not knowing
how to read, he had carried it to the house and given it to his employer.
The news spread through the neighborhood. Maître
Hauchecome was informed of it. He immediately went the circuit and began to recount his story completed by the happy climax.
He was in triumph.
This part of the story is the turning point of the action, because the
pocketbook and its contents were returned to Maitre Houlbreque
Falling Action
"What
grieved me so much was not the thing itself as the lying. There is nothing so shameful as to be placed under a cloud on account
of a lie."
He talked of his adventure all day long; he told it on the highway to people who were passing by, in the wineshop
to people who were drinking there and to persons coming out of church the following Sunday. He stopped strangers to tell them
about it. He was calm now, and yet something disturbed him without his knowing exactly what it was. People had the air of
joking while they listened. They did not seem convinced. He seemed to feel that remarks were being made behind his back.
On
Tuesday of the next week he went to the market at Goderville, urged solely by the necessity he felt of discussing the case.
Malandain, standing at his door, began to laugh on seeing him pass. Why?
He approached a farmer from Crequetot who
did not let him finish and, giving him a thump in the stomach, said to his face:
"You big rascal."
Then he turned
his back on him.
Maître Hauchecome was confused; why was he called a big rascal?
When he was seated at the table in
Jourdain's tavern he commenced to explain "the affair."
A horse dealer from Monvilliers called to him:
"Come, come,
old sharper, that's an old trick; I know all about your piece of string!"
Hauchecome stammered:
"But since the pocketbook
was found."
But the other man replied:
"Shut up, papa, there is one that finds and there is one that reports. At any
rate you are mixed with it."
The peasant stood choking. He understood. They accused him of having had the pocketbook returned
by a confederate, by an accomplice.
He tried to protest. All the table began to laugh.
He could not finish his dinner
and went away in the midst of jeers.
He went home ashamed and indignant, choking with anger and confusion, the more dejected
that he was capable, with his Norman cunning, of doing what they had accused him of and ever boasting of it as of a good turn.
His innocence to him, in a confused way, was impossible to prove, as his sharpness was known. And he was stricken to the heart
by the injustice of the suspicion.
Then he began to recount the adventures again, prolonging his history every day, adding
each time new reasons, more energetic protestations,more solemn oaths which he imagined and prepared in his hours of solitude,
his whole mind given up to the story of the string. He was believed so much the less as his defense was more complicated and
his arguing more subtile.
"Those are lying excuses," they said behind his back.
He felt it, consumed his heart over
it and wore himself out with useless efforts. He wasted away before their very eyes.
This
is the event after the climax, and the story is coming to its end, but the plot is not yet solved
Denouement
(Resolution)
The wags now made him tell about the string to amuse them, as they make a soldier who has been on
a campaign tell about his battles. His mind, touched to the depth, began to weaken.
Toward the end of December he took
to his bed.
He died in the first days of January, and in the delirium of his death struggles he kept claiming his innocence,
reiterating:
"A piece of string, a piece of string--look--here it is, M'sieu the Mayor."
The
tangles of the plot are untied and the mystery is now solved
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