GERMINAL
In spite of his firm voice, he was growing pale with increasing anxiety, as the flood of miners continued to swell. He would be relieved at mid-day; but fearing that he would not be able to hold out until then, he had sent a trammer from the pit to Montsou to ask for reinforcements.
Shouts had replied to him:
"Kill the blacklegs! Kill the Borains! We mean to be masters in our own place!"
Étienne drew back in despair. The end had come; there was nothing more except to fight and to die. And he ceased to hold back his mates. The mob moved up to the little troop. There were nearly four hundred of them, and the people from the neighbouring settlements were all running up. They all shouted the same cry. Maheu and Levaque said furiously to the soldiers:
"Get off with you! We have nothing against you! Get off with you!"
"This doesn't concern you," said Maheude. "Let us attend to our own affairs."
And, from behind, the Levaque woman added, more violently:
"Must we eat you to get through? Just clear out of the bloody place!"
Even Lydie's shrill voice was heard. She had crammed herself in more closely, with Bébert, and was saying, in a high voice:
"Oh! the pale-livered Tommies!"
Catherine, a few paces off, was gazing and listening, stupefied by new scenes of violence, into the midst of which ill-luck seemed to be always throwing her. Had she not suffered too much already? What fault had she committed, then, that misfortune would never give her any rest? The day before she had understood nothing of the fury of the strike; she thought that when one has one's share of blows it is useless to go and seek for more. And now her heart was swelling with hatred; she remembered what Étienne had once told her when they used to sit up; she tried to hear what he was now saying to the soldiers. He was treating them as mates; he reminded them that they also belonged to the people, and that they ought to be on the side of the people against those who took advantage of their wretchedness.
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