Charles looked at him without comprehending, and went back to his
play.

But all were chilled. Without the set expression of her countenance
changing Aunt Dide wept, a flood of tears rolled from her living eyes
over her dead cheeks. Her gaze fixed immovably upon the boy, she wept
slowly, endlessly. A great thing had happened.

And now an extraordinary emotion took possession of Pascal. He caught
Clotilde by the arm and pressed it hard, trying to make her
understand. Before his eyes appeared the whole line, the legitimate
branch and the bastard branch, which had sprung from this trunk
already vitiated by neurosis. Five generations were there present--the
Rougons and the Macquarts, Adelaide Fouque at the root, then the
scoundrelly old uncle, then himself, then Clotilde and Maxime, and
lastly, Charles. Felicite occupied the place of her dead husband.
There was no link wanting; the chain of heredity, logical and
implacable, was unbroken. And what a world was evoked from the depths
of the tragic cabin which breathed this horror that came from the
far-off past in such appalling shape that every one, notwithstanding
the oppressive heat, shivered.

"What is it, master?" whispered Clotilde, trembling.

"No, no, nothing!" murmured the doctor. "I will tell you later."

Macquart, who alone continued to sneer, scolded the old mother. What
an idea was hers, to receive people with tears when they put
themselves out to come and make her a visit. It was scarcely polite.