Kevin Putnam

Per. 2, Krucli

Sept. 30, 2003

Plot/Elements

 

Exposition: “ALONG ALL THE ROADS around Goderville the peasants and their wives were coming toward the burgh because it was market day. The men were proceeding with slow steps, the whole body bent forward at each movement of their long twisted legs; deformed by their hard work, by the weight on the plow which, at the same time, raised the left shoulder and swerved the figure, by the reaping of the wheat which made the knees spread to make a firm "purchase," by all the slow and painful labors of the country. Their blouses, blue, "stiff-starched," shining as if varnished, ornamented with a little design in white at the neck and wrists, puffed about their bony bodies, seemed like balloons ready to carry them off. From each of them two feet protruded.

“Some led a cow or a calf by a cord, and their wives, walking behind the animal, whipped its haunches with a leafy branch to hasten its progress. They carried large baskets on their arms from which, in some cases, chickens and, in others, ducks thrust out their heads. And they walked with a quicker, livelier step than their husbands. Their spare straight figures were wrapped in a scanty little shawl pinned over their flat bosoms, and their heads were enveloped in a white cloth glued to the hair and surmounted by a cap.

 

            The information tells about the town of Goderville and all of its features and traits. It explains the life of the animals and how bad it is almost with the explanation of the people. This is not a place you want to live.

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.

When Maitre Hauchcome picks the string off the ground, he commits the act that sets the story in motion. The simple act of picking up the piece of string will lead Malandain to accuse him of stealing the wallet and ultimately, to Hauchcome's death.

 

Rising Action: 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.

 

            When Hauchecome looked down and picked up the string you wonder why he picked it up in the first place. Then, Malandain saw him looking at this string and hauchecome hid it and looked away. There must be something special about that string.

 

Climax: "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.
And the meal concluded. They were finishing their coffee when a chief of the gendarmes appeared upon the threshold.
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.
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 climax shows the process of Hauchecome being accused of stealing the pocket book. Then someone comes forward to turn in the pocket book to start the falling action.

 

Falling Action: 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.
"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.

 

                In the falling action Houchecome is still feeling bad that they accused him of stealing the pocket book even though someone confessed to the taking of it.

 

Resolution (Denouement): 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.
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."

 

                Hauchecome dies at the end to finish up the story. He is proven innocent after being accused of stealing a pocket book when picking up a piece of string