Fauconnier, a fat woman, still good looking, first put in an appearance;
she wore a chintz dress with a flowery pattern, a pink tie and a cap
over-trimmed with flowers. Next came Mademoiselle Remanjou, looking very
thin in the eternal black dress which she seemed to keep on even when
she went to bed; and the two Gaudrons--the husband, like some heavy
animal and almost bursting his brown jacket at the slightest movement,
the wife, an enormous woman, whose figure indicated evident signs of an
approaching maternity and whose stiff violet colored skirt still more
increased her rotundity. Coupeau explained that they were not to
wait for My-Boots; his comrade would join the party on the Route de
Saint-Denis.

"Well!" exclaimed Madame Lerat as she entered, "it'll pour in torrents
soon! That'll be pleasant!"

And she called everyone to the door of the wineshop to see the clouds
as black as ink which were rising rapidly to the south of Paris. Madame
Lerat, eldest of the Coupeaus, was a tall, gaunt woman who talked
through her nose. She was unattractively dressed in a puce-colored robe
that hung loosely on her and had such long dangling fringes that
they made her look like a skinny poodle coming out of the water. She
brandished her umbrella like a club. After greeting Gervaise, she said,
"You've no idea. The heat in the street is like a slap on the face.
You'd think someone was throwing fire at you."

Everyone agreed that they knew the storm was coming. It was in the air.
Monsieur Madinier said that he had seen it as they were coming out of
the church. Lorilleux mentioned that his corns were aching and he hadn't
been able to sleep since three in the morning. A storm was due. It had
been much too hot for three days in a row.