"You look very fine. Where did you get that dress? Come here and let me arrange it for you a little. You devil! There he is again!" And he leaped at the wall, but the soft cushions threw him back. "Whom do you see?" asked the young doctor. "Lantier! Lantier!" Gervaise could not endure the eyes of the young man, for the scene brought back to her so much of her former life. Coupeau fancied, as he had been thrown back from the wall in front, that he was now attacked in the rear, and he leaped over the mattress with the agility of a cat. His respiration grew shorter and shorter, his eyes starting from their sockets. "He is killing her!" he shrieked. "Killing her! Just see the blood!" He fell back against the wall with his hands wide open before him, as if he were repelling the approach of some frightful object. He uttered two long, low groans and then fell flat on the mattress. "He is dead! He is dead!" moaned Gervaise. The keeper lifted Coupeau. No, he was not dead; his bare feet quivered with a regular motion. The surgeon in chief came in, bringing two colleagues. The three men stood in grave silence, watching the man for some time. They uncovered him, and Gervaise saw his shoulders and back. The tremulous motion had now taken complete possession of the body as well as the limbs, and a strange ripple ran just under the skin. "He is asleep," said the surgeon in chief, turning to his colleagues. Coupeau's eyes were closed, and his face twitched convulsively. Coupeau might sleep, but his feet did nothing of the kind. Gervaise, seeing the doctors lay their hands on Coupeau's body, wished to do the same. She approached softly and placed her hand on his shoulder and left it there for a minute. What was going on there? A river seemed hurrying on under that skin. It was the liquor of the Assommoir, working like a mole through muscle, nerves, bone and marrow. The doctors went away, and Gervaise, at the end of another hour, said to the young surgeon: "He is dead, sir." But the surgeon, looking at the feet, said: "No," for those poor feet were still dancing. Another hour, and yet another passed. Suddenly the feet were stiff and motionless, and the young surgeon turned to Gervaise. "He is dead," he said. Death alone had stopped those feet. When Gervaise went back she was met at the door by a crowd of people who wished to ask her questions, she thought. "He is dead," she said quietly as she moved on. But no one heard her. They had their own tale to tell then. How Poisson had nearly murdered Lantier. Poisson was a tiger, and he ought to have seen what was going on long before. And Boche said the woman had taken the shop and that Lantier was, as usual, in luck again, for he adored tripe. In the meantime Gervaise went directly to Mme Lerat and Mme Lorilleux and said faintly: "He is dead--after four days of horror."