Three days after this he gave the boy a kick, and it was not long before the child, when he heard him coming, ran into the Goujets', where there was always a corner at the table for him. Gervaise had long since resumed her work. She no longer lifted the globe of her clock to take out her bankbook; her savings were all gone, and it was necessary to count the sous pretty closely, for there were four mouths to feed, and they were all dependent on the work of her two hands. When anyone found fault with Coupeau and blamed him she always took his part. "Think how much he has suffered," she said with tears in her eyes. "Think of the shock to his nerves! Who can wonder that he is a little sour? Wait awhile, though, until he is perfectly well, and you will see that his temper will be as sweet as it ever was." And if anyone ventured to observe that he seemed quite well and that he ought to go to work she would exclaim: "No indeed, not yet. It would never do." She did not want him down in his bed again. She knew what the doctor had said, and she every day begged him to take his own time. She even slipped a little silver, into his vest pocket. All this Coupeau accepted as a matter of course. He complained of all sorts of pains and aches to gain a little longer period of indolence and at the end of six months had begun to look upon himself as a confirmed invalid. He almost daily dropped into a wineshop with a friend; it was a place where he could chat a little, and where was the harm? Besides, whoever heard of a glass of wine killing a man? But he swore to himself that he would never touch anything but wine--not a drop of brandy should pass his lips. Wine was good for one--prolonged one's life, aided digestion--but brandy was a very different matter. Notwithstanding all these wise resolutions, it came to pass more than once that he came in, after visiting a dozen different cabarets, decidedly tipsy. On these occasions Gervaise locked her doors and declared she was ill, to prevent the Goujets from seeing her husband. The poor woman was growing very sad. Every night and morning she passed the shop for which she had so ardently longed. She made her calculations over and over again until her brain was dizzy. Two hundred and fifty francs for rent, one hundred and fifty for moving and the apparatus she needed, one hundred francs to keep things going until business began to come in. No, it could not be done under five hundred francs. She said nothing of this to anyone, deterred only by the fear of seeming to regret the money she had spent for her husband during his illness. She was pale and dispirited at the thought that she must work five years at least before she could save that much money. One evening Gervaise was alone. Goujet entered, took a chair in silence and looked at her as he smoked his pipe. He seemed to be revolving something in his mind. Suddenly he took his pipe from his mouth.