Through the mouth of his hero, provincial lawyer Abel Bretodo, the author, year after year, from 1953 to 1967, sets out a chronicle of the daily life of the family. According to Abel, novelists are usually only interested in the beginning and end of love, but not its middle. “And where, one wonders, is married life itself?” He exclaims. However, the author’s attitude towards marriage is partially expressed in the epigraph explaining the name of the novel: “I call the word Matrimoine everything that is naturally dependent on a woman in marriage, and also everything that nowadays tends to turn the lioness’s share into the lion's share”.
Novice attorney Abel Bretodo, the only son in the family, falls in love with the daughter of the shopkeeper Mariette Guimarch. In the Guimarch family, besides Mariette, there are four more children: two unmarried sisters Simon and Arlette, the older sister Ren, who married a wealthy Parisian aristocrat much older than herself, and Eric, whose wife, Gabriel, gives him the third girl. Having married Mariette, Abel, in fact, becomes as if one of the members of the large Guimarch family. Abel brings his wife to his house, where before that lived six generations of Bretodo. From the very first steps, Mariette behaves like a hostess in him and takes up violent activities to update and replace everything and everything.
Every day, Mariette hangs on the phone for a long time - she is used to consulting Madame Guimarch in everything. The town of Angers, where both families live, is small, so my mother-in-law often comes to young spouses. The benefits of her visits: dishes prepared by Mariette under her leadership are much more edible than those that she cooks herself.
At the end of the first year of marriage, Abel, who loves to take stock, compiles a peculiar list of the strengths and weaknesses of his wife: eight qualities speak in her favor and the same amount is against. And one more disappointing conclusion: the wife spends too much. Abel takes up any work, but there is still not enough money, because the ladies' magazines that Mariette reads constantly offer something new in terms of housekeeping.
And here is the event that Mariette was looking forward to: they will have a child. Abel is glad, but it’s still difficult for him to determine his attitude to the incident.
After the birth of Nicola, the wife becomes primarily a mother. The son is the center and the meaning of her existence. “A steak is cooked for the father and the mayonnaise is almost beaten up - it doesn’t matter: let the meat burn, let the mayonnaise fall, but only a special alarm clock (a wonderful invention that starts once a day during feeding hours) gave a signal - of course, drop everything. There can be no delay. ” The problems associated with the person of the husband completely disappear.
Mariette completely subordinates himself to the baby. It seems to Abel that “it is a child, and nothing else, that allows you to really feel the main disaster of married life: these constant transitions from the inexpressible to the stupid, from admiration to disgust, from honey to litter are terrible.” Abel understands perfectly well the parents who give their children to the nanny, and thereby maintain their habits, their daily routine, as well as their respectability. The latter is especially important for Abel’s work: clients come to him, and the children's squeal does not contribute to business conversations. The wife’s desire to “have everything” for the child, he regards as an attempt to limit primarily his requests. After all, money in a family flows like water. “My wife gave me a child, I give her the wallet,” Abel muses sadly. Soon Louis is born, and then twins - Marianne and Yvonne. Abel is horrified: in little Angers there are no major criminals, which means there is no hope for noisy processes. So how can a lawyer increase his budget? “Fathers have a heart ache under a wallet that is thin. With mothers, the heart rejoices under the breast that has poured, ”his uncle Tio consoles Abel.
And now - money is mercilessly destroyed. But at the same time, everything becomes terribly simple: “Madame Bretodo is gone or almost gone. Mariette barely cuts out an hour a day to take the kids out for a walk. He neglects his toilet so much that you can easily make a mistake by mistaking her for a governess from a good house. With the exception of a few hasty forays into department stores, Mariette became as invisible as the good half of Angers’s female population. ” Between the husband and wife grows a wall of apron and household utensils.
What is family talk about? Of course, about the children. Mariette completely ceased to be interested in her husband's work, but regularly requires money for children and household. It seems to Abel that Mariette is doing too much for the children. “In fact, she already has no time to live on her own,” he concludes.
Quarrels between spouses become rare - they rarely see each other - but solid: balanced Abel, in his heart feeling like an "evil shark", breaks down to a cry. Guimarchs, the manners of which master Bretodo refers only to “syrup,” act as peacekeepers and give the family a new large refrigerator, for which Abel has no money.
And so Mr. Lawyer, who lost the battle at the level of reason, gives the floor to Abel, trying to comprehend what is happening to him and his wife. It seems to him that the "cackling hen" forever replaced the old "cooing doves." He reasoned: “From time to time, you will start running away from home: you must speak at the trial in Rennes, in Mans, in Type. You will be willing to agree to trips, even start looking for them in order to get a respite. Two or three times, no more - because rapprochement is also an art, and besides, you need money and not enough time - you will take these trips to have fun with some strangers, and if one of them tells you at dawn, that she is married, it will outrage you and provoke the thought: “Here is a whore if Mariette did this to me?” However, you will clearly recognize that this is not the same thing. You will not leave the feeling that you did not violate marital fidelity, you were married, married and staying and are not going to encroach on the peace of your family. ”
Abel cheats on his wife with her young relative Annik. But in a small town, the life of each of its inhabitants takes place in front of everyone, and their romance quickly ends. In fact, Abel is happy about this - he does not have the strength to break with his family.
Abel does not know if Mariette is aware of his betrayal. Intending to restore peace in the family, he was surprised to notice that his wife had visited a hairdresser. Moreover, she begins to do gymnastics and follow a diet. Abel begins to look at his wife in a new way: how can he rebuke her for the constant fuss? The education received by his wife was “completely erased with an eraser,” but what did he do to prevent this? “Have you heard of a continuous working day?” Without any reward. No vacation. Without retirement, ”he recalls Mariette’s caustic remark. And among the seemingly hopeless everyday life, Abel still finds a ray of happiness: these are the smiles of his children.
And here is the result that the hero brings. "My dear! I'm dreaming! I ask myself, where is the one I married? Here she is, here; and where is the one you married? And he is here too. As we are now. Much has ended for both of us. I wanted to say that the thought that everything could have ended differently ended. Well, what will be the future for us? My God, it depends on the goodwill of each of us. It’s enough to assume that there is no complete happiness in the world (show me such happiness), and then the feeling of disaster will disappear, because the marriage did not succeed, you will consider it purely relative and cease to be touched by your sorrows. ”
“Take a look. It is not evening yet. Transparent twilight still lasts, at the time of the summer solstice it is long so light that a sunset ray penetrates the lattice shutter, and it is visible how dust particles dance. We are familiar with these specks of dust. They lay on the furniture in gray, I inhale and inhale them, they are in you and in me. There is not a single house, not a single family, wherever they exist. But we know: there is something in us that, flaring up, can illuminate them at times, and they will light up. ”
