When she reached the constable's, a high wooden dwelling in ample view of the stream, Seenie took charge of the pantry. She tied on the ruffled bib, stuck a scornful nose in the larder, sampled skeptically the plantain, stewed in cocoa fat, which she had put aside the previous evening, following a tradition of the tropics, for any starving ghost who might pass along in the night.
"T'row de t'ing 'way, gal, um ent no good, um sour," she said, and heaved it through the window.
There were even limits to Water Spout's gastric feats.
Suddenly a fragrant presence invaded the pantry.
"Good morning, Seenie," said Miss Esteena.
"Mawnin,' mum," replied the girl, sticking a match under the chocolate kettle in the coal pot.
An illuminating contrast; the girl, grating the cassava for the bake the Sergeant liked so well; with her despairing uncomely face, the high cheek bones, the sprawling mouth eternally white at the ends, the tapering chin. On the other hand there was reflected in Miss Esteena's sullen grace the fruit of a Negro culture as old as the civilization of the Incas. An Albertown belle, she was tall, brown, beautiful. Shimmering in white, the collar of her hand-wrought bodice closed high about her throat after the fashion of the time of Mary Queen of Scots.
"Be sure," said Miss Esteena, in her sharp, pointed tones, "to season the corass, properly, Seenie. Put plenty of salt and pepper and steam it long and well with the pot half full of water. Until it begins to crack. Then call me."
"Yes, mum, when Oi get roun' to it, mum."
But Miss Esteena was used to help of her own hue, and so had come to shut her ears to the thin veil of obedience in the Bordeaux girl's voice.