"Do you mean to say you've brought some preserved fruit with you?"
"I filled my bag with them. Here, do you recognize your own plums? The real, the identical fruit as sold at Hilaire's up-to-date grocery stores. The old and the new world united!"
Mlle. Zoé opened her small valise and M. Hilaire saw that it contained several paper bags, bearing his name and address, full of preserved fruit. It was a delicate attention and softened M. Hilaire's heart beyond measure, so that his eyes grew moist, and he could not refrain from saying to his pretty companion:
"Look here, my dear Zoé, I must give you a kiss."
And they kissed each other as they devoured the fruit. At that juncture they heard a great clatter on their right. It was the train to Paris, steaming towards Marseilles, for at this spot the permanent way runs for several miles along the sea front.
But the train as it plunged forward made less noise than a certain lady of our acquaintance who was standing at the door of one of the carriages and began literally to bellow. The fury of her invective rose above the song of the wheels, and the frenzy of her gestures scared the man guarding the line.
"Virginie. . . . It's Virginie!"
"Madame. . . . It's Madame!"
It was indeed Madame, and she was in a mighty temper.
It must be stated that the speed of the car was equal to that of the train, so that for a while car and train traveled abreast, and the lady at the carriage door did not miss a single iota of what was happening in the car. She recognized M. Hilaire; She recognized Zoé. She recognized the plums!