Gaspard had sold the barrique de vin to a syndicate of two old women who had combined to buy it, and perhaps peddle it round town with other produce, for they had with them a small cane truck, when, turning to the boat to find something else to sell, he saw in the midst of the surrounding crowd the girl. She was without her tray, her little shapely head was bound with a yellow and blue madras, she had a basket in her hand, and she was coming to buy fish. Then she saw Gaspard. Their eyes met and she instantly looked away.
Pierre-Alphonse saw her, too.
Not only had she looked away, she had turned away.
Pierre-Alphonse’s mouth flew open:
“Hi, Marie—Marie de Morne Rouge—ho, Marie, are you deaf this morning? Here are the fish calling thee—she’s gone—” Then to Gaspard, “Now what devil has got into the girl—she often buys from me, she was coming, and she is gone—no matter, here is another barrique—sell him, O thou man from the sea—”
“Who is she?” asked Gaspard, taking the barrique.
“Marie—whose father lives at Morne Rouge.”
“Where does she live?”
“With her aunt in the street of the Precipice. Ho, there, Mayotte, here is a fish for thee pretty as thyself—take it for nothing—next to nothing, two sous and it is thine, ’tis as big as a baby—”
“What is she, this Marie?”