“A display, I understand,” Donna Emilia said.
“How wonderful the bay looks with the shipping,” Rosa said quickly. “Do you see, Hi, the shallows beyond the bay? All that southern bay is only about six feet deep.”
“Good bathing, I should think,” Hi said. “Is one allowed to bathe there?”
“I believe that some of the Indians sometimes bathe there,” Rosa said, “but there are swarms of sharks. If you go out in a boat, they’ll come all round you, and rub along the side and try to tip you out.”
“What do you do then?” Hi asked. “Sing them to sleep?”
“The best way is to hit them a bat with the flat of an oar-blade.”
“I wonder you don’t stare at them,” Hi said. “No shark can resist the power of the human eye.”
“Women’s eyes excite them,” Rosa said.
“I should have thought a haughty look would shrivel them. The books are full of it: ‘She darted a freezing glance at him.’ ”
At this moment they were passing through the gate of the city. On their right was a park of palms, flowers and busts, on their left, beyond the fortress, was the approach to the market pier, where the boats landed fish, fruit and other produce at dawn each morning. A party of men and women were coming from this pier with donkey carts laden with fruits, eggs and vegetables. “They’re the second market,” Rosa said, “they buy up the leavings from the boats and hawk them through the closes.”