At this point Sisa appeared. She said good morning to the women, and entered the manse.
“She’s gone in, let us go too,” said the sisters, and they followed her.
Sisa felt her heart beat violently. She did not know what to say to the curate in defence of her child. She had risen at daybreak, picked all the fine vegetables left in her garden, and arranged them in a basket with platane leaves and flowers, and had been to the river to get a fresh salad of pakô. Then, dressed in the best she had, the basket on her head, without waking her son, she had set out for the pueblo.
She went slowly through the manse, listening if by chance she might hear a well-known voice, fresh and childish. But she met no one, heard nothing, and went on to the kitchen.
The servants and sacristans received her coldly, scarcely answering her greetings.
“Where may I put these vegetables?” she asked, without showing offence.
“There—wherever you want to,” replied the cook curtly.
Sisa, half-smiling, placed all in order on the table, and laid on top the flowers and the tender shoots of the pakô; then she asked a servant who seemed more friendly than the cook:
“Do you know if Crispin is in the sacristy?”
The servant looked at her in surprise.