“St. Eustache! Can’t we go into the church a little while first?”
And so, hand in hand with the old Normandy peasant, Judy Kean walked into the great old church, and together they knelt on the flagged floor and prayed. Judy never did anything by halves, not even praying. When she prayed, she did it with a fervor and earnestness St. Anthony himself would have envied. When they rose from their knees, they both looked happier. Old Tricot had prayed for his boy, so soon to be in the trenches, and Judy offered an impassioned petition for the safety of her beloved parents.
When they emerged from the church, the sun was up and the market was almost like a carnival, except for the fact that the color was subdued somewhat by the mourning that many of the women wore.
“Already so many in mourning!” thought the girl. “What will it be later?”
“First the butter and eggs and cheese! This way, Mam’selle!”
They wormed their way between the great yellow wagons unloading huge crates of eggs and giant cheeses. The smell of butter made Judy think of Chatsworth and the dairy where she had helped Caroline churn on her memorable visit to the Browns. Ah me! How glad she would be to see them again. And Kent! She had not let herself think of Kent lately. He must be angry with her for not taking his advice and listening to his entreaties to go back to the United States with him. He had not written at all and he must have been home several weeks. Maybe the letter had miscarried, but other letters had come lately; and he might even have cabled her. He certainly seemed indifferent to her welfare, as now that the war had broken out, he had not even inquired as to her safety or her whereabouts; not even let her know whether or not the job in New York had materialized.
She was awakened from her musings by her old friend, who had completed his bargaining for cheese, butter and eggs and now was proceeding to the fish market.
“I must buy much fish. It is Friday, you remember, and since the war started, religion has become the style again in France, and now fish, and only fish, must be eaten on Friday. There are those that say that the war will help the country by making us good again.”
And so, in a far corner of the cart, well away from the susceptible butter and cheese, many fish were piled up, fenced off from the rest of the produce by a wall of huge black mussels in a tangle of sea weed.
“Well, there are fish enough in this market to regenerate the whole world, I should think,” laughed Judy.