"He hears you."
The fair woman above laughed:
"Perhaps; in his fashion. But he pays me ill as yet."
And she plucked one of the silver pins from her hair, and stabbed the rosy foam of the saxafrage through and through with it; for she was but a gardener's wife, and was restless and full of discontent.
"Get you gone," she added quickly, "or I will throw a stone at you, you witch; you have the evil eye, they say, and you may strike me blind if you stare so."
Folle-Farine went on her way over the sharp stones with a heavy heart. That picture in the casement had made that passage bright to her many a time; and when at last the picture had moved and spoken, it had only mocked her and reviled her as the rest did.
The street was dark for her like all the others now.
The gardener's wife, leaning there, with the green and gold of the vineleaves brushing her hair, looked after her down the crooked way.
"That young wretch will be more beautiful than I," she thought; and the thought was bitter to her, as such a one is to a fair woman.
Folle-Farine went slowly and sadly through the street, with her head dropped, and the large osier basket trailing behind her over the stones.