ious thrill of satisfied
vengeance that her huge body fairly quivered. Florent, still doubtful,
glanced at the beautiful Norman; but the young woman, now completely
reconciled with her mother, turned on her tap and slapped her fish,
pretending not to hear what was being said.

"You are quite sure?" said Florent to Mother Mehudin.

"Oh, yes, indeed. Isn't that so, Louise?" said the old woman in a
shriller voice.

Florent concluded that it must be some one who wanted to see him about
the great business, and he resolved to go up to his room. He was just
about to leave the pavilion, when, happening to turn round, he observed
the beautiful Norman watching him with a grave expression on her face.
Then he passed in front of the three gossips.

"Do you notice that there's no one in the pork shop?" remarked
Mademoiselle Saget. "Beautiful Lisa's not the woman to compromise
herself."

The shop was, indeed, quite empty. The front of the house was still
bright with sunshine; the building looked like some honest, prosperous
pile guilelessly warming itself in the morning rays. Up above, the
pomegranate on the balcony was in full bloom. As Florent crossed the
roadway he gave a friendly nod to Logre and Monsieur Lebigre, who
appeared to be enjoying the fresh air on the doorstep of the latter's
establishment. They returned his greeting with a smile. Florent was then
about to enter the side-passage, when he fancied he saw Auguste's pale
face hastily vanishing from its dark and narrow depths. Thereupon he
turned back and glanced into the shop to make sure that the middle-aged
gentleman was not waiting for him there. But he saw no one but Mouton,
who sat on a block displaying his double chin and bristling whiskers,
and gazed at him defiantly with his great yellow eyes. And when he had
at last made up his mind to enter the passage, Lisa's face appeared
behind the little curtain of a glazed door at the back of the shop.

A hush had fallen over the fish market. All the huge paunches and bosoms
held their breath, waiting till Florent should disappear from sight.
Then there was an uproarious outbreak; and the bosoms heaved wildly
and the paunches nearly burst with malicious delight. The joke had
succeeded. Nothing could be more comical. As old Mother Mehudin vented
her merriment she shook and quivered like a wine-skin that is being
emptied. Her story of the middle-aged gentleman went the round of the
market, and the fish-wives found it ex