ll
never accept anything from the Empire, and I would rather die of
starvation than serve under the Prefecture. It is quite out of the
question, Gavard, quite so!"

Gavard seemed somewhat put out on hearing this. Quenu had lowered his
head, while Lisa, turning round, looked keenly at Florent, her neck
swollen, her bosom straining her bodice almost to bursting point. She
was just going to open her mouth when La Sarriette entered the shop, and
there was another pause in the conversation.

"Dear me!" exclaimed La Sarriette with her soft laugh, "I'd almost
forgotten to get any bacon fat. Please, Madame Quenu, cut me a dozen
thin strips--very thin ones, you know; I want them for larding larks.
Jules has taken it into his head to eat some larks. Ah! how do you do,
uncle?"

She filled the whole shop with her dancing skirts and smiled brightly at
everyone. Her face looked fresh and creamy, and on one side her hair was
coming down, loosened by the wind which blew through the markets. Gavard
grasped her hands, while she with merry impudence resumed: "I'll bet
that you were talking about me just as I came in. Tell me what you were
saying, uncle."

However, Lisa now called to her, "Just look and tell me if this is thin
enough."

She was cutting the strips of bacon fat with great care on a piece of
board in front of her. Then as she wrapped them up she inquired, "Can I
give you anything else?"

"Well, yes," replied La Sarriette; "since I'm about it, I think I'll
have a pound of lard. I'm awfully fond of fried potatoes; I can make a
breakfast off a penn'orth of potatoes and a bunch of radishes. Yes, I'll
have a pound of lard, please, Madame Quenu."

Lisa placed a sheet of stout paper in the pan of the scales. Then she
took the lard out of a jar under the shelves with a boxwood spatula,
gently adding small quantities to the fatty heap, which began to melt
and run slightly. When the plate of the scale fell, she took up the
paper, folded it, and rapidly twisted the ends with her finger-tips.

"That makes twenty-four sous," she said; "the bacon is six sous--thirty
sous altogether. There's nothing else you want, is there?"

"No," said La Sarriette, "nothing." She paid her money, still laughing
and showing her teeth, and staring the men in the face. Her grey skirt
was all awry, and her loosely fastened red neckerchief allowed a little
of her white bosom to appear. Before she went away she stepped up to
Gavard again, and pretend