myself into the river as I come back over the
bridge."

Big tears were streaming from her eyes; and she rushed off to her
bedroom, banging the doors violently behind her. Old Madame Mehudin said
nothing more about denouncing Florent. Muche, however, told La Normande
that he met his grandma talking with Monsieur Lebigre in every corner of
the neighbourhood.

The rivalry between the beautiful Norman and the beautiful Lisa
now assumed a less aggressive but more disturbing character. In the
afternoon, when the red-striped canvas awning was drawn down in front
of the pork shop, the fish-girl would remark that the big fat thing felt
afraid, and was concealing herself. She was also much exasperated by
the occasional lowering of the window-blind, on which was pictured
a hunting-breakfast in a forest glade, with ladies and gentlemen in
evening dress partaking of a red pasty, as big as themselves, on the
yellow grass.

Beautiful Lisa, however, was by no means afraid. As soon as the sun
began to sink she drew up the blind; and, as she sat knitting behind her
counter, she serenely scanned the market square, where numerous urchins
were poking about in the soil under the gratings which protected the
roots of the plane-trees, while porters smoked their pipes on the
benches along the footway, at either end of which was an advertisement
column covered with theatrical posters, alternately green, yellow, red,
and blue, like some harlequin's costume. And while pretending to watch
the passing vehicles, Lisa would really be scrutinising the beautiful
Norman. She might occasionally be seen bending forward, as though her
eyes were following the Bastille and Place Wagram omnibus to the Pointe
Saint Eustache, where it always stopped for a time. But this was only a
manoeuvre to enable her to get a better view of the fish-girl, who, as
a set-off against the blind, retorted by covering her head and fish with
large sheets of brown paper, on the pretext of warding off the rays of
the setting sun. The advantage at present was on Lisa's side, for as
the time for striking the decisive blow approached she manifested the
calmest serenity of bearing, whereas her rival, in spite of all her
efforts to attain the same air of distinction, always lapsed into some
piece of gross vulgarity, which she afterwards regretted. La Normande's
ambition was to look "like a lady." Nothing irritated her more than to
hear people extolling the good manners of her rival. Th