Gavard entered the shop.  With an air of great importance he went to fetch Quenu from the kitchen.  Then he seated himself upon a small marble-topped table, while Florent remained on his chair and Lisa behind the counter; Quenu meantime leaning his back against a side of pork.  And thereupon Gavard announced that he had at last found a situation for Florent.  They would be vastly amused when they heard what it was, and the Government would be nicely caught.

But all at once he stopped short, for a passing neighbour, Mademoiselle Saget, having seen such a large party gossiping together at the Quenu-Gradelles’, had opened the door and entered the shop.  Carrying her everlasting black ribbonless straw hat, which appropriately cast a shadow over her prying white face, she saluted the men with a slight bow and Lisa with a sharp smile.

She was an acquaintance of the family, and still lived in the house in the Rue Pirouette where she had resided for the last forty years, probably on a small private income; but of that she never spoke.  She had, however, one day talked of Cherbourg, mentioning that she had been born there.  Nothing further was ever known of her antecedents.  All her conversation was about other people; she could tell the whole story of their daily lives, even to the number of things they sent to be washed each month; and she carried her prying curiosity concerning her neighbours’ affairs so far as to listen behind their doors and open their letters.  Her tongue was feared from the Rue Saint Denis to the Rue Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and from the Rue Saint Honore to the Rue Mauconseil.  All day long she went ferreting about with her empty bag, pretending that she was marketing, but in reality buying nothing, as her sole purpose was to retail scandal and gossip, and keep herself fully informed of every trifling incident that happened.  Indeed, she had turned her brain into an encyclopaedia brimful of every possible particular concerning the people of the neighbourhood and their homes.

Quenu had always accused her of having spread the story of his Uncle Gradelle’s death on the chopping-block, and had borne her a grudge ever since.  She was extremely well posted in the history of Uncle Gradelle and the Quenus, and knew them, she would say, by heart.  For the last fortnight, however, Florent’s arrival had greatly perplexed her, filled her, indeed, with a perfect fever of curiosity.  She became quite ill when she discovered any unforeseen gap in her information.  And yet she could have sworn that she had seen that tall lanky fellow somewhere or other before.

She remained standing in front of the counter, examining the dishes one after another, and saying in a shrill voice: 

“I hardly know what to have.  When the afternoon comes I feel quite famished for my dinner, and then, later on, I don’t seem able to fancy anything at all.  Have you got a cutlet rolled in bread-crumbs left, Madame Quenu?”