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Chapter 4

The following morning Anna left her room to go to work. The ground, soaked in the rain of the previous day, sent up a vapor against the rays of the morning sun. Anna walked along the Boulevard Belleville, making her way between the long rows of market stalls that extended down to Père Lachaise.

On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays this Boulevard is market place, and the people of the neighborhood come to buy provisions, second hand clothes, worn shoes, made-over coats, outmoded hats and other cast-offs. Wives of workers, careful of their pennies, fill their bags with painstakingly chosen bargains. Beggars hang around at the outskirts of the crowds, picking up spoiled oranges, squashed grapes, bits of cakes and cheese-crumbs. Ragamuffins snatch from the stalls and petty thieves pick at the pockets of unwary shoppers. And sometimes some poor devil of a pervert, seeking to ease his sex-hunger, fumbles about among the crowds of women, pinching a fat arm or exposed bosom, until one lets out a cry of alarm and the rest set upon the intruder with bags, brooms and fists and drive him out of Belleville.

But early in the morning the Boulevard is comparatively quiet. Between seven and eight the stall-keepers are busy displaying their wares and haggling over the more desirable locations. Wide-hipped women wipe the sweat from their

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