Today Lela was not allowed to go to school. Lela was happy. "Little sloth," Mum said. But it wasn't only that; Mum didn't know that it was good, because of Eva. Eva would be annoyed, Eva would see that Manuela didn't care about her at all. Only one couldn't explain it to Mum. Why could one really not?
She got a little basket in her hand and was allowed to accompany Mum to the market hall. What could a market that was in a hall look like? When she was very little, Lela had always been passionate about going to the market with the cook. But the market in Dünheim had been something quite ordinary. Fat peasant women sat there speaking a terrible dialect and had names for fruit, potatoes and flowers that one had to learn first. Some had nothing more than a sack spread out on the pavement and on it, a couple of turnips, horseradish and lettuce. In the middle, around the old fountain, sat the flower women. One went to them at the very end, if one still had twenty pfennigs left, and bought a couple forget-me-nots for Mum. But here, here everything was completely different, the market also.
The market hall was not a hall as Manuela had imagined it. She felt a little disappointment as she stood in front of the big building. It looked more like a huge barn. It was lively inside. Shouting, screaming, gesticulating. Lela entered the room, anxiously grasping Mum's hand. Because she came out of the sun, she could not see right at first. Only gradually did her eye get used to the semi-darkness.
"Eh bien, Madame désire? Madame est déjà servie?" (Well, Madame wants? Is Madame already served?) sounded from all sides.
Lela stopped, standing rooted to the spot. She held her mother tightly by the hand. As if she were experiencing a miracle that nevertheless seemed true against all concepts of nature, it came from her lips: "Mum, the market women speak French!"
Frau von Meinhardis had already stepped up to a stall and looked at a huge pile of asparagus.
"Mum, how do peasant women know French?"
"Because they're French, silly."
Now there was nothing left for Lela to say. Still, "French women" were different. And then these were so nice, so polite—not at all like market women.
She heard her mother bargaining in French. It was about the asparagus. There were very big, very thick, round packages with many, many bunches of asparagus. They had blue-purple-pink little heads. Others, small packs, very thin, like for dolls, were green, grass-green and not very long and had full-grown little heads. Then there was normal asparagus, like she had always seen, in pound packs with pink mesh, and then a row of very pale, very fat, thick ones with snow-white, thick heads—that was the most expensive. Next to Lela, a pyramid of radishes rose on the ground. A real little tower. Wide at the bottom and tapering at the top, as high as Lela herself. The green was invisibly turned inwards; from the outside one could only see masses of delicate tails on round red little heads. She had to laugh; it was too pretty. She almost felt sorry for the structure when they put a few wet bundles in her basket.
Then she saw something new: "Mom, cucumbers, cucumbers already." "Yes, my child. But they are too expensive for us."
Mum had bought the cheapest asparagus. Lela only looked longingly at the fat white mushrooms that were piled up in a clean chip basket. Mum must have seen them too, but if the cucumbers were too expensive . . . Slowly, the two went on. There were a lot of fruits and vegetables that Lela had never seen. Thick, purple-blue aubergines, strange lettuce they called chicory. Mum didn't buy all these things; although it would have been very interesting. But Lela preferred not to say anything. One must not be immodest and one couldn't always want the best. All that was there for some unknown others. Because someone would buy "the best". For example, the young geese hanging there, the chickens for roasting, the pigeons and chickens. Although Lela was quite happy that she didn't have to put anything bleeding in her basket, she couldn't help but gave them a look.
The big salmon and silvery fish lying there cut up, slippery and cold on wet tables, were repugnant to her. But just here mother stopped and bought a haddock. Lela tried to look away, because he also came from a barrel that was overflowing on the side and had the lowest price. Fortunately, Mother picked up the stained brown paper herself.
The fish seller was not nearly as polite as the vegetable women. He quickly packed up what he wanted and almost threw it in Mum's face. Also, he didn't he say "thank you," not even "adieu" when they left. Lela didn't know whether it was because Mutti didn't know how haddock was in French, or because she had only bought haddock.
On the way home, walking alongside Mum, she secretly glanced into the shop windows to catch her reflection together with Mum. She was already a big girl and was almost up to Mum's shoulder. But she grew out her clothes terribly fast. Mum always had to let out the hem of her dress and lengthen the sleeves; because her thin wrists were coming to light. And again she felt the hot little pain in her breast. Eva. Today she didn't see her. But tomorrow. Tomorrow she'll certainly say Beri's greetings to her. She'll talk to her. Why not? Even if others are there. She looks sideways at Mum. What would Mum say if Lela asked her now if she go to school tomorrow in another dress . . . But Mum has other worries.
She stopped in front of a pastry shop, remembering visitors who were expected to arrive tomorrow. Her sister and brother-in-law from Berlin wanted to visit Mühlberg. So it was probably appropriate to order some biscuits here.
Monsieur Calignan was not a hater of Prussians. When he saw Lela's eyes and open mouth longingly fixed on the tall jars of multi-coloured sweets, he didn't hesitate to wrap few for her and put them in her basket with the head of lettuce and radishes. Lela said a shy "Merci bien" to him. (Thank you very much.) But inwardly she was excited and curious about what could be inside these funny little eggs that she had admired hundreds of times in the shop window. As soon as she got home, she put a white one between her teeth. It was terribly hard. Then it cracked, and an almond appeared. A little disappointed, she looked at the others: pale purple, blue-pink, brownish. Strange colours. Quite pretty on the outside, but quite hard, and inside nothing but a very ordinary almond. Slowly she dropped one by one into an open drawer; it sounded as if they were stones. And again she had failed to say a word to Mum about the hanging dress.