Ella stood watching, her arms crossed over her chest. The little boy at the stall watched, too, occasionally looking up at Ella, trying to read her expression. I caught his eye, and he grinned at me—a genuine smile. I smiled back.

Suddenly the argument stopped. Ti Me shouted, “Madame Sara!” and the other woman began to laugh. She held up her hands, as if in surrender.

Ti Me looked back at me slyly over her shoulder. “Madame Sara,” she said, and then she looked pointedly at Ella to translate. She did not want me to miss the joke.

“It is a type of bird,” Ella said. “It’s very small and yellowish and black and green, and it’s always chirping. You see it around Marchand Dessalines. She called the market woman that because she, too, is small and always chirping, and she goes from one town to another to sell, always talking, talking. The Madame Sara can build its nest anywhere, and this woman can sell anywhere, too.”

“It is a kind of compliment, then?”

“Ti Me is too soft,” Ella said.

“She seems to do well.”

“Yes, but you must understand. No one here respects you if you’re soft. You must be hard and righteous to gain respect. Look, there.” She pointed to the other end of the market, where a drawing of the Virgin Mary, sketched on a piece of spare wood in charcoal and mud, hung on a pole over a communal pump. “Popish nonsense like this, everywhere. A whole country that glorifies suffering and not sacrifice. It is a big job, to be here. I hope Emmanuel has made that clear to you.”

“He loves Haiti. He says it is where the future of the Negro race lies.”

“He is not wrong. If we can ensure the right kind of Negro is here, he is not wrong.”

“No one born here is the right kind?”

“Not without education and hard work. We must make them, too. That’s what you’re here for, I suppose. Why he brought you. Though why he thinks you are good for that, I do not know.”

“I beg your pardon,” I said. But Ella was not so brave as to meet my eye.

Ti Me stopped her bargaining to toss her head over her shoulder and call to us, “Bon manman, bon pitit.” She turned back, picking up the rhythm skillfully, as if there was no interruption.

“What does that mean?” I said.

“It is an old Haitian saying. ‘If the mother is good, the child will be good.’”

I looked away from Ella, back to Ti Me, who was grinning at me now. She winked.

“Mèsi,” I said to her.

“The people here are very fond of proverbs,” Ella said, staring straight ahead. “None of them make sense to me, though. The best proverbs, of course, are in the Bible.”

“But these ones sound very agreeable,” I said.

Ella said nothing, only kept watching the haggle.