liras — a third of her wage for a long week?

And there was nothing she could do... to return the shirt, say, and take back her liras — she had promised it to her son, and there was no longer any way to buy cloth from the market, for the cloth-sellers' shops had closed.

It was useless to open her mouth to say anything, for the agent had a face that would not soften to the logic of poverty; so she gathered herself and turned to go.

On her way she stopped to buy a piece of meat and some veg-etables, and hesitated long before entering the confectioner's, to

come out with little cakes hidden beneath a layer of fine sugar.

Altogether she paid out five liras, and on top of them five piasters for the tram. When she reached the quarter, and Nadim caught sight of her from afar staggering under her load, he hurried to lighten it for her and asked breathlessly about the shirt. She tried to smile as she said: Didn't I promise you I would bring it? It is with these parcels. And the little one flew off with what he carried and reached the house ahead of her — then before long he met her at the door with tears in his eyes:

— Mother, you lied to me. Where is the shirt?

— I do not lie. Come! And she took him by the hand and opened the parcels with him — and the shirt was not in any one of them. The whole bundle was lost. She was beside herself: had the bundle flown off in the crush of the market, or fallen in the tramcar?...

It was neither the weariness nor the four liras that lay behind her anguish... but her grief for Nadim, who would spend the feast in an old shirt. She sank onto the nearest seat, drinking in the little one's tears as he drank hers, scarcely hearing her husband's voice saying in vexation: Did you bring anything home for supper?