While Cyrillia is busy with her _canari_, she talks to herself or sings.
She has a low rich voice,--sings strange things, things that have been
forgotten by this generation,--creole songs of the old days, having a
weird rhythm and fractions of tones that are surely African. But more
generally she talks to herself, as all the Martiniquaises do: it is
a continual murmur as of a stream. At first I used to think she was
talking to somebody else, and would call out:--
--"_Épi quiless moune ça ou ka pàlé-à?_"
But she would always answer:--"_Moin ka pàlé anni cò moin_" (I am only
talking to my own body), which is the creole expression for talking to
oneself.
--"And what are you talking so much to your own body about, Cyrillia?"
--"I am talking about my own little affairs" (_ti zaffai-moin_).... That
is all that I could ever draw from her.
But when not working, she will sit for hours looking out of the window.
In this she resembles the kitten: both seem to find the same silent
pleasure in watching the street, or the green heights that rise above
its roofs,--the Morne d'Orange. Occasionally at such times she will
break the silence in the strangest way, if she thinks I am not too busy
with my papers to answer a question:--
--"_Missié?_"--timidly.
--"Eh?"
--"_Di moin, chè, ti manmaille dans pays ou, toutt piti, piti,--ess ça
pàlé Anglais?_" (Do the little children in my country--the very, very
little children--talk English?)
--"Why, certainly, Cyrillia."
--"_Toutt piti, piti?_"--with growing surprise.
--"Why, of course!"
--"_C'est drôle, ça_" (It is queer, that!) She cannot understand it.
--"And the little _manmaille_ in Martinique, Cyrillia--_toutt
piti, piti_,--don't they talk creole?"
--"'_Oui; mais toutt moune ka pâlé nègue: ça facile_." (Yes; but anybody
can talk negro--that is easy to learn.)