Retorted

According to the Merriam Webster the word retorted is to pay or hurl back .Retorted is a verb.On the short story “Sweats” by Zora Neale Hurtston it starts with “A god, an’ be dough. You all gimme twenty cents and a slice way, Clarke retorted. Ah needs a col’ slice m’self. Heah, everybody chip in. Ah’ll lend y’ll mah meat knife.” In this sentence Joe ask everybody to chip in to pay for the cold slice he bought. I thought retorted meaning to be shocked. The word retorted is used pay back for what he got. The meaning of the word retorted helped me understand what the sentence was trying to mean.