“Oh, I say! It would be no fun at all!”
They had reached Shipley by this time—a little quaint old-world place consisting of one village 139 street of picturesque cottages, most of them covered with roses or vines, and with flowery gardens in front. The tiny church stood on a mound, surrounded by trees, and looked far smaller than the handsome vicarage whose great gates opened opposite the school. The post office appeared also to be a general store, where articles of every description were on sale. From the ceiling were suspended tin pails, coils of clothes-line, rows of boots or shoes, pans, kettles, brooms, and lanterns, while the walls were lined with shelves containing groceries and draperies, stationery, hosiery, quack medicines, garden seeds, and, in fact, an absolutely miscellaneous assortment of goods and chattels, some old, some new, some fresh, some faded, some appetizing, and some decidedly stale.
Raymonde asked to use the telephone, and retired to the little boxed-off portion of the shop reserved for that instrument, where she successfully rang up Dr. Wilton, and received his promise to call during the morning at the camp. This most pressing business done, they proceeded to execute a few commissions for Miss Jones, Miss Lowe, and several other members of the party. Miss Hoyle had begged them to buy a few yards of anything with which she might trim a large shady rush hat she had brought with her, so the girls asked the postmistress to show them some white ribbon. That elderly spinster, having first, with considerable ingenuity, satisfied her curiosity as to the object for which they required it, commenced a vigorous hunt among the miscellaneous collection of boxes in her establishment.
“I know I have some,” she soliloquized, “for it 140 was only six weeks ago I sold a yard and a half to Mrs. Cox, to finish a tea-cosy she was making. Where can I have put it? No, this is lead-pencils and india-rubber, and this, neuralgic powders and babies’ comforters. It might have got into the small wares, but I had that out only yesterday. Why, here it is, after all, among the tapes and buttons!”
The girls soon found that shopping at Shipley possessed an immense advantage over kindred expeditions in town. When there was only a single article, no selection could be made; it was impossible to be bewildered with too many fineries, and “This or nothing” offered a unique simplicity in the way of choice. Miss Pearson, the postmistress, decided for them that the ribbon was the right width and quality, and even offered a few hints on the subject of trimming.
“I believe she’s longing to do it herself!” whispered Aveline. “Are those specimens of her millinery in the window? I’d as soon wear a cauliflower on my head as that erection with the squirms of velvet and the lace border!”
“You’re sure three yards will be sufficient?” pattered the little storekeeper. “Well, of course you can come for more if you want. I’m not likely to be selling it out, and, if anybody should happen to come and ask for the rest of it, I’ll get them to wait till you’ve finished trimming your hat. Dear me! If I haven’t mislaid my scissors now! I was cutting flowers with them in the garden before breakfast, and I must have put them down in the middle of the sweet peas, or on the onion bed. It wouldn’t take me five minutes to find them. You’d 141 rather not wait? Then perhaps you’ll excuse my using this.”
Without further apology, Miss Pearson seized the carving-knife with which she usually operated on the cheese and bacon, and, giving it a hasty wipe upon her apron, proceeded to saw through the ribbon, wrapping up the three yards in a scrap of newspaper.
“I’m sorry I’m out of paper bags,” she announced airily, “but the traveller only calls once in six months. Let me know how you get on with the hat, and, if you want any help that I can give you, just bring it across to me, and I’ll do my best. By the by, I suppose you young ladies go to a fine boarding-school? Do you learn foreign languages there?”
“Why, yes—French and German and Latin—most of us,” replied Raymonde, rather astonished.