“Yes, it was a bad lot, Mrs Stannard. I am awfully sorry, but, as you know, we couldn’t help it. We never meant to sell that consignment when we found it was bad. But Colonel Monk commandeered it for the children’s use as there was nothing better in the town.”
“I know. I’m not complaining,” she said gently. “The children would have starved without it. Only I do hope you’ve got some fresher tins in now?”
“Why, certainly,” Hallam waved his hand at the well-filled shelves behind him. “We’ve got plenty of everything since the troops came up. And I can vouch for the milk—it’s a first-class brand, and fresh as paint. Where are these things to be sent, Mrs Stannard? Out to your camp?”
“No,” she said in a low voice; “keep them here until that convoy of waggons arrives from Salisbury—they are expected to-night, I believe—then send the box out to be put on the waggon in which I have engaged accommodation for myself and child.” Hallam looked up as if something had hit him, but she stared at him so haughtily that he dropped his eyes and applied himself to the business of adding up the bill. She paid, and with a cold nod and no further glance at the other men left the shop. Bettington, having occasion to go to the door to examine some whip thongs that hung in a bunch before the entry, saw her walking in light fleet fashion towards the Police Camp.
“She won’t hurt the daisies,” he murmured pleasantly to himself, as he sauntered back into the shop where the two other men were neck deep in what sounded perilously like village scandal.
“What do you think of that?” Hallam was inquiring with a stunned air. He had come over to Randal’s side of the shop. “She’s had enough! Going to take the baby and scoot!”
“And I don’t blame her a brass button. The only wonder is she didn’t do it long ago!” Randal wore a judicial manner.
“Her sister kept her from it, I guess, and lack of funds. Stannard is tight with the sinews of war. Needs them all to square his whiskey bills.”
Bettington made no attempt to take part in this interesting dialogue, but listened to it very carefully and pensively.
“What will Miss van Rimmel do?” Randal wondered. “Go with her?”