“Oil stove, and oil.”
To this, upon her mother’s initiative, she proposed to add a pistol; on her own, four pounds of chocolate and a handsome supply of peppermints.
She had culled from newspapers, books, and advertisements at least six different lists of the kind and quantity of food one would need. Already she had ordered several cases of mineral water, but she was still pondering “evaporated eggs,” “desiccated potatoes,” “malted milk tablets,” and “bouillon capsules,” as she stood in one of the great provision houses that very day she had got her ticket.
The place was crowded. Here, as elsewhere, a few women among the many men; both sexes equally bent on business. While she waited in the throng, a clerk who, with difficulty, had been making his way to her, interrupted a query modestly preferred by a little weather-beaten woman in black. As if he had not heard the one who spoke, of the one who had said nothing he asked, “Is anybody looking after you?”
“As soon as the lady has finished—” began Hildegarde. The rusty one glanced at her fellow-woman in some surprise, and said again to the clerk, “I just stepped in to ask you to be sure to have a keg of witch-hazel ready to go out with our stuff. You ran out of it last year.”
“Oh, are you Mrs. Blumpitty?”
“Yes.”
“Have you given your order?” The clerk’s manner had changed, he had plenty of time now.
“Mr. Blumpitty will step in to-morrow about it. He is quite a little rushed to-day, hunting around for a place to sleep in.”