The Van Roon

by J. C. Snaith

Promising to be back in an hour, which was all that Mr. Mitchell could allow if they were to be home before the rising of the moon, June and William, feeling more romantic than ever before in their lives, set out on a pilgrimage up the High Street. It was the only street in the town which aspired to a sense of importance; the point in fact towards which all meaner streets converged. One of these it was they had now to find.

Alas, from the outset there was a grave doubt in the mind of William in the matter of his bearings. To the best of his recollection the old woman’s shop was either the second or third turning up, then to the left, then across, and then to the left again into an obscure alley of which he had forgotten the name. That was like him. In June’s private opinion, it was also like him, although lèse-majesté of course, to let him know it, to take her to look for a serendipity shop in a bottle of hay.

William knew neither the name of the old woman, nor the byway that had contained her, and in the course of half an hour’s meandering it grew clear to the practical mind of June that she was in serious danger of having to go without her annuity. Having come so far it would be humiliating to return with a tale of total defeat; yet up till now these emotions had been held in check by the romance of the case.

Mr. Mitchell’s hour was all but sped, when William stopped abruptly. Light had come. He had hit the trail.

At the corner of the lane into which for the third time they had penetrated, was an enticing little shop called Middleton’s Dairy. The sight of it brought back to William’s mind a recollection. Immediately the picture had been acquired, he went into that shop to get a bun and a glass of milk. Pausing a moment to wrestle with his sense of locality, he gazed down the street. The old woman’s store would be just opposite.

Only a glance was needed to show that the old woman’s store was not just opposite. The housebreakers had been recently at work and the decrepit block of which her premises formed a part was razed to the ground.

Faced by the problem of what had happened to the old woman the only thing now was to enter Middleton’s Dairy and enquire. They were cordially received by a girl who in June’s opinion showed too many teeth when she smiled to be really good looking; who, also, in June’s opinion, wore corsets that didn’t suit her figure, and whose hair would have looked better had it been bobbed.

Like Miss Ferris, the landlady’s daughter, this girl seemed to remember William quite well, which was rather odd June felt, since he had only been once in the town previously and then for but a few hours. The inference to be drawn from the fact was that William was William, and that in an outlandish one-horse place like Crowdham Market, young men of his quality were necessarily at a premium.

But at the moment that was neither here nor there. And with equal truth the formula applied to the old woman. However, in regard to her it seemed, they were now in the way of getting information.

After William, with a certain particularity had described the old creature and her shop to the girl who kept on showing her teeth while he did so, he was informed that she was known among the neighbours as Mother Stark. And the poor old thing, the girl understood, had been turned out of house and home because she could no longer pay her rates and taxes.