"I feel like one sometimes, Mrs. Buffle. When children are left, as I and Robert were, with a baby brother to bring up, and hardly any means to do it upon, it helps to steady them. Tom——"
Eliza Tyrrett burst in at the door, with a violence that made its bell twang and tinkle. "Half-a-pound o' dips, long-tens, Dame Buffle, and be quick about it," was her order. "There's such a flare-up, in at Mason's."
"A flare-up!" repeated Mrs. Buffle, who was always ripe and ready for a dish of scandal, whether it touched on domestic differences, or on young girls' improvidence in the shape of dress. "Is Mason and her having a noise?"
"It's not him and her. It's about Carry. Hetty Mason locked Carry up this afternoon, and Mason never came home at all to tea; he went and had some beer instead, and a turn at skittles, and she wouldn't let Carry out. He came in just now, and his wife told him a whole heap about Carry, and Mason went up to the cock-loft, undid the door, and threatened to kick Carry down. They're having it out in the kitchen, all three."
"What has Carry done?" asked Mrs. Buffle eagerly.
"Perhaps Charlotte East can tell," said Eliza Tyrrett, slyly. "She has been thick with Carry lately. I am not a-going to spoil sport."
Charlotte took up her butter, and bending a severe look of caution on the Tyrrett girl, left the shop. Anthony Dare's reputation was not a brilliant one, and the bare fact of Caroline Mason's allowing herself to walk with him would have damaged her in the eyes of Honey Fair. As well keep it, if possible, from Mrs. Buffle and other gossips.
As Charlotte crossed to her own door, she became conscious that some one was flying towards her in the dusk of the evening: a woman with a fleet foot and panting breath. Charlotte caught hold of her. "Caroline, where are you going?"
"Let me alone, Charlotte East"—and Caroline's nostrils were working, her eyes flashing. "I have left their house for ever, and am going to one who will give me a better."
Charlotte held her tight. "You must not go, Caroline."