She had showered drinks on all her friends, and had, moreover, clattered and screamed herself hoarse, when the church-clock outside slowly struck eight. She started, changed countenance, and got up to pay at once.
'Why, there's another o' them half-crowns o' yourn, Bessie,' said a consumptive-looking girl in a bedraggled hat and feathers, as Mrs. Costrell handed her coin to the landlord. 'Wheriver do yer get 'em?'
'If yer don't ask no questions, I won't tell yer no lies,' said Bessie, with quick impudence. 'Where did you get them hat and feathers?'
There was a coarse laugh from the company. The girl in the hat reddened furiously, and she and Bessie—both of them in a quarrelsome state— began to bandy words.
Meanwhile the landlord was showing the coin to his assistant at the bar.
'Rum, ain't it? I niver seed one o' them pieces in the village afore this winter, an I've been 'ere twenty-two year come April.'
A decent-looking labourer, who did not often visit the 'Spotted Deer,' was leaning over the bar and caught the words.
'Well then, I 'ave,' he said, promptly. 'I mind well as when I were a lad, sixteen year ago, my fayther borrered a bit o' money off John Bolderfield, to buy a cow with—an there was 'arf of it in them 'arf-crowns.'
Those standing near overheard. Bessie and the girl stopped quarrelling. The landlord, startled, cast a sly eye in Bessie's direction. She came up to the bar.
'What's that yer sayin?' she demanded.