"But where must I go?" whined Aunt Palmyra.
"Go where you like! Go to the devil!" shouted the exasperated inspector.
"Oh, well, I suppose I ought not to say so," replied the old woman, looking seriously offended, "but, though you are an inspector, you have a very rude tongue in your head!"
To emphasise her majestic exit, Aunt Palmyra added:
"Fancy now! Not one of you have thought of it! I am going as far as the corner to look for flowers for this poor little thing."
Either florists were difficult to find, or Aunt Palmyra had no wish to see them as she passed by, for the old woman walked right through the town without stopping. When she reached the railway station she looked at the clock.
"By the saints! I have barely time," she ejaculated.
The old termagant traversed the waiting-room, got her ticket punched—it was a return ticket—and stepped on to the platform at the precise moment a porter was crying in an ear-piercing voice:
"Passengers for Paris take your seats!"