The queue all speak at once.
"She's a 'oarder, she is. Got 'arf-a-pound o' sugar already in 'er basket and only 'erself and 'er 'usband at 'ome, while I got five kids."
A lady down the queue caps this with seven kids, and in the distance a lady in a fur cap claims ten, and is at once engaged by her neighbours in a bitter controversy as to whether three in France should count in sugar buying.
All the time the hoarder stands with nose in the air, the picture of lofty indifference.
Tact—tact—I remember the Inspector's advice.
"Excuse me, Madam," I say, "but in these times we all have to make sacrifices. You already have sugar. Some of your friends have none. Under the circumstances—"
Slowly the lady turns a withering eye on me. "I'll move nowhere no'ow for nobody."
A lady in the background suggests that the female should be boiled in a sugar-sack. A more humane person expresses the hope that she will be bombed that night.
"But, Madam, consider your friends," I proceed.
"Don't you call that lot my friends! I'm 'ere fer a pound of marge, and get it I will if all the bloomin' speshuls come 'oo 're doin' reglar coppers outer jobs."