"Wouldn't it be rather nice to walk down to the village after supper and see if we could buy a paper?"
So, after supper, they went.
Aunt Beatrice said that she never had liked Germans, so stuffy, that sleeping with the feather beds on top of them, and then the way they bought all that cooked meat and sausage stuff at shops.
All the way down to the village, she said that she had always known that the Parkers' German governess had been a spy.
The village street was strangely unfamiliar in the half light of the summer evening. Unexpected shadows and whisperings moved and rustled in the quiet air. Little knots of people stood round the open doorways of shops that should have been shut long ago. Noises, from down the road, the horn of a motor-car, the call of children at their play, broke in upon the stillness. With significant reiteration, a dog in a far-off farm-house barked persistently.
"Go into the Ackroyds', Muriel, and see if you can get an evening paper. I want to talk to Mrs. Cartwright. There's that bazaar on the 4th."
The paper shop was small and very crowded. It smelt of paraffin from the swinging lamp above the counter. Muriel watched two great moths flapping with unbelievable clumsiness against its flyblown globe.
She pushed her way to the counter. The proprietor, a meek little man with a fierce black moustache, stood shaking his head nervously. "The ultimatum expires to-night at midnight," he said hoarsely. "That's a very serious thing. A very serious thing." Then he saw Muriel. "Good evening, Miss Hammond."
"Have you any papers left?"
"I'm sorry, miss, I'm very sorry. I always like to oblige anyone from Miller's Rise. You might get one at the station perhaps."