the boy Melk meditatively, after a pause.

"Why?" asked Mr. Tregaskis, looking up from the counter.

"Because," said the boy, "Old Mother Treacher was here, not ten minutes
ago, and the way she spent her money was a caution. There's the best
part of four shillin' in the till, if only you'll look."

"What did she buy?"

"Eggs mostly--and bacon--and marmalade."

Mr. Tregaskis walked to his shop door, and stared up the hill after the
Commandant.

"Must be going off their heads," he decided, and shook his own
doubtfully. "It can't be a merry-makin' either; for, when you come to
think of it, folks don't feast off such things as streaky bacon."

"Not off this sort, any'ow," airily agreed the steward, who had been
examining a piece on the counter.

* * * * *

The Commandant had started fiercely enough to climb the hill, but by
the time he reached the bend of the hill where stood the cottage which
had been Vashti's home he was drawing difficult breath. Indeed, he was
on the point of setting down his load and resting when, as he turned
the corner, he came full upon Mrs. Banfield, the good wife of the
present occupier, in conversation with Mrs. Medlin, her neighbour
across the road. The two women were staring up the hill, each from her
doorway, but at the sound of the Commandant's footsteps they turned and
stared at him instead: whereat he blushed and hung on his heel for a
moment before charging through the cross-fire of gossip.

"Good morning, ladies!"

"Aw, good morning to you, sir," answered Mrs. Banfield, with a curtsey,
and gazed hard at his basket. "Nothing wrong up to the garrison, I
hope?"

"So far as I know, ma'am, nothing at all."

"Seein' that great stack of luggage go up the hill," explained Mrs.
Medlin, "why naturally it made a person anxious. And when you put a
civil question, as I did to Sergeant Archelaus, and he turns round and
as good as snaps your head off, why a person can't help putting two and
two together."

"Indeed, ma'am, and what did you make the result?" asked the
Commandant, politely.

"Why, sir, Mrs. Banfield here was reckoning that the Government had
sent stores for you at last, and says I, 'You may be right, Sarah, and
glad enough we shall a-be to hear of it, for it do make my heart bleed
to remember old days and see what the garrison is reduced to in vittles
and small-clothes. But,' says I, 'the luggage comes from the great
steamship, a