e residue upon the
counter. A feeling of panic came upon me. "Right you are," I exclaimed
hurriedly, "I'll take the lot." As a matter of fact she only wanted a
pair of gloves for her nephew in France.

A few days later, still having the wool shortage in mind, I approached
my hosier and haberdasher on the subject of shirts. For a second or two
he looked thoughtfully at the toe of his boot. Then coming suddenly to a
decision he disappeared stealthily into the back premises, from which
he presently emerged carrying a large bale of flannel, which he cast
caber-wise upon the counter.

"There," he said triumphantly, "I don't suppose there's another piece of
flannel like that in the country." He fingered it with an expert touch.

"You don't say so," I said as I rubbed it reverently between my finger
and thumb, just to show that he wasn't the only one who could do it.

"I'm afraid it's only too true," he confessed, "and I may add that,
after we have sold out our present stocks, flannel of any kind will be
absolutely unobtainable."

"None at all?" I asked, horror-struck at the vision of my public life in
1920--a bow cravat over a double-width vestum.

He shook his head and smiled wisely.

I am instinctively against hoarding, but I knew that if I did not buy it
Jones would, and then some fine day, when nobody else had a shirt left,
he would swagger about and make my life intolerable. This decided me and
I bought the piece.

A few days later it occurred to me that it might be advisable to lay
down some socks. My idea was in perfect unison with that of my hosier
and haberdasher. Socks were going to be unprocurable in a few months. I
patted myself on the back and bought up the 1916 vintage of Llama-Llama
footwear. The following week thirty-seven shirts arrived and I had to
buy a new chest-of-drawers.

This, as I have stated before, was about a year ago. Yesterday I paid my
hosier and haberdasher another visit. If all the bone factories had not
been too exclusively engaged, etc., etc., I wished to buy a collar stud.
There was an elderly man standing in the shop. He was quite alone,
contemplating a mountain of garments. There were little vesties,
double-width vestums, and ordinary woollen affairs.

You could have knocked me over with a dress-sock.

And where was my hosier and haberdasher? Had the stranger--just awakened
to the value of his possessions--entered the shop and suddenly cast all
this treasure upon the counter?