nded him five shillings and fourpence change with his
quittance, and on his way home he made a detour to hobble into Mr
Gedye's shop--"S. Gedye, Ironmonger and Ship-Chandler"--and purchase
two staples, a hasp, and a stout padlock, with key.

Mr Gedye, selecting these articles with a care that was slow torture
to his customer, opined that the weather was settled at last, and
trusted it would assist the Russians in mobilising. The slower Mr
Gedye became, the more ardently he repeated an expression of hope
that the Russians would hurry up.

"Once they get going--" said Mr Gedye, and pulled out a drawerful of
staples so far that it upset and spilled its contents in an avalanche
on the dark floor behind the counter. "I knew a ship's captain once,
a Russian that married a woman over to Troy and would go to sleep for
a week on end every time he came home from a voyage. His wife would
wake him up and give him tea: that was all he took--tea without milk,
between the sheets. He had been a Radical over in his own country,
and the Radical agent over to Troy got wind o' this an' took steps to
naturalise him. It took seven years. . . . But put him on deck in a
gale o' wind and a better skipper (I'm told) you wouldn' meet in a
day's march. When he got up an' dressed, he'd dander down to the
butcher's an' point to the fatty parts of the meat with the end of
his walking-stick, which was made out of a shark's backbone, if you
ever! In my experience, a very quiet nation until roused. . . .
Well, the Kaiser's done it this time--and a padlock, I think you
said? An uncomfortable man--that's my opinion of him, and I've never
seen cause to change it. Now, for a padlock, here is one I can
thoroughly recommend, with two keys, so that you can lose one and
still have the other, which is often a convenience. Yu'll be lockin'
up your 'taty-patch, Mr Nanjivell, against the Germans? Well, a very
proper precaution."

"One can't be too careful in these times," said Nicky-Nan with
feigned artlessness.

"No, indeed! Anything I can do for 'ee in the way of barbed wire?"

"No, I thank 'ee." Nicky-Nan's eyes had been wandering around the
shop. "But I'll take this small sieve, now I come to think on it."

"Certainly, Mr Nanjivell. One-an'-three. Shall I send it for 'ee?
No?--an' nothing further to-day? Then one-an'-three and one is
two-an'-three, an' two two's four, two-an'-seven, screws and staples
two two's, two-an'-eleven. If you