just because they know she'll treat 'em, She's a-doin' of it now--there's
lots of 'em. And allus changin' such a queer lot of money too--odd
half-crowns--years and years old--King George the Third, sir. No--it's
strange--very strange."

The two walked on into the darkness, still talking.

Meanwhile, inside the Spotted Deer Bessie Costrell was treating her
hangers-on. She had drunk one glass of gin and water--it had made a
beauty of her in the judgment of the tap-room, such a kindling had it
given to her brown eyes and such a redness to her cheek. Bessie, in
truth, had reached her moment of physical prime. The marvel was that
there were no lovers in addition to the drinking and the extravagance.
But the worst of the village scandal-mongers knew of none. Since this
new phase of character in her had developed, she would drink and make
merry with any young fellow in the place, but it went no farther. She
was _bonne camarade_ with all the world--no more. Perhaps at bottom some
coolness of temperament protected her; nobody, at any rate, suspected
that it had anything to do with Isaac, or that she cared a ha'porth for
so lugubrious and hypocritical a husband.

She had showered drinks on all her friends, and had, moreover, chattered
and screamed herself hoarse, when the church-clock outside slowly struck
eight. She started, changed countenance, and got up to pay at once.

"Why, there's another o' them half-crowns o' yourn, Bessie," said a
consumptive-looking girl in a bedraggled hat and feathers, as Mrs.
Costrell handed her coin to the landlord. "Wheriver do yer get 'em?"

"If yer don't ask no questions, I won't tell yer no lies," said Bessie,
with quick impudence. "Where did you get them hat and feathers?"

There was a coarse laugh from the company. The girl in the hat reddened
furiously, and she and Bessie--both of them in a quarrelsome state--began
to bandy words.

Meanwhile the landlord was showing the coin to his assistant at the bar.

"Rum, ain't it? I niver seed one o' them pieces in the village afore
this winter, an' I've been 'ere twenty-two year come April."

A decent-looking labourer, who did not often visit the Spotted Deer, was
leaning over the bar and caught the words.

"Well, then, I 'ave," he said promptly. "I mind well as when I were a
lad, sixteen year ago, my fayther borrered a bit o' money off John
Bolderfield, to buy a cow with--an' there was 'arf of it in them
'arf-crowns."

Tho