s mouth, though 'tis where he puts most things."

"But you're goin' to the Treat yourself, ma'am?" Nicky-Nan suggested.

"What, in _this_ rig-out? Catch me!" answered Mrs Penhaligon, not
with literal intention but idiomatically. "No, I'm but goin' up to
see 'em off decent. But I wonder at you liggin' behind, when 'tis
the only Bank Holiday randivoo this side o' Troy. . . ."

"'Tidn' for want o' will," Nicky-Nan answered ruefully and
truthfully, with a downward glance, which reminded Mrs Penhaligon to
be remorseful.

"Eh, but I forgot . . . and you with that leg on your mind!
But you'll forgive a body as has been these two days in a stirabout.
And if you're fittin' to take a stroll before I get back, maybe
you'll not forget to lock the house up."

Nicky-Nan promised. (He and the Penhaligons had separate keys of the
main door.) He watched the good woman as she hurried on her way,
tying her bonnet-strings as she went.

It occurred to him that, leg or no leg, he felt lonely, and would be
all the better for a stroll. So, having fetched his stick and locked
the house-door behind him, he dandered down towards the Quay.
The street was empty, uncannily silent. "It's queer now," thought
Nicky-Nan, "what a difference childern make to a town, an' you never
noticin' it till they're gone." All the children had departed--the
happy little Wesleyans to climb on board the waggons, the small
Church of England minority to watch them, and solace their envy with
expectation of their own Treat, a more select one, promised for
this-day-fortnight. Then would be _their_ turn, and some people
would live to be sorry that they went to Chapel. But a fortnight is
a long time, and weather in the West is notoriously uncertain.
Of course you cannot eat your cake and have it: but Mrs Penhaligon
arrived just in time to stop a fight between 'Bert and Matthey
Matthew's ugly boy, who sang in the Church choir, and hoped it would
rain. (_Odium theologicum_.)

The most of the mothers had departed also, either to "assist" at the
Treat or to watch the embarkation: while those of the men whom the
War had not claimed had tramped it over to Troy, which six weeks
ago--and long before the idea of a European War had occurred to any
one--had advertised a small regatta for Bank Holiday, with an
afternoon's horse-racing.

The tunding of the drum up the valley seemed to Nicky-Nan to
emphasise the loneliness all about him. But down by the Quay-head he