Then when the transport had been effected and the improvised porter lavishly tipped, the landlady came up to Elizabeth’s bedroom and asked brightly what she had ordered for her dinner, as nothing had come yet.

Elizabeth had forgotten to order anything. She said blankly,

“Oh—er—I am dining out to-night!”

“What about breakfast, ma’am?” inquired Mrs. Cotton.

“I—well, to tell the truth, I forgot about breakfast. I—I’ll bring in some eggs.”

“Well, as long as I know,” Mrs. Cotton said. “Thompson, the greengrocer up the road, ’as very nice eggs. Very nice indeed they are. P’raps you’ll be dealing with ’im, ma’am?”

“Yes, if—if he’s reliable. I don’t know the shops in this district. Can you advise me?”

“I’m sure I shall be very pleased to do anything I can to ’elp,” Mrs. Cotton said obligingly. “There’s Dimson, the butcher. I always ’ave said and I always shall say that barring accidents you couldn’t do no better than to go to ’im. As to grocers, well, there you are! You’ve got Sainsbury’s just around the corner, or the ’Ome Colonial, though I must say their new man what comes down this way is not at all what I’d call a gentleman. ’Owever, that’s neither ’ere nor there, and I ’ope I knows ’ow to keep a man in ’is place. No, realy, I should say you couldn’t do better than to try the ’Ome Colonial. And Mr. Williams, I’m sure ’e’d be only too glad to supply you with bread, an’ flour an’ that. ’E’s a very obliging man, ma’am.”

“All right,” Elizabeth said. “Perhaps you’d ask him to call for orders?”

“Certainly,” said Mrs. Cotton.

Elizabeth unpacked, and tried to make her sitting-room look more like home. The thought that she must dine out depressed her, but if there was no food in the house there was nothing else to be done. As she was getting ready to go, Mrs. Cotton appeared again, with a latch-key.

“The gentleman as used to ’ave these rooms was very pertickler about ’aving a key,” she remarked, standing half in and half out of the doorway. “I just popped up to ask if you’d like to ’ave it now ’e’s gorn. It saves me ’aving to come up them basement stairs every time you come in, and reely what with my ’eart and my rheumatics, well, there! You know what it is, ma’am!”

“Thank you; I should like to have a key,” Elizabeth said, taking it. “Thanks very much.”

“It’s a great convenience,” said Mrs. Cotton.