"Say!" he called out to the hatchet-faced woman who was writing down
sundry items in a ledger at a high desk. "The boys has all cleared
out. What's up, I wonder?"

"They'll be back," said the woman imperturbably, "an' more with 'em.
You want t' git your glasses all washed up, Gus; an' you may as well
fetch up another demijohn out the cellar."

Was it foreknowledge, or merely coincidence which at this same hour
led Mrs. Solomon Black, frugally inspecting her supplies for tomorrow
morning's breakfast, to discover that her baking-powder can was
empty?

"I'll have to roll out a few biscuits for their breakfast," she
decided, "or else I'll run short of bread for dinner."

Her two boarders, Lydia Orr and the minister, were sitting on the
piazza, engaged in what appeared to be a most interesting
conversation, when Mrs. Black unlatched the front gate and emerged
upon the street, her second-best hat carefully disposed upon her
water-waves.

"I won't be gone a minute," she paused to assure them; "I just got to
step down to the grocery."

A sudden hush fell upon a loud and excited conversation when Mrs.
Solomon Black, very erect as to her spinal column and noticeably
composed and dignified in her manner, entered Henry Daggett's store.
She walked straight past the group of men who stood about the door to
the counter, where Mr. Daggett was wrapping in brown paper two large