It was a very ordinary country sale of work. The Countess of Bilberry
declared it open in a neat little speech, and then bought generously
from every stall: her daughter, whose smile nobody could resist, did a
fine trade with raffle tickets for the record pumpkin produced by the
local allotments: Mrs. Dodd, the Rector's wife, presided over a pair
of scales and a strictly rationed tea, and all the rest of the village
sold vegetables and socks and pincushions, and tried to pretend that
antimacassars and shaving tidies and woolwork waistbelts were the most
desirable things in the world when they were made by wounded men at
the nearest Red Cross Hospital, in whose aid the sale was held.
But there was one unique figure amongst all the folk who knew each
other, and each other's clothes, and each other's clothes' cost, so
well. She arrived at the Village Hall in a pony-carriage, drawn by
the ugliest little pony that ever sniffed oats. She was very quietly
and very tastefully dressed, and, instead of concentrating on the
well-laden stalls of garden produce or the orderly stacks of knitted
comforts, or the really useful baskets, she went straight to the stall
which even Mrs. Dodd, who had the kindest heart in the countryside,
had been compelled to relegate to a dark corner. There was
woolwork run riot over cushions of incredible hardness; there were
candle-shades guaranteed to catch alight at the mere sight of a match;
there were crochet dressing-table mats, and there was a three-legged
stool on which even a fairy could not have sat without danger of a
break-down.
The youngest Miss Dodd, a severely practical young lady of sixteen,
who was presiding at this stall, jumped up in surprise at the sight of
a customer, and in doing so knocked over a glass box bound with red
and white and blue ribbon, with "Handkerchiefs" painted across the
corner in a design of forget-me-nots. There was very little glass box
left when she picked it up, and the splinters had made a good many
little craters in the surface of a big bowl of clotted cream, labelled
"Positively the last appearance for the Duration of the War," which
was at the corner of the next stall.
The little stranger said that she would take the box and the damaged
cream too; she bought a whole family of crochet mats with centres
of orange woollen loops; three pincushions made of playing cards
discharged as no longer fit for active service; a table-centre with
pen-painting of the Allied flags, and a letter-case with the badges of
the Dominions worked in wool and "Across the sea, A letter from thee,"
straggling wearily across one corner. Then there was an antimacassar
in purple and magenta sateen, with yellow daffodils making a brave
attempt to flourish in unlikely surroundings.
At the next stall she bought a photograph frame which had lost its
prop in an unequal contest with a tea-tray which had collapsed from
the heartiness of the Rector's clapping at the conclusion of the
Countess's speech; and a Noah's Ark from which the star performer
and his very best beasts had somehow disappeared.
Then the little lady paused before the live-stock stall.
"There isn't anything really hideous here," she murmured to herself;
"but I think that puppy--it's never had its tail cut, and nobody will
ever know whether it's a sealyham, a spaniel or even a dash of a
setter--I will take the puppy, please," she added, "as soon as I've
had some tea. After that I will see what is left. You have such nice
things."
After tea she went back to the youngest Miss Dodd and collected a few
more of the more glaring atrocities, paid her bills, and then went off
to her pony-carriage; the youngest Miss Dodd, very much inclined to
giggle, bearing armfuls of odd purchases in her wake, crowned by the
bowl of cream and the mongrel pup. She handed them in and was just
going away when the little old lady pressed a piece of paper into her
hand.
"I don't like to worry people," she said gently, "but if you have time
you might read this. It has been a great opportunity to-day; I don't
often find so much to be done--and I shall love the puppy."
The youngest Miss Dodd watched the start of the ugly pony with a
snigger and then went back into the lighted hall to read the pamphlet.
It was a touching little document--many people know it well--and the
youngest Miss Dodd, who had never been known to sentimentalize over
anything before, blew her nose rather violently when she had read it.
"Bless her dear little soul!" she said to herself: "I don't wonder
that pup was trying to kiss her. I only hope she won't try to eat that
cream with the glass in it, or give it to the pup." For the pamphlet
was the Rules for Membership and a treatise on the Objects and Methods
of the "Society for Buying What Nobody Wants."
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