"That's nothing," said Miss Hawkins. "They'll marry again with the rattle in their throats."
That tart was in the oven, and had to be remembered. Or else Aunt Elizabeth Jane wanted to see no more of Mr. Wix. "I must be running back to my cooking," said she. "But if this gentleman goes again to find out Sappses, he's only got to ask for my niece at Number One, or Mrs. Wardle at Number Seven, and he'll find Mrs. Prichard easy." She did not speak directly to the man, and he for his part noticed her departure very slightly, giving it a fraction of a grunt he wanted the rest of later.
Nor did Aunt Elizabeth Jane seem in a great hurry to get away when Miss Hawkins had seen her to the door. She lingered a moment to refer to Aunt's M'riar's talk of Widow Prichard. Certainly Mrs. Wardle at Number Seven _she_ said nothing of any second marriage, and thought Prichard was the name of the old lady's first husband, who had died in Van Diemen's Land. Miss Julia paid very little attention. What business of hers was Widow Prichard? She was much more interested in a couple of policemen walking along the lane. Not a very common spectacle in that retired thoroughfare! Also, instead of following on along the riverside road it opened into, they both wheeled right-about-face and came back.
Miss Julia, taking down a shutter to reinstate The Pigeons as a tavern open to customers, noted that the faces of these two were strange to her. Also that they passed her with the barest good-morning, forbiddingly. The police generally cultivate intercourse with public-house keepers of every sort, but when one happens to be a lady with ringlets especially so; even should her complexion be partly due to correctives, to amalgamate a blotchiness. These officers overdid their indifference, and it attracted Miss Julia's attention.
Aunt Elizabeth Jane thought at the time she might have mistaken what she heard one of them say to the other. For, of course, she passed them close. The words she heard seemed to be:--"That will be Hawkins." Something in them rang false with her concept of the situation. But there was the cherry-tart to be seen to, and some peas to boil. Only not the whole lot at once for only her and Michael! As for that boy, she had sent him off to the baker's, the minute he came back, to wait till the bit of the best end of the neck was sure to be quite done, and bring it away directly minute.