“Don’t talk I say, Mrs. Bilton, but listen.  Listen now.  I can’t stand seeing those children in there.  It sheer makes my gorge rise.  I want you to fetch them in here—­now don’t talk—­you and me’ll do the confounded waiting—­no, no, don’t talk—­they’re to stay quiet in here till the last of those Germans have gone.  Just go and fetch them, please Mrs. Bilton.  No, no, we’ll talk afterwards.  I’ll stay here till they come.”  And he urged her out into the tea-room again.

The guests had finished their tea long ago, but still sat on, for they were very comfortable.  Obviously they were thoroughly enjoying themselves, and all were growing, as time passed, more manifestly at home.  They were now having a kind of supper of ices and fruit-salads.  Five dollars, thought the sensible Germans, was after all a great deal to pay for afternoon tea, however good the cause might be and however important one’s own ulterior motives; and since one had in any case to pay, one should eat what one could.  So they kept the Annas very busy.  There seemed to be no end, thought the Annas as they ran hither and thither, to what a German will hold.

Mrs. Bilton waylaid the heated and harried Anna-Rose as she was carrying a tray of ices to a party she felt she had been carrying ices to innumerable times already.  The little curls beneath her cap clung damply to her forehead.  Her face was flushed and distressed.  What with having to carry so many trays, and remember so many orders, and try at the same time to escape from the orderers and their questions and admiration, she was in a condition not very far from tears.

Mrs. Bilton took the tray out of her hands, and told her Mr. Twist wanted to speak to her; and Anna-Rose was in such a general bewilderment that she felt quite scared, and thought he must be going to scold her.  She went towards the office reluctantly.  If Mr. Twist were to be severe, she was sure she wouldn’t be able not to cry.  She made her way very slowly to the office, and Mrs. Bilton looked round the room for the other one.  There was no sign of her.  Perhaps, thought Mrs. Bilton, she was fetching something in the kitchen, and would appear in a minute; and seeing a group over by the entrance door, for whom the tray she held was evidently destined, gesticulating to her, she felt she had better keep them quiet first and then go and look for Anna-Felicitas.

Mrs. Bilton set her teeth and plunged into her strange new duties.  Never would she have dreamed it possible that she should have to carry trays to Germans.  If Mr. Bilton could see her now he would certainly turn in his grave.  Well, she was a woman of grit, of adhesiveness to her guns; if Mr. Bilton did see her and did turn in his grave, let him; he would, she dared say, be more comfortable on his other side after all these years.