“War’s a funny thing,” she mused.  “Where do you feel it, Mother?”

“Don’t clacky so much, that’s a darlin’, but go on with your breakfast.”  But Mrs Penhaligon heaved a sigh that was answer enough.

“Well, I wanted to know, because down by Quay-end I heard old Aun’ Rundle say it made her feel like the bottom of her stomach was fallin’ out.  I suppose it takes people differ’nt as they get up in years.”

“I know azackly where I feel it!” announced ’Biades.  “It’s here.”  He set down his spoon and pointed a finger on the third button of his small waistcoat.  “An’ it keeps workin’ up an’ down an’ makin’ noises just like Billy Richard’s key-bugle.”

“Then it’s a mercy it ben’t real,” commented his brother.

“’Biades is right, all the same.”  ’Beida regarded the child and nodded slowly.  “It do feel very much like when you hear a band comin’ up the street.  It catches you—­” She broke off and laid her open palm on her chest a little below the collar.  “An’ then it’s creepin’ up the back of your legs an’ along your arms, an’ up your backbone, right into the roots o’ your hair.  But the funniest thing of all is, the place looks so differ’nt—­an’ all the more because there’s so little happenin’ differ’nt. . . .  I can’t tell just what I mean,” she owned candidly, turning to Nicky-Nan; “but it don’t seem we be here somehow, nor the houses don’t seem real, somehow.  ‘Tis as if your real inside was walkin’ about somewhere else, listenin’ to the band.”

“Nonsense your tellin’,” ’Bert interrupted.  “Father’s put on his uniform.  How can you make it that things ben’t differ’nt, after that?”

“An’ he’s here!” ’Biades nodded, over his half-lifted spoon, at Nicky-Nan.

“Oh!” said ‘Bert, “that isn’ because of the War.  That’s to say Good-bye, because he’s turnin’ out this week.”

“For goodness, children, eat up your meal, an’ stop talkin’!” Mrs Penhaligon returned from the hearth to the table and set down a dish of eggs and sizzling bacon.  “Wherever you pick up such notions! . . .  You must excuse their manners, Mr Nanjivell.”

But Nicky-Nan was staring at young ’Bert from under fiercely bent eyebrows.

“Who told you that I was turnin’ out this week?” he demanded.

“I heard Mr Pamphlett say it, day before yesterday.  He was round with Squinny Gilbert—­”

“Fie now, your manners get worse and worse!” his mother reproved him.  “Who be you, to talk of the builder-man without callin’ him ’Mister’?”

“Well then, he was round with Mister Squinny Gilbert, lookin’ over the back o’ the house.  I heard him say as you was done for, and would have to clear inside the next two or three days—­”

“He did—­did he?” Nicky-Nan was arising in ungovernable rage; but Mrs Penhaligon coaxed him to sit down.

“There now!” she said soothingly.  “Take un’ eat, Mr Nanjivell!  The Good Lord bids us be like the lilies o’ the field, and I can vouch the eggs to be new-laid.  Sufficient for the day. . . .  An’ here ‘tis the Sabbath, an’ to-morrow Bank Holiday.  Put the man out o’ your thoughts, an’ leave the Lord to provide.”