As she came down from her room, purse in hand, she observed through the staircase window the blank faces of Sam and his underlings, as the carrier tossed the cheeses to them from the cart, grinning the while as though at some excellent joke. She stamped her foot, and caught her breath with a little angry sob. She had been so proud in despatching to Branston load after load of these fine round cheeses, she had often congratulated herself on the wisdom and cleverness of this expedient of hers—and now to have them ignominiously thrown back at her without having even disposed of one—to be turned into a laughing-stock for her own folks as well as for the whole town of Branston; to be actually made to pay for the ill-success of her experiment! Rosalie was as a rule open-handed and generous enough, but the disbursal of this particular sixteen-and-eightpence caused her a pang of almost physical anguish. Half an hour later, when the carrier had departed and the men returned to their work, she entered the dairy, and stood gazing with clasped hands and a melancholy countenance at the heaps of despised Blue Vinneys which were piled up on every side. To her presently came Sam Belbin, his arms dangling limply by his sides, his expression duly composed to sympathetic gloom. ‘Oh, Sam!’ exclaimed Rosalie in a heartbroken tone, pointing tragically to the nearest yellow mound. ‘I would n’t take on, I’m sure, mum,’ responded Sam with a ghastly smile. ‘Nay now, I would n’t take on. ’T was very ill done o’ Mr. Hardy—so everybody do say, but he’s that graspin’—he never do care for sellin’ a bit o’ cheese to poor folks—’t is all bacon, bacon wi’ he! “Don’t ’ee go for to fill your stummicks wi’ that there ’ard cheese,” I ’ve a-heard him say myself. “Buy a bit o’ bacon as ’ull stand to ye hot or cold.”’ ‘Bacon!’ ejaculated Rosalie with a note of even deeper woe. Then, pointing to the cheeses again, she groaned: ‘Oh, Sam, was it worth while getting rid of the pigs—for this?’ ‘Dear heart alive, mum,’ responded Belbin, plucking up his courage, and speaking more cheerfully. ‘Mr. Hardy bain’t the only grocer in Branston! There be a-many more as ’ud be proud an’ glad to sell them cheeses for ye.’ ‘No, no. Why, the story must be all over the town by now—no one will look at them in Branston. Everyone will know that Mr. Hardy packed them back to me. No, if I sell them at all I must send them away somewhere—to Dorchester, perhaps.’ ‘Well, and that ’ud be a good notion, mum,’ commented Belbin. ‘You’d get a better price for them there, I d’ ’low. Lard! At Dorchester the Blue Vinney cheeses do go off like smoke.’ ‘There is always a sale for them there, to be sure,’ said Rosalie, somewhat less lugubriously.