The three comrades had tea in the garden, and were studied suspiciously by the landlord’s wife, a comely little woman with bright, brown eyes. The few words that she uttered were addressed to Eve. “A nice May we’re having!” “Splendid.” And then Joan Gaunt proceeded to make an implacable enemy of her by telling her to see that the beds were properly aired. About seven o’clock Pulborough discovered that it had been invaded by suffragettes. Three women had stationed themselves with their backs to a wall at a place where three roads met, and one of the women—it was Lizzie Straker—brandished a small flag. Pulborough gathered. The news spread somehow even to the outlying cottages. Stale eggs are to be found even in the country, and a certain number of stale eggs rushed to attend the meeting. Lizzie Straker was the speaker, and the people of Pulborough appeared to discover something intensely funny in Lizzie Straker. Her enthusiastic and earnest spluttering tickled them. The more she frowned and punched the air with that brown fist of hers, the more amusing they found her. The Executive had not been wise in its choice of an itinerant orator, for Lizzie Straker lost her temper very quickly on such occasions, and growing venomous, began to say scathing things, things that even a Sussex brain can understand. Some of the younger spirits began to jeer. “Do you wonder she be’unt married!” “Can’t she talk! Like a kettle a-boiling over!” “What’s she wanting a vote for?” “I’ll tell you for why; to have laws made so as all the pretty girls shall be sent off to Canada.” Their humour was hardly less crude than Lizzie Straker’s sneering superiority. And then an egg flew, and broke against the wall behind Joan Gaunt’s head. The crowd closed in threateningly. The flag was snatched from Lizzie Straker, and someone threw a dead mouse in Joan Gaunt’s face. The retreat to the inn was not dignified. The rest of the eggs followed them, but for some reason or other Eve was spared. Her two comrades came in for all the honour. The crowd accompanied them to the inn, and found the blue-eyed landlord standing in the doorway. “Chuck ’em out, Mister Crowhurst!” “We don’t want the likes of them in Pulborough!” Joan Gaunt was for pushing her way in, and the landlord gave way. He said a few words to the crowd, shut the door, and followed the suffragettes into the long passage. “Sorry, ladies, but you’ll have to turn out. I can’t keep you. It isn’t safe.” Lizzie Straker’s claws were still out. “But you have got to. You keep a public house. It’s the law!” A voice chimed in from the end of the passage: “John, I won’t have those women in my house! No, I won’t; that’s a fact. They’ve got neither sense nor manners.” “All right, my dear.” “If I had my way, I’d have them all put in asylums. Disgusting fools. I don’t care; let them summon us. I won’t have them in my house.” Joan Gaunt tried her Roman manner. “I shall insist on staying. Where are the police?”