Page:Pontoppidan - Emanuel, or Children of the Soil (1896).djvu/252

 slums, who had lately been entrusted to his care "by the direction of the Almighty," as Villing expressed it, and by which he meant an advertisement in the daily paper.

Little by little the customers dropped in, and up to church-time the shop was crammed. Most of them came, more to wile away a leisure hour than to deal. The shop was the common meeting place for the men, where they went at least once a day to hear the news, fetch the letters, and learn the day's prices.

The public mind was unusually depressed to-day. Rumours were afloat as to the preparations for war between the Provst and the people of Skibberup. One thing was certain, and that was, that the Provst had lodged a formal complaint with the Bishop about Emanuel, and had asked that he might be removed at once. Any one could see that the Skibberup people would not let this insult pass unnoticed.

According to some, the weaver had said with his malicious smile that there would not be peace in the parish till the Provst was driven out of Veilby Parsonage,—and what the weaver promised with a smile he usually performed.

Villing went about his business behind the counter with his ears pricked up to follow the various conversations. But neither he nor his wife—who had appeared in the shop like a sunbeam in a pink cotton gown—forgot to look