Anna read the words again and again. This was
treating her at last as she ought always to have been
treated! Anna did not like her erst fellow-country-man,
and she considered that she had good reason for
her dislike. Resentment against ingratitude is not
confined to any one nationality.

When Manfred Hegner had first come to Witanbury,
Anna had been delighted to make his acquaintance,
and she had spent many happy half-hours chatting
with him in the little _Delicatessen_ shop he had
established in Bridge Street, close to the Market
Place.

Starting with only the goodwill of a bankrupt confectioner,
he had very soon built up a wonderfully
prosperous business. But his early success had been
in a measure undoubtedly owing to Mrs. Otway and
her German cook. Mrs. Otway had told all her
friends of this amusing little German shop, and of
the good things which were to be bought there. _Delicatessen_
had become quite the fashion, not only among
the good people of Witanbury itself, but among the
county gentry who made the cathedral town their
shopping headquarters, and who enjoyed motoring
in there to spend an idly busy morning.

Then had come the erection of the big Stores.
Over that matter quite a storm had arisen, and local
feeling had been very mixed. A petition originated
by those who called themselves the Art Society of
Witanbury, pointed out that a large modern building
of the kind proposed would ruin the old-world, picturesque
appearance of the Market Place. But the
big local builder, the man who later promoted the
election of Manfred Hegner on to the City Council,

[[46]]

p045 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p046w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p047

v?