scarce

Adjective

• deficient in quantity or number compared with the demand
  • fresh vegetables were scarce during the drought
    

Adverb

• only a very short time before
  • they could barely hear the speaker
    
  • we hardly knew them
    
  • just missed being hit
    
  • had scarcely rung the bell when the door flew open
    
  • would have scarce arrived before she would have found some excuse to leave- W.B.Yeats
    

Related words

• Synonyms: 
  barely , hardly , just , scarcely