Coquette

whispered to herself. "My!" For a time that was all she couldsay; but as she resumed her journey she exclaimed: "Chocolates! He nevergave Rose anything at all. Ee! He was going to ask me to dinner. Wish hehad! He didn't dare! My word, he hasn't half got a crush on me! OldGaga!" She was consumed with delighted laughter, that made her breakinto smiles at intervals during the whole of the dismal walk whichfollowed.

  viii

  "Here, have a chocolate, ma," said Sally. Mrs. Minto was sitting besidethe empty grate reading, with the aid of a magnifying glass, a piece ofnewspaper which had been wrapped around Sally's mended shoes. She lookedvery frail and meagre, but she was very much better than she had been,and but for the ugliness of the room and the drabness of her clothes shewould not have appeared miserable. She was, in fact, a pathetic figure;but thanks to Sally they were no longer starving, or in immediate dangerof it.

  "Chocolates!" cried Mrs. Minto. Then, sternly and suspiciously, she saidin her weak voice of warning, "Where did you get _them_ from, Sally?"

  "Won 'em in a raffle," declared Sally.

  "Oo, gambling!" reproved Mrs. Minto. "It's very wrong of younggirls----"

  "Fiddlesticks! They're good chocolates, too," said Sally. "Don't makeyourself sick. It's a nuisance. Besides, I want some myself. I _am_hungry. I've been working all the evening."

  "Working!" grumbled her mother, incredulously.

  "Well.... I ... _have_!" asserted Sally. "Perhaps you'd like me to getMiss Summers to give me a certificate? You'll see. I shall have a bitmore money at the end of the week. Then you'll rub your eyes. You'llapologise--I don't think! No, I'm a bad girl, wasting my time gaddingabout. You never think of that when you get the money, or the money ifI'm late."

  "Hush! Hush!" begged her mother. "I never said you was a bad girl.You're a very good girl. But when you bring home a box of chocolates atthis hour--nine o'clock, and past--and say you won them in a raffle, andyou've been working--well!"

  "What's that you're reading?" asked Sally, pointing to the small print.

  Mrs. Minto straightened the sheet of newspaper, and held it up to thelight.

  "It's an old paper," she said. "A trial."

  "Lor! Murder?" Sally almost left her supper. "What's it all about?"

  "Well ... oo, he must a been a wicked wretch. He poisoned the old lady.He'd robbed her before he did it. Took all her money to give her anannuity, and then he poisoned her."

  "Poison! Whew! What sort of poison?"

  "Flypapers, it was. Not them sticky ones, but the brown, what you put inwater. Got arsenic in them, they have."

  "What's arsenic?"

  Mrs. Minto looked over her magnifying glass at Sally in a bewilderedway.

  "I don't know. It's poison. I never poisoned anybody. Not that I knowof."

  "No," agreed Sally. She thought to herself: "She ought to have poisoneddad. All of us." Melancholy seized her, a dreadful passing fit ofdepression. Suddenly she longed for Toby. Aloud, she proceeded, moreseriously: "If it's in the flypapers, why don't we all get poisoned,ma?"

  "Well, it seems he soaked the papers, and drained off the water, withthe poison in it, and mixed it with her food--beef tea, and that. _She_never noticed anything. She had awful pains, and diarrhoea, and wassick; and then she died, poor thing."

  "Hn," said Sally, reaching out for the chocolates. "I'll read it. I likemurders."

  "Hush!" cried Mrs. Minto, in horror. "Read them--yes; but say you likemurders! What wicked people there are in the world, to be sure. I hopethey hanged him."

  "Doesn't it say?" mumbled Sally, dealing with a chocolate with caramelinside it.

  "It's torn across. It's what I got your shoes in, Sally. It's a.... It's'Stories of Famous Trials,' in the Weekly Something.... I can't see whatit is."

  For the next quarter of an hour Sally ate chocolates and read about thetrial of Seddon for murdering Miss Barrow.

  "Miss Barrow!" she exclaimed. "Wonder if she was any relation to oldPerce! I'll ask Mrs. Perce about it. Oo--fancy Tollington Park! Quitenear us in Hornsey Road."

  Mrs. Minto shuddered, and looked furtively at the clock, longing forher bedtime. Sally caught the glance, shut up the box of chocolates, andfolded the paper.

  "You going to work?" asked her mother.

  "Wash my hair."

  "You're always washing ... _washing_, you call it!" cried Mrs. Minto.

  Sally ignored the sneer, and proceeded to her occupation. There was asilence. Mrs. Minto yawned. She looked at Sally making her preparations,and into her face came a watchful anxiety that was mingled with profoundesteem. There was a _chic_ about her girl that made Mrs. Minto assumethis expression quite often, and Sally knew it. She knew it now, and waselaborately unconscious of it. As she waited for the kettle and movedthe lamp so that it would illumine the washstand, she whistled to showhow blind she was to any sign of emotion from her mother. When thewhistle was unavailing, she said sharply:

  "Don't you think this is a pretty frock, ma?"

  Mrs. Minto sighed heavily, and pulled herself up out of her chair.

  "Far _too_ pretty, if you ask me," she said. "Looks to me fast." She wasfull of concern, and did not try to hide it from Sally.

  "Oo!" cried Sally. "You _are_ stupid, ma!" And with that she whipped thedress over her head and revealed the fact that she wore no petticoat.Her mother was the more outraged.

  Sally began to sing.

  "'When you and I go down the love path together, Stars shall be shining and the night so fair.'"

  "Well, it's a good thing nobody else sees you like that," sniffed hermother, rebukingly. "I don't know what they _would_ think!"

  Sally forebore to make the obvious retort. Her mother prepared for bed.

  ix

  For the next fortnight Sally did not see Gaga, and only at the end ofthe period did she learn that he had been away from London on business.This was one of the journeys of which Miss Summers had spoken, to theagricultural districts. Sally could not discover whether Gaga actuallyacted as traveller for his own firm; but she gathered that he found ituseful to see how the country was behaving itself in the matter ofagriculture. She suspected also that he went away for his health. Shespeculated as to what he looked like with his handsome coat off, andrecalled wrists that could have been spanned with ease by her own smallfingers. In contrast, when she saw Toby, she saw with swelling pride howbig his hands were, and felt his already increased muscles. Once heswung her clear from the ground with one arm, so that her feet kickedagainst his leg in helplessness. He was getting stronger and stouterthan ever, and his eyes were clear and his skin tanned and smoothed bythe breeze. She adored him. He wanted her to go away with him during oneof his leaves; but Sally did not dare to go, because her mother had beenspecially grumbling and suspicious. So they saw each other rarely forthe rest of the year, and their meetings became the more precious forthat reason.

  Soon after Gaga returned, Madam went away. She had had no holiday, andshe had fallen ill, with headaches and bilious attacks and a threat ofjaundice. So it happened that Gaga came each day to the dressmakingestablishment and took charge of the cash and the accounts, while MissSummers and Miss Rapson interviewed any customers who came aboutdresses. Miss Rapson, a tall, thin, dark woman, was in another room,with eight girls under her; but Miss Summers was really in charge whileMadam was away, because she understood the whole business, and was amore experienced woman than Miss Rapson. Sally had hardly ever seen MissRapson until this time, so much did she keep to her own room; but now,when the two who were in charge had to arrange their work together,there was more interchange. Sally had often to go into the other roomwith messages or work, and she came to understand very quickly what wenton there. Miss Rapson was strict, and rather disagreeable. Her girlswere like mice, unless she was absent; and her sallow face gave the clueto her disagreeableness. She did not like Sally at all, because she wasjealous of her. Sally was quick to perceive this, but she did notretaliate. She formed her own cool conclusions about Miss Rapson. Sheunderstood the complexion, and
she was more concerned with the detailsof the work than with anything else. Besides, she was in a strongposition. She had nothing to fear from Miss Rapson. She soon recognisedthat she had not much to learn from her, either. Miss Rapson was forty,angular, shortsighted. She was inclined to be fussy and self-importantand lacking in self-reliance. If anything went wrong she lost first herhead and then her temper. "Hysterics!" thought Sally, cruelly. And MissRapson was very anxious indeed to have the reversion of Miss Summers'place of