“Jem, you’re a—” began Jack hotly; but his mother touched his lips with her hand.
“Don’t call him names, whatever he’s done, Jack. That won’t do any good. But oh, Jem, it is too bad if you have, when you know how poor we are, and how little your father has had to do lately.”
“But don’t you see, mother,” said Jem, with a rather superior smile, “I mean to get something better, so that I shall be more real help. I’m sure I ought to be making more than four shillings a week, and I believe I can if you leave me alone.”
“Oh, yes,” put in Edie, who always believed in Jem, and took his part against the whole world, “he’ll soon find a better place, where he’ll get on—won’t you, dear? And he has stayed in this one a month now—that’s longer than he was last time, and next time he’ll stay longer still.”
Jack gave a sort of grunt that seemed to express disapproval, and the matter dropped until Bob came in a couple of hours later, very tired and not in the best of tempers in consequence.
“Father’s coming directly, mother,” he said. “I won’t have anything till he comes in, and then we’ll have a bit of supper together.”
He sat down, and Bessie, the smallest and palest of the girls, climbed on his knee, and slipped her arm under his and round his back.
“Well, monster,” he said, for this was his nickname for the slight little creature, “how have you been getting on? Any news?”
“No,” said Bessie, “except that Jem’s left his place.”
“Left? What, have they sent him off?”