‘Affery, what girl was that in my mother’s room just now?’
‘Girl?’ said Mrs Flintwinch in a rather sharp key.
‘It was a girl, surely, whom I saw near you—almost hidden in the dark corner?’
‘Oh! She? Little Dorrit? She’s nothing; she’s a whim of—hers.’ It was a peculiarity of Affery Flintwinch that she never spoke of Mrs Clennam by name. ‘But there’s another sort of girls than that about. Have you forgot your old sweetheart? Long and long ago, I’ll be bound.’
‘I suffered enough from my mother’s separating us, to remember her. I recollect her very well.’
‘Have you got another?’
‘No.’
‘Here’s news for you, then. She’s well to do now, and a widow. And if you like to have her, why you can.’
‘And how do you know that, Affery?’
‘Them two clever ones have been speaking about it.—There’s Jeremiah on the stairs!’ She was gone in a moment.