The charwoman stared blankly for a moment, and then flushed, changing her weight with an embarrassed awkwardness from foot to foot.
“I thought of just going up to have a look at the house,” she hesitated at last. “It’s a bit grasping, likely, going up so soon, but I’m fair aching to have a peep. That’s why I’m all donned out in my Sunday black!” she finished with an apologetic smile.
A second sigh that had begun as an outsize in Emma’s mouth issued in miniature on the soft September air. She nodded gently.
“I don’t know as it isn’t wise. Things don’t always come off, and it don’t do to chance a slip.... Seems to me, though, you might spare a minute to step in. You’ve all afternoon before you, and you can do a deal o’ looking in that.”
Mrs. Clapham hesitated a moment longer, and then capitulated. Even the Emmas of life were hardly to be refused on this her beautiful day. She was in the mood, too, to believe that even Emmas might have their moments; that, in spite of intuition and other more definite evidence to the contrary, they might yet end by proving themselves honest and true friends....
“Ay, well, I’ll see what I can do,” she agreed, though still rather doubtfully, looking down at the cloth on her arm. “I’ve a deal to see to, though; I shan’t be able to stop. Anyway, I’d best slip home first wi’ t’ clout, and I’ve a pot o’ Mrs. James’s to return an’ all.”
She hurried off as she spoke, throwing the last words backwards, almost as if afraid that she might be dragged into Emma’s on the spot, swam down the hill with great noddings of the black feather and billowings of the black gown, and disappeared; while Emma herself stayed watching her until she was out of sight, and then faded towards the steps, and up the steps, and through the doorway into the dark beyond....
Mrs. Clapham was so busy turning over in her mind the why and wherefore of Emma’s request that she failed to notice various forms scuttling into their dwellings at her approach—forms which bore a decided resemblance to members of the Chorus. But by the time she had deposited the cloth, locked the door, and gone on to leave the china with Mrs. James, she discovered that the street had not been by any means empty during the foregoing scene. The younger woman received her thanks with that kindly self-satisfaction which forms the usual interpretation of the dictum that it is more blessed to give than to receive, and hurried on to a subject of greater interest.
“What in the name o’ goodness were you and Mrs. Catterall doing outside o’ Martha Jane’s?” she inquired eagerly. “You seemed terribly interested in something or other, I’m sure! Not that I’ve been spying or owt, so don’t think it. I leave that to our friend Emma! But I was just looking out, thinking we might be going to have a—a spot o’ rain, and I see you and her together, as thick as thieves. Mrs. Tanner was looking out, too, and much about the same time, seeking yon cat of hers as she sets such store by, you’ll think on; and we were both on us fair puzzled what the two on you could be at!”
“Nay, it was nowt,” the charwoman answered hastily, feeling decidedly mean in refusing the tit-bit for which her supporter obviously yearned, yet resolved in her own mind not to give Martha Jane away. “I just slipped up with a bit o’ my currant cake as a peace-offering like, and a sop to my conscience at the same time!” She tried to laugh with her usual open heartiness.... “As for Emma, she’s as queer as Dick’s hatband to-day. I reckon she was just up to her usual tricks, spying on other folks’ doings for want of some of her own!”