"All right, dear!" called Mr. Ellis.
"All right!" shrilled a little voice——
Well, here they were, in the kitchen. Mrs. Ellis was a brown-haired woman with a tired look in her eyes. She looked a long time at Jack, holding his hand in her one hand and feeling his wet coat with the other.
"You're wet. But you can go to bed when you've had your supper. I hope you'll be all right. Tom'll look after you."
She was hoping that he would only bring good with him. She was all mother: and mother of her own children first. She felt kindly towards him. But he was another woman's son.
When they had eaten, Tom led the newcomer away out of the house, across a little yard, threw open a door in the dark, and lit a candle stuck in the neck of a bottle. Jack looked round at the mud floor, the windowless window, the unlined wooden walls, the calico ceiling, and he was glad. He was to share this cubby hole, as they called it, with the other Ellis boys. His truckle bed was fresh and clean. He was content. It wasn't stuffy, it was rough and remote.
When he opened his portmanteau to get out his nightshirt he asked Tom where he was to put his clothes. For there was no cupboard or chest of drawers or anything.
"On your back or under your bed," said Tom. "Or I might find y' an old packing case, if y're decent.—But say, ol' bloke, lemme give y'a hint. Don't y' get sidey or nosey up here, puttin' on jam an suchlike, f'r if y'do y'll shame me in front of strangers, an' I won't stand it."
"Jam, did you say?"
"Yes, jam, macaroni, cockadoodle. We're plain people out here-aways, not mantel ornaments nor dickey-toffs, an' we want no flash sparks round, see?"