"Of course it's me. Who else gets the coals—or does anything else in this 'ouse?"
Theresa ignored the implication, but she felt it sorely, and at the same time she pitied Bessie. Justice forced her to the admission that she had scanty help, and the sight of her now holding a dripping candle in one hand, and in the other a shovel into which she heaped the coal with a felt-shod foot, gave her a blurred impression to which thus early she could put no name, of physical energy ill-controlled. Bessie, in the bowels of the earth, struggling ineffectually, wasting time because with one hand she must hold that tallow candle which gave off such an offensive smell; grumbling, but toiling doggedly, with all the labour of the day looming up before her like a great ash-heap which she must remove unaided—there was little here of the dignity of labour; it was chaotic, dark, grimy. Theresa felt herself bewildered by the endlessness and the dirt of it. There was no danger to enliven it, no beauty to make it noble; the house did not catch fire, though chimneys smoked and food was burnt. No, there was nothing glorious in Bessie's life. And Theresa's own was to be so brilliant! Poor Bessie, it was not all her fault.
Theresa moved from one foot to the other, and said: "Is mother awake?"
"Yes, but she's breakfasting in bed. 'Asn't slept, so she says. 'Eart bad."
"I wish she didn't have such a bad heart," said Theresa, looking Bessie fairly in the eyes. The reality of her mother's complaint was not very present with her, and Bessie had not tried to hide a like incredulity which may have had its influence with the child, but Theresa was loyal to her mother. If she wanted to have a weak heart she must be supported in her desire, against all the sneers of the kitchen, though Bessie was Theresa's friend.
"So can I, I can tell you. Out of the way, Miss Terry dear." She carried a large scuttle to the kitchen. Theresa followed.
"I think I'd better go and wake Grace, don't you?"
"She won't get up unless. Such laziness! And you'll have to have your breakfasts in the kitchen; I can't be carrying them all up and down the house."
"Oh no! And we like it here. Bessie, is everybody's kitchen as dark as ours?"
"I should think not. You should see Alice's at Mrs. Bendall's. It's on the ground floor and as light! But these old-fashioned 'ouses 'ave no 'earts. Pit ponies, that's what they make me think of."