"I'd like you to keep out of my way and leave me to do my work as I please!" Mrs. Brown interrupted. "Stay, though, you can give these scraps to the fowls."
The little boy took the plate of scraps she offered him and went out into the yard. When he returned with the plate empty Mrs. Brown had cleared the table and was washing up.
"So your mother used to make you useful?" she remarked inquiringly.
"Yes, Granny," he answered, "and I liked helping her. She used to be so tired sometimes—she worked very hard, you know."
"Humph! She'd have been wiser if she'd gone into a situation when your father died instead of starting a business of her own."
Billy was silent. His mother—she had been a milliner's apprentice before her marriage—had opened a little business of her own when his father, who had been employed in a warehouse, had died. She had earned enough to support her child and herself, but there had been nothing over.
"Mother didn't want to be parted from me," the little boy said, in a faltering voice; "and now—and now—oh, I can't bear it! Oh, what shall I do?"
He flung himself on the settle by the fire, covered his face with his hands, and wept.
"Don't go on like that, child," Mrs. Brown said hastily; "perhaps we'd better not talk of your mother any more. Come, stop crying, like a sensible boy! Why, here's May! You don't want to upset her, do you?"
Billy sat up, struggling to regain composure. He was wiping his eyes with his pocket-handkerchief when May, entering by the back door, appeared upon the scene. She ran to her grandmother and kissed her, then, turning to Billy, was struck with dismay at his woe-begone look.