[137]
]CHAPTER XII.
THREE COURSES, ONE SHILLING.
“Yesterday’s errors let yesterday cover;
Yesterday’s wounds which smarted and bled
Are healed with the healing which night has shed.”
Poppet had been for lunch with Esther or Meg to the Fresh Food and Ice Company, Quong Tart’s, and such places on various occasions. But the restaurant to which Malcolm and Martha took her was quite a new experience. She did not know the name of the street it was in, but it was not very far from the Quay, and there was a rather mixed, if interesting, assembly of diners. Not that it was a particularly low-class place; it had a very good name for the excellency of its food and its moderate prices, and its patrons comprised poor clerks who minded fashion less than a good dinner,—tradesmen, sailors, and occasional wharf labourers. Martha had asked Malcolm whether, as she had Poppet with her, they had better go to some place higher up town. Malcolm, [138] ]who dined there regularly, seemed to see no reason why he should change his custom for a little slip of a girl under ten.
As for Poppet, it was all one with her where she went, and while Martha and Malcolm were studying the bill of fare, she fell to watching some sailors at an adjoining table with the deepest interest.
“Now, Miss Poppet,” said Martha, “what will you have? Me and Malcolm have fixed on sucking pig, sweet potatoes and baked pumpkin, but I think you’d better have something plainer; there’s roast mutton, or corned beef, or beefsteak pie.”
“Why,” said Poppet, “we have those things at home. No, I’ll have sucking pig too, please, Martha; I like tasting new things.”
“Did you ever!” remarked Martha, looking troubled; “it might make you ill, Miss Poppet dear. Have corned beef like a good little girl.”
But Poppet could be firm on occasion. She did not dine at a restaurant every day, and when she did she had no intention of confining herself to ordinary things.