Pennyloaf looked up and down in a shamefaced way.
‘I only did it just because I thought he might like to see me. He promised me faithful as he’d come ’ome to-night, and I thought—it’s only somethink as got into my ’ed to-day, Miss Snowdon.’
‘But hasn’t he been coming home since I saw you last?’
‘He did just once, an’ then it was all the old ways again. I did what you told me; I did, as sure as I’m a-standin’ ’ere! I made the room so clean you wouldn’t have believed; I scrubbed the floor an’ the table, an’ I washed the winders—you can see they ain’t dirty yet. An’ he’d never a’ paid a bit o’ notice if I hadn’t told him. He was jolly enough for one night, just like he can be when he likes. But I knew as it wouldn’t last, an’ the next night he was off with a lot o’ fellers an’ girls, same as ever. I didn’t make no row when he came ’ome; I wish I may die if I said a word to set his back up! An’ I’ve gone on just the same all the week; we haven’t had not the least bit of a row; so you see I kep’ my promise. But it’s no good; he won’t come ’ome; he’s always got fellers an’ girls to go round with. He took his hoath as he’d come back to-night, an’ then it come into my ’ed as I’d put my best things on, just to—you know what I mean, Miss Snowdon. But he won’t come before twelve o’clock; I know he won’t. An’ I get that low sittin’ ’ere, you can’t think! I can’t go nowhere, because o’ the children. If it wasn’t for them I could go to work again, an’ I’d be that glad; I feel as if my ’ed would drop off sometimes! I ham so glad you just come in!’
Jane had tried so many forms of encouragement, of consolation, on previous occasions that she knew not how to repeat herself. She was ashamed to speak words which sounded so hollow and profitless. This silence was only too significant to Pennyloaf, and in a moment she exclaimed with querulous energy:
‘I know what’ll be the bend of it! I’ll go an’ do like mother does—I will! I will! I’ll put my ring away, an’ I’ll go an’ sit all night in the public-’ouse! It’s what all the others does, an’ I’ll do the same. I often feel I’m a fool to go on like this. I don’t know what I live for, P’r’aps he’ll be sorry when I get run in like mother.’
‘Don’t talk like that, Pennyloaf!’ cried Jane, stamping her foot, (It was odd how completely difference of character had reversed their natural relations to each other; Pennyloaf was the child, Jane the mature woman.) ‘You know better, and you’ve no right to give way to such thoughts. I was going to say I’d come and be with you all Saturday afternoon, but I don’t know whether I shall now. And I’d been thinking you might like to come and see me on Sunday, but I can’t have people that go to the public-house, so we won’t say anything more about it. I shall have to be off; good-bye!’
She stepped to the door.
‘Miss Snowdon!’
Jane turned, and after an instant of mock severity, broke into a laugh which seemed to fill the wretched den with sunlight. Words, too, she found; words of soothing influence such as leap from the heart to the tongue in spite of the heavy thoughts that try to check them. Pennyloaf was learning to depend upon these words for strength in her desolation. They did not excite her to much hopefulness, but there was a sustaining power in their sweet sincerity which made all the difference between despair tending to evil and the sigh of renewed effort. ‘I don’t care,’ Pennyloaf had got into the habit of thinking, after her friend’s departure, ‘I won’t give up as long as she looks in now and then.’