The women had a good cry in each other's arms, and then Mrs. Lewis advised Esther to take the situation, even if it were no more than sixteen. "A lot can be done by constant saving, and if she gives yer 'er dresses and ten shillings for a Christmas-box, I don't see why you should not pull through. The baby shan't cost you more than five shillings a week till you get a situation as plain cook. Here is the address—Miss Rice, Avondale Road, West Kensington."
XXII
Avondale Road was an obscure corner of the suburb—obscure, for it had just sprung into existence. The scaffolding that had built it now littered an adjoining field, where in a few months it would rise about Horsely Gardens, whose red gables and tiled upper walls will correspond unfailingly with those of Avondale Road. Nowhere in this neighbourhood could Esther detect signs of eighteen pounds a year. Scanning the Venetian blinds of the single drawing-room window, she said to herself, "Hot joint today, cold the next." She noted the trim iron railings and the spare shrubs, and raising her eyes she saw the tiny gable windows of the cupboard-like rooms where the single servant kept in these houses slept.
A few steps more brought her to 41, the corner house. The thin passage and the meagre staircase confirmed Esther in the impression she had received from the aspect of the street; and she felt that the place was more suitable to the gaunt woman with iron-grey hair who waited in the passage. This woman looked apprehensively at Esther, and when Esther said that she had come after the place a painful change of expression passed over her face, and she said—
"You'll get it; I'm too old for anything but charing. How much are you going to ask?"
"I can't take less than sixteen."
"Sixteen! I used to get that once; I'd be glad enough to get twelve now. You can't think of sixteen once you've turned forty, and I've lost my teeth, and they means a couple of pound off."
Then the door opened, and a woman's voice called to the gaunt woman to come in. She went in, and Esther breathed a prayer that she might not be engaged. A minute intervened, and the gaunt woman came out; there were tears in her eyes, and she whispered to Esther as she passed, "No good; I told you so. I'm too old for anything but charing." The abruptness of the interview suggested a hard mistress, and Esther was surprised to find herself in the presence of a slim lady, about seven-and-thirty, whose small grey eyes seemed to express a kind and gentle nature. As she stood speaking to her, Esther saw a tall glass filled with chrysanthemums and a large writing-table covered with books and papers. There was a bookcase, and in place of the usual folding-doors, a bead curtain hung between the rooms.
The room almost said that the occupant was a spinster and a writer, and Esther remembered that she had noticed even at the time Miss Rice's manuscript, it was such a beautiful clear round hand, and it lay on the table, ready to be continued the moment she should have settled with her.
"I saw your advertisement in the paper, miss; I've come after the situation."