"I'm bothered about the thing," he said.
Mrs. Austin passed on the letter to Mrs. Jefferson. On the whole, she was conscious of some satisfaction, because she thought Mrs. Musgrave's use of the postscript significant.
"One doesn't like to hear one's relations are ill," she remarked in a sympathetic voice.
For a moment or two Kit hesitated. Mrs. Austin was Olivia's sister and he had not meant to talk about Betty. Sometimes he did talk when he ought to be quiet.
"Betty is not a relation, but I'm bothered about her being ill," he said and indicated the snowy peak, silver mist and shining Atlantic. "I feel shabby, as if the thing's not just. You see, I've got so much and Betty, who needs all I've got more, is shivering in the cold. You don't know Liverpool when the east winds blow in spring."
"I know other English, and some American, towns in winter," said Mrs. Jefferson. "When my husband found I could not stand the cold, he brought me back to the Canaries. I think I can sympathise with Betty."
"Not altogether," Kit rejoined. "When you are tired, you can rest; Betty can't. You have not to go to an office at nine o'clock, knowing that if you're ill for a week or two you may lose your job. You are not forced to stop until nine o'clock in the evening, without extra pay, when trade is good."
"Are office girls paid nothing extra for extra work?"
"All I know are not," said Kit. "Perhaps five pounds at Christmas, if the house is remarkably prosperous; but I don't think Betty minded this. You feel the dreariness most; the poor food you eat in the middle of a crowd; the fight for the tram-cars when it rains, and the long walk through muddy streets when you can't get on board. I expect a girl hates to sit all day in wet clothes. Besides, it isn't good. Then Betty's office is dark, and she writes entries in a book until her eyes ache. The thing's, so to speak, hopeless. You feel you've got to go on like that for ever——"
He paused and his look was very gentle when he resumed: "Betty bore it cheerfully. She has pluck, but I knew she was tired, and now she's ill!"