When she had finished the last shirt, Mrs Yabsley looked at the clock with an exclamation. It was nearly ten. She had to deliver the shirts, and then buy the week's supplies. For she did her shopping at the last minute, in a panic. It had been her mother's way—to dash into the butcher's as he swept the last bones together, to hammer at the grocer's door as he turned out the lights. And she always forgot something which she got on Sunday morning from the little shop at the corner.
As she was tying the shirts into bundles, she heard the tinkle of a bell in the street, and a hoarse voice that cried:
"Peas an' pies, all 'ot, all 'ot!"
"'Ow'd yer like some peas, Joe?" she cried, dropping the shirts and seizing a basin.
"I wouldn't mind," said Jonah.
"'Ere, Ada, run an' git threepenn'orth," she cried.
In a minute Ada returned with the basin full of green peas, boiled into a squashy mass.
Mrs Yabsley went out with the shirts, and Jonah and Ada sat down to the peas, which they ate with keen relish, after sprinkling them with pepper and vinegar.
After the green peas, Ada noticed that Jonah was looking furtively about the room and listening, as if he expected to hear something. She guessed the cause, and decided to change his thoughts.
"Give us a tune, Joe," she cried.