Chook looked idly at the stars, remote and lofty, strewn like sand across the sky, and wondered at one that gleamed and glowed as he watched. A song of the music-hall about eyes and stars came into his head. He looked steadily into Pinkey's eyes, darkened by the broad brim of her hat, and could see no resemblance, for he was no poet. And as he looked, he forgot the stars in an intense desire to know the intimate details of her life—the mechanical, monotonous habits that fill the day from morning till night, and yet are too trivial to tell. He asked some questions about Packard's factory where she worked, and Pinkey's tongue ran on wheels when she found a sympathetic listener. Apart from the boot factory, the great events of her life had been the death of her mother, her father's second marriage, and the night of her elder sister, Lil, who had gone to the bad. She blamed her stepmother for that. Lil had acted like a fool, and Mrs Partridge, with her insatiable greed for gossip, had gathered hints and rumours from the four corners of Sydney, and Lil had bolted rather than argue it out with her father. That and the death of Pinkey's mother had soured his temper, and his wits, never very powerful, had grown childish under the blow.
"So don't yous go pokin' borak at 'im," she cried, flushing pink. "'E's a good father to me, if she lets 'im alone. But she's got 'im under 'er thumb with 'er nasty tongue."
Chook thought Mrs Partridge was an agreeable woman. Instantly Pinkey's eyes blazed with anger.
"Is she? You ought ter 'ear 'er talk. She's got a tongue like a dog's tail; it's always waggin'. An' niver a good word for anybody. I wish she'd mind 'er own business, an' clean up the 'ouse. W'en my mother was alive, you could eat yer dinner off the floor, but Sarah's too delicate for 'ousework. She'd 'ave married the greengrocer, but she was too delicate to wait in the shop. We niver see a bit o' fresh meat in the 'ouse, an' if yer say anythin' she bursts into tears, an' sez somethin' nasty about Lil. She makes believe she's got no more appetite than a canary, but she lives on the pick of the 'am shop w'en nobody's lookin'. Look 'ow fat she is. W'en she married Dad, you could 'ear 'er bones rattle. I wouldn't mind if she did the washin'. But she puts the things in soak on Monday, an' then on Saturday I 'ave ter turn to an' do the lot, 'cause she's delicate. I ain't delicate. I'm only skin an' bone."
Her face was flushed and eager; her eyes sparkled. Chook remembered the song about eyes and stars, and agreed with the words. And as suddenly the sparkle died out of her eyes, her mouth drooped, and the colour left her face, pale as ivory in the faint gleam of the stars.
"Yous don't think any worse o' me 'cause Lil's crook, do yer?" she asked piteously.
Chook swore a denial.
"P'raps yer think it runs in the family; but Lil 'ud 'a' gone straight if she 'adn't been driven out o' the 'ouse by Sarah's nasty tongue."
Chook declared that Lil was spotless.
"No, she ain't," said Pinkey; "she's as bad as they make 'em now; but...wot makes yer tail up after me?" she inquired suddenly.