The girl sobbed on, with averted face. Robert looked distractedly round, and his glance fell upon the kettle which was boiling cheerfully.
“She’d like her tea,” he said, confidentially addressing this kettle—“a sup o’ tea ’ull put her to rights. Come we’ll make it in a minute.”
He reached for the teapot, rinsed it, dropped the contents of another little twisted paper into it, and poured in the boiling water.
“Don’t fill it quite full,” said the girl, turning sharply round, and displaying a tear-stained face which was nevertheless alight with interest.
“Oh, mustn’t I fill it? I always fill mine right up to the brim.”
“Have you got nobody to do for you then?”
“Nay, I’m a single man. I have lodgin’s over yonder, but I do for myself mostly.”
He paused looking at the girl curiously. “You never told me your name,” he said.
“You did never ax me,” she said with a dawning smile. “My name’s Rebecca Masters. I live down there, just at the foot of the hill, wi’ my grandmother.”
“Father and mother livin’?” inquired Formby.