“You’re not angry with Bethany, are you, Daddy Grandpa?”
“No,” he said, “I’m not angry.”
“We used to do it at Mrs. Tingsby’s,” she said, spreading her little hands to the blaze. “Annie, and Rodd, and Goldie, and I used to take little pails and go round the streets; on barge days we got lots.”
“What do you mean by barge days,” asked the Judge.
“Days when the barges came up the river with coal. Then the trucks took it round the city. We followed the trucks. We could keep the kitchen fire going for days. Lots of children did it, Daddy Grandpa.”
The Judge was ominously silent, and Bethany went on in a depreciatory way. “Mrs. Tingsby was very good to me. When my mamma died she said, ‘You must do all you can to help her, but do not go round to the hotels with her.’”
“To the hotels?” repeated the Judge.
“Yes, sir; to the back doors. They give poor people leavings from plates. Mrs. Tingsby used to get quite nice things sometimes, such as turkey slices, broken cake, perhaps even whole mutton chops, fish heads and tails, cut apples, decayed bananas, melted ice cream, lumps of pudding—”
“Stop!” implored the Judge.
Bethany looked up at him quietly, for she had been gazing at the fire and speaking in a dreamy fashion.