Mrs. Tregennis could not trust herself to go down to the quay, so she had not seen Tregennis yet, for the fish must come first.
“I expect you’m cold and hungry, Tom,” was her greeting when at last he came holding Tommy by the hand. Her lower lip trembled as she spoke. “Here be a good meal for ee, an’ there be hot bottles in the bed. So hurry up do ee now, for you do be fair done.”
“I tried Miss Margaret’s plan o’ chewin’,” said Tregennis, smiling a little wearily as he sat down to a bit of somethin’ to eat. “An’ upon my sam I believe there be somethin’ in it. But in a while there warn’t nothin’ left to chew. Not in my mouth I don’t mean this time, but not in the hamper neither. Brave an’ empty ’e was I can tell ee; never a single crumb left, no, not even for a sparrer to pick.”
Later in the evening Mrs. Tregennis held in her hand eight pounds nine shillings and sixpence, Tregennis’s share of the record sale.
“What be I to do with this vasty sum?” she asked the ladies, as they sat by the fire and laughed at nothing at all. “I shall think I be some size now,” she asserted, drawing herself very upright and tilting her chin. “What’ll I do with all this gold?”
“Why not go up to London?” suggested the Blue Lady, “and stay at the Hotel Cecil. I believe you can live there quite comfortably for five pounds a day.”
“Can ee now, Miss, indeed? I hadn’t known of that. Well, th’ objects no money to me, so Tommy, shall you an’ me an’ Daddy go up to London for to see the King?”
“Yes,” nodded Tommy, his mouth full of bread and butter.
“Then come along o’ me,” said Mammy, and she put on her hat and coat, walked up Main Street to the Post Office, and there with pride she pushed the eight pounds nine shillings and sixpence across the counter to be added to her small account.