"Won't Charlotte warm his back for him!" apostrophised Mrs. Fisher.
The boy threw a disdainful look at her, in return for the remark. "Charlotte's not so fond of warming backs. She never even scolds for an accident."
The boy and Robert East were half-brothers. They entered one of the cottages. Robert East and his sister were between twenty and thirty, and the boy was ten. Their mother had died early, and the young boy's mother, their father's second wife, died when the child was born. The father also died. How Robert and his sister, the one then seventeen, the other fourteen, had struggled to make a living for themselves, and to bring up the baby, they alone knew. The manner in which they had succeeded was a marvel to many; none were more respectable now than they were in all Honey Fair.
Charlotte, neat and nice, sat by her bright kitchen fire, a savoury stew cooking on the hob beside it. It was her custom to have something good for supper on a Saturday night. Did she make home attractive on that night to draw her brother from the seductions of the public-house? Most likely. And she had her reward: for Robert never failed to come. The cloth was laid, the red bricks of the floor were clean, and Charlotte's face, as she looked up from her stocking-mending, was bright. It darkened to consternation, however, when she cast her eyes on the boy.
"Tom, what have you been doing?"
"Jacky Brumm threw a pot of dye over me, Charlotte."
"There's not much real damage, Charlotte," interposed her brother. "It looks worse than it is. I'll get it out of his hair presently, and put his clothes into a pail of water. What have you got to-night? It smells good."
He alluded to supper, and took off the lid of the saucepan to peep in. She had some stewed beef, with carrots, and the savoury steam ascended to Robert's pleased face.
Very few in Honey Fair managed as did Charlotte East. How she did her housework no one knew. Not a woman, married or single, got through more glove-sewing than Charlotte. Not one kept her house in better order: and her clothes and her brother's were neat and respectable, week-days as well as Sundays. Her work was taken into the warehouse on Saturday mornings, and her marketing was done. In the afternoon she cleaned her house, and by four o'clock was ready to sit down to her mending. No one ever saw her in a bustle, and yet all her work was done; and well done. Perhaps one great secret of it was that she rose very early in the morning, winter and summer.
"Look, Robert, here is a nice book I have bought," said she, putting a periodical into his hands. "It comes out weekly. I shall take it in."