Then the stout lady presented him with a bowl of hot water, a dish-cloth, and a towel, and told him to wash up. Wash up! He had never washed up before. He swished the water round the bowl with the dish-cloth very fast one way, and then quickly changed and swished it round the other. It was fascinating. He lifted the dish-cloth high out of the water and swirled the thin stream to and fro. He soaked his apron and swamped the floor.
Finally, his patroness, who had been indulging in a doze, awoke and fixed eyes of horror upon him.
“What yer think yer a-doing of?” she said indignantly. “Yer think yer at the seaside, don’t yer? Yer think yer’ve got yer little bucket an’ spade, don’t yer? Waistin’ of good water—spoilin’ of a good hapron. Where did ’Erb find yer, I’d like ter know. Picked yer aht of a lunatic asylum, I should say.... Oh, lumme, ’ere’s toffs comin’. Sharp, now, be ready wiv the hurn an’ try an’ ’ave a bit of sense, an’ heverythin’ double price fer toffs, now—don’t forget.”
*****
But William, with a sinking heart, had recognised the toffs. Looking wildly round he saw a large cap (presumably ’Erb’s) on a lower shelf of the stall. He seized it, put it on, and dragged it over his eye. The “toffs” approached—four of them. One of them, the elder lady, seemed upset.
“Have you seen,” she said to the owner of the stall, “a little boy anywhere about—a little boy in an Eton suit?”
“No, mam,” said the proprietress, “I hain’t seen no one in a heton suit.”
“He was going out to a party,” went on Mrs. Brown breathlessly, “and he must have got lost on the way. They rang up to say he hadn’t arrived, and the police have had no news of him, and we’ve traced him to this locality. You—you haven’t seen a little boy that looked as if he were going to a party?”
“No, mam,” said the lady of the coffee-stall. “I hain’t seen no little boy goin’ to no party this hevening.”
“Oh, mother,” said Ethel; and William, trying to hide his face between his cap-brim and his apron, groaned in spirit as he heard her voice. “Do let’s have some coffee now we’re here.”