One night as she was coming in, Pidge heard Fanny’s low laugh on the floor above, as she ran upstairs in time to shoo a lodger from Fanny’s arms in the doorway. Then she followed into the littered room and a light was made. The two women faced. The laugh remained unwithered on Fanny’s cheerful face.
“Oh, Musser, you look so cross,” she panted.
“Don’t you remember—?” Pidge began.
“Remember wot?”
“What you were in that beast’s nest in Foley Street?”
“That’s what you always want, Musser, always want me to keep rememberin’, just as I’m getting straightened out.”
The fashion of Fanny’s straightening out settled upon Pidge, as she looked around the room. Its awfulness was beyond tears to her, even beyond laughter.
“Fanny Gallup, if you bring another baby here, I’ll—I’ll——”
“There ain’t going to be no other baby here, Musser. I ain’t nobody’s chicken like that.”