Sons and Lovers

“Then what else shall I wear,” replied the mother tartly. “And I’m sure it’s right enough.”

It had started with a tip;^br then had had flowers; now was reduced to black lace and a bit of jet.

“It looks rather come down,” said Paul. “Couldn’t you give it a pick-me-up?”

“I’ll jowl^bs your head for impudence,” said Mrs. Morel, and she tied the strings of the black bonnet valiantly under her chin.

She glanced at the dish again. Both she and her enemy, the pot man, had an uncomfortable feeling, as if there were something between them. Suddenly he shouted:

“Do you want it for fivepence?”

She started. Her heart hardened; but then she stooped and took up her dish.

“I’ll have it,” she said.

“Yer’ll do me the favour, like?”^bt he said. “Yer’d better spit in it, like yor do when y’ave something give yer.”

Mrs. Morel paid him the fivepence in a cold manner.

“I don’t see you give it me,” she said. “You wouldn’t let me have it for fivepence if you didn’t want to.”

“In this flamin‘, scrattlin’^bu place you may count yerself lucky if you can give your things away,” he growled.

“Yes; there are bad times, and good,” said Mrs. Morel.

But she had forgiven the pot man. They were friends. She dare now finger his pots. So she was happy.

Paul was waiting for her. He loved her home-coming. She was always her best so—triumphant, tired, laden with parcels, feeling rich in spirit. He heard her quick, light step in the entry and looked up from his drawing.

“Oh!” she sighed, smiling at him from the doorway.

“My word, you are loaded!” he exclaimed, putting down his brush.

“I am!” she gasped. “That brazen Annie said she’d meet me. Such a weight!”

She dropped her string bag and her packages on the table.

“Is the bread done?” she asked, going to the oven.

“The last one is soaking,”^bv he replied. “You needn’t look, I’ve not forgotten it.”

“Oh, that pot man!” she said, closing the oven door. “You know what a wretch I’ve said he was? Well, I don’t think he’s quite so bad.”

“Don’t you?”

The boy was attentive to her. She took off her little black bonnet.

“No. I think he can’t make any money—well, it’s everybody’s cry alike nowadays—and it makes him disagreeable.”

“It would me,” said Paul.

“Well, one can’t wonder at it. And he let me have—how much do you think he let me have this for?”

She took the dish out of its rag of newspaper, and stood looking on it with joy.

“Show me!” said Paul.

The two stood together gloating over the dish.

“I love cornflowers on things,” said Paul.

“Yes, and I thought of the teapot you bought me—”

“One and three,” said Paul.

“Fivepence!”

“It’s not enough, mother.”

“No. Do you know, I fairly sneaked off with it. But I’d been extravagant, I couldn’t afford any more. And he needn’t have let me have it if he hadn’t wanted to.”

“No, he needn’t, need he,” said Paul, and the two comforted each other from the fear of having robbed the pot man.

“We c’n have stewed fruit in it,” said Paul.

“Or custard, or a jelly,” said his mother.

“Or radishes and lettuce,” said he.

“Don’t forget that bread,” she said, her voice bright with glee.

Paul looked in the oven; tapped the loaf on the base.

“It’s done,” he said, giving it to her.

She tapped it also.