‘Go and clean the kitchen grate,’ said Rosalie, beginning to skim with great rapidity and decision; ‘and see that you blacklead it properly.’ ‘Ho yes, mum, _I’ll_ blacklead it,’ returned the elder matron, without, however, attempting to move from the spot where she stood, and continuing to fix her eyes mournfully on her mistress—‘_I’ll_ blacklead it right enough,’ she repeated, with a kind of groan, after a pause, during which she had meditatively polished first one skinny bare arm and then the other with a not over-clean apron. ‘Well, why in Heaven’s name don’t you go, then?’ cried Rosalie impatiently, for she felt Mrs. Greene’s sorrowfully disapproving gaze right at the back of her head. ‘I be going, mum, I be going. If I mid take the liberty of remindin’ you, mum—’t is your _hat_ as you’ve a-got on your head.’ ‘Well?’ inquired Rosalie, reddening ominously. ‘Well, Mrs. Fiander,’ returned the char-woman with an insinuating smile, ‘would n’t you like me to run upstairs wi’ it now and fetch you down your cap?’ ‘No,’ replied her mistress very shortly; ‘if I had wished for it I should have sent for it. You need not be so officious. The strings would get in my way while I worked,’ she added a little inconsequently. She felt she was lowering herself by making this explanation, yet she could not bear that even Mrs. Greene and the two maids should think her wanting in respect to Elias’s memory. Mrs. Greene withdrew, murmuring under her breath that it was to be ’oped as nobody would n’t chance t’ look in that morning, which was not, indeed, very likely, the hands of the old-fashioned clock in the kitchen beyond just pointing to the quarter-past six.