‘I can’t stop,’ said Jane, ‘but I thought I’d just look in and speak a word. How have you been getting on?’ ‘Oh, do come in for just a minute!’ pleaded Pennyloaf, moving backwards to an open door, whither Jane followed. They entered a room—much like other rooms that we have looked into from time to time. Following the nomadic custom of their kind, Bob Hewett and his wife had lived in six or seven different lodgings since their honeymoon in Shooter’s Gardens. Mrs. Candy first of all made a change necessary, as might have been anticipated, and the restlessness of domestic ill-being subsequently drove them from place to place. ‘Come in ’ere, Johnny,’ she Called to the child lying on the landing. ‘What’s the good o’ washin’ you, I’d like to know? Just see, Miss Snowdon, he’s made his face all white with the milk as the boy spilt on the stairs! Take this brush an’ play with it, do! I _can’t_ keep ’em clean, Miss Snowdon, so it’s no use talkin’.’ ‘Are you going somewhere to-night?’ Jane inquired, with a glance at the strange costume. Pennyloaf looked up and down in a shamefaced way. ‘I only did it just because I thought he might like to see me. He promised me faithful as he’d come ’ome to-night, and I thought—it’s only somethink as got into my ’ed to-day, Miss Snowdon.’ ‘But hasn’t he been coming home since I saw you last?’ ‘He did just once, an’ then it was all the old ways again. I did what you told me; I did, as sure as I’m a-standin’ ’ere! I made the room so clean you wouldn’t have believed; I scrubbed the floor an’ the table, an’ I washed the winders—you can see they ain’t dirty yet. An’ he’d never a’ paid a bit o’ notice if I hadn’t told him. He was jolly enough for one night, just like he can be when he likes. But I knew as it wouldn’t last, an’ the next night he was off with a lot o’ fellers an’ girls, same as ever. I didn’t make no row when he came ’ome; I wish I may die if I said a word to set his back up! An’ I’ve gone on just the same all the week; we haven’t had not the least bit of a row; so you see I kep’ my promise. But it’s no good; he won’t come ’ome; he’s always got fellers an’ girls to go round with. He took his hoath as he’d come back to-night, an’ then it come into my ’ed as I’d put my best things on, just to—you know what I mean, Miss Snowdon. But he won’t come before twelve o’clock; I know he won’t. An’ I get that low sittin’ ’ere, you can’t think! I can’t go nowhere, because o’ the children. If it wasn’t for them I could go to work again, an’ I’d be that glad; I feel as if my ’ed would drop off sometimes! I _ham_ so glad you just come in!’ Jane had tried so many forms of encouragement, of consolation, on previous occasions that she knew not how to repeat herself. She was ashamed to speak words which sounded so hollow and profitless. This silence was only too significant to Pennyloaf, and in a moment she exclaimed with querulous energy: