great width; her nose was well shapen, and had large sensual
apertures; her cruel lips may be seen on certain fine antique busts;
the neck that supported her heavy head was splendidly rounded. In
laughing, she became a model for an artist, an embodiment of fierce
life independent of morality. Her health was probably less sound
than it seemed to be; one would have compared her, not to some piece
of exuberant normal vegetation, but rather to a rank,
evilly-fostered growth. The putrid soil of that nether world yields
other forms besides the obviously blighted and sapless.

'Have you done any work for Mrs. Hewett to-day?' she asked of her
victim, after sufficiently savouring the spectacle of terror.

'Yes, miss; I did the front-room fireplace, an' fetched fourteen of
coals, an' washed out a few things.'

'What did she give you?'

'A penny, miss. I gave it to Mrs. Peckover before she went.'

'Oh, you did? Well, look 'ere; you'll just remember in future that
all you get from the lodgers belongs to me, an' not to mother. It's
a new arrangement, understand. An' if you dare to give up a 'apenny
to mother, I'll lick you till you're nothin' but a bag o' bones.
Understand?'

Having on the spur of the moment devised this ingenious difficulty
for the child, who was sure to suffer in many ways from such a
conflict of authorities, Clem began to consider how she should spend
her evening. After all, Jane was too poor-spirited a victim to