She could only have said, "I hate it. It comes so fast. It is
always coming. It makes a sound as if thunder was quite close. I
can never get away from it." The children in the other flats
rather liked it. They hung out of the window perilously to watch
it thunder past and to see the people who crowded it pressed
close together in the seats, standing in the aisles, hanging on
to the straps. Sometimes in the evening there were people in it
who were going to the theatre, and the women and girls were
dressed in light colours and wore hats covered with white
feathers and flowers. At such times the children were delighted,
and Judith used to hear the three in the next flat calling out to
each other, "That's MY lady! That's MY lady! That one's mine!"

Judith was not like the children in the other flats. She was a
frail, curious creature, with silent ways and a soft voice and
eyes. She liked to play by herself in a corner of the room and to
talk to herself as she played. No one knew what she talked about,
and in fact no one inquired. Her mother was always too busy. When
she was not making men's coats by the score at the whizzing
sewing machine, she was hurriedly preparing a meal which was
always in danger of being late. There was the breakfast, which
might not be ready in time for her husband to reach his "shop"
when the whistle blew; there was the supper, which might not be
in time to be in waiting for him when he returned in the evening.
The midday meal was a trifling matter, needing no special
preparation. One ate anything one could find left from supper or
breakfast.

Judith's relation to her father and mother was not a very
intimate one. They were too hard worked to have time for domestic