painted on each. A black bird with a red beak and red legs. She had set
them up on the chimney-piece under the picture of the Holy Family. She
put the Bible in the middle and the parroquet on the top of the Bible and
the vases one on each side.

She worshipped them, because of Mamma and Mark.

She said to herself: "God won't like _that_, but I can't help it. The
kind, clever God won't mind a bit. He's much too busy making things. And
it's not as if they were graven images."


III.

Jenny had taken her for a walk to Ilford and they were going home to the
house in Ley Street.

There were only two walks that Jenny liked to go: down Ley Street to
Barkingside where the little shops were; and up Ley Street to Ilford and
Mr. Spall's, the cobbler's. She liked Ilford best because of Mr. Spall.
She carried your boots to Mr. Spall just as they were getting
comfortable; she was always ferreting in Sarah's cupboard for a pair to
take to him. Mr. Spall was very tall and lean; he had thick black
eyebrows rumpled up the wrong way and a long nose with a red knob at the
end of it. A dirty grey beard hung under his chin, and his long, shaved
lips curled over in a disagreeable way when he smiled at you.

When Jenny and Catty went to sing the New Year in at the Wesleyan Chapel
he brought them home. Jenny liked him because his wife was dead, and
because he was a Wesleyan and Deputy Grand Master of the Independent