Sir George Tressady — Volume II by Mrs. Humphry Ward
page 43 of 337 (12%)
page 43 of 337 (12%)
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neighbours and friends clapped her on the back as she passed, laughing
and urging her on. Then, presently, there she stood on the platform, a thin, wand-like creature, with her battered bonnet sideways on her head, a woollen crossover on her shoulders, in spite of July, her hands clasped across her chest, her queer light eyes wandering and smiling hither and thither. In her emaciation, her weird cheerfulness, she was like a figure from a Dance of Death. But what was amazing was her self-possession. "Now yer laffin' at me," she began in a conversational tone, nodding towards the group of women she had just left. "You go 'long! I told the lidy I'd speak, an I will. Well, they comes to me, an they ses, Mrs. Dickson, yer not to work at 'ome no longer--they'll put yer in prison if yer do't, they ses; yer to go out ter work, same as the shop 'ands, they ses; and what's more, if they cotch Mr. Butterford--that's my landlord; p'raps yer dunno 'im--" She looked down at the meeting with a whimsical grin, her eyes screwed up and her crooked brows lifted, so that the room roared merely to look at her. The trim lady-secretary, however, bent forward with an air of annoyance. She had not, perhaps, realised that Mrs. Dickson was so much of a character. "If they cotch Mr. Butterford, they'll make 'im pay up smart for lettin yer do such a thing as make knickers in 'is 'ouse. So I asks the lidy, Wot's ter become o' me an the little uns? An she says she done know, but yer mus come and speak Tuesday night, she says--Manx Road Schools, she says--if yer want to perwent em making a law ov it. Which I'm a doin of--aint I?" Fresh laughter and response from the room. She went on satisfied. |
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