of
crying, Emmy watched Jenny's proceedings, her eyes travelling from the
hat to the ever-growing heap of discarded ornaments. She was dully
impressed with the swift judgment of her sister in consulting the
secrets of her inner taste. It was a judgment unlike anything in her own
nature of which she was aware, excepting the measurement of ingredients
for a pudding.

So they sat, all engrossed, while the kettle began to sing and the
desired steam to pour from the spout, clouding the scullery. The only
sound that arose was the gurgling of Pa Blanchard's pipe (for he was
what is called in Kennington Park a wet smoker). He sat remembering
something or pondering the insufficiency of news. Nobody ever knew what
he thought about in his silences. It was a mystery over which the girls
did not puzzle, because they were themselves in the habit of sitting for
long periods without speech. Pa's broodings were as customary to them
as the absorbed contemplativeness of a baby. "Give him his pipe," as
Jenny said; "and he'll be quiet for hours--till it goes out. _Then_
there's a fuss! My word, what a racket! Talk about a fire alarm!" And on
such occasions she would mimic him ridiculingly, to diminish his
complaints, while Emmy roughly relighted the hubble-bubble and patted
her father once more into a contented silence. Pa was to them, although
they did not know it, their bond of union. Without him, they would have
fallen apart, like the outer pieces of a wooden boot-tree. For his sake,
with all the apparent lack of sympathy shown in their behaviour to him,
they endured a life which neither desired nor would have tolerated upon
her own account. So it was that Pa's presence acted as a check and
served them as company of a meagre kind, although he was less
interesting or expansive than a little dog might have been.

When Jenny went out to the scullery carrying her hat, after sweeping the
scraps she had declined back into the old draper's cardboard box which
amply contained such treasures and preserved them from dust, Emmy, now
quite quiet again, continued to sit by the fire, staring at the small
glowing strip that showed under the door of the kitchen grate. Every now
and then she would sigh, wearily closing her eyes; and her breast would
rise as if with a sob. And she would sometimes look slowly up at the
clock, with her head upon one side in order to see the hands in their
proper aspect, as if she were calculating.

ii

From the scull