Above the partition appeared a face like a harvest moon.

‘I have come in reply to your letter,’ Mrs. Ormonde said, ’the letter about the girl who is ill.’

‘Oh, you’ve come, have you, mum!’ was the reply, in a voice at once respectful and surprised.  ’Would you be so good as step inside, mum?  Please push the door.’

Mrs. Ormonde was relieved to pass into the privacy of the kitchen.  It was a room of some ten feet square, insufferably hot, very dirty, a factory for the production of human fodder.  On a side table stood a great red dripping mass, whence Mrs. Gandle severed portions to be supplied as roast beef.  Vessels on the range held a green substance which was called cabbage, and yellow lumps doled forth as potatoes.  Before the fire, bacon and sausages were frizzling; above it was spluttering a beef-steak.  On a sink in one corner were piled eating utensils which awaited the wipe of a very loathsome rag hanging hard by.  Other objects lay about in indescribable confusion.

Mrs. Gandle was a very stout woman, with bare arms.  She perspired freely, and was not a little disconcerted by the appearance of her visitor.  Her moon-face had a simple and not disagreeable look.

’You won’t mind me a-getting on with my work the whiles I talk, mum?’ she said.  ’The men’s tied to time, most of em, and I’ve often lost a customer by keepin’ him waitin’.  They’re not too sweet-tempered in these parts.  I was born and bred in Peckham myself, and only come here when I married my second husband, which he’s a plumber by trade.  I can’t so much as ask you for to sit down, mum.  You see, we have to ’conomise room, as my husband says.  But I can talk and work, both; only I’ve got to keep one ear open—­’

A shrill voice cried from the shop: 

’Two beefs, ‘taters an’ greens!  One steak-pie, ‘taters!  Two cups o’ tea!’

‘Right!’ cried Mrs. Gandle, and proceeded to execute the orders.

‘What is this poor girl’s name?’ Mrs. Ormonde asked.  ’You didn’t mention it.’

‘Well, mum, she calls herself Mary Wood.  Do you know any one o’ that name?’

‘I think not.’

’Now come along, ‘Lizabeth!’ screamed the woman of a sudden, at the top of her voice.  ‘Don’t stand a-talkin’ there!  Two beefs, ’taters and greens.’

‘That’s right, Mrs. Gandle!’ roared some man.  ’You give it her.  It’s the usial Bow-bells with her an’ Sandy Dick ‘ere!’

There was laughter, and ’Lizabeth came running for her orders.  Mrs. Gandle, with endless interruptions, proceeded thus: 

’Between you and me, mum, I don’t believe as that is her name.  But she give it at first, and she’s stuck to it.  No, I don’t think she’s worse to-day, though she talked a lot in the night.  Yes, we’ve had a doctor.  She wouldn’t have me send for nobody, and said as there was nothing ailed her, but then it come as she couldn’t stand on her feet.  She’s a littlish girl, may be seventeen or eighteen, with