Page:Delight - de la Roche - 1926.djvu/111

 May scrubbed the table; she put a pot of potatoes on to boil. A pan of sausages, smeared with drippings, was soon sputtering in the oven. She found another lamp in the bedroom, trimmed the wick, and polished the glass with the corner of a red shawl that hung on the kitchen door. She set the lamp on the table and flung the shawl in a corner. With a purr of delight the cat pounced on it, and, with arched back and ardent claws, began to prepare a bed for himself. He thought: "At last the bed that suits me. Colour and softness. All along of this new female."

As she drew the blinds and laid the table she was rehearsing what she would say to Albert—how she would get him going—first a full stomach—and then the two of them in the rocking-chair. Everything was ready, she wished he would hurry. Her eyes swept over the table spread for two: mounds of buttered toast, slabs of cheese, a pot of strawberry jam. Ah, the delicious smell of stewing tea!

A step crunched on the gravelled path. A hand fumbled at the latch. Albert entered.

He stood blinking in the unaccustomed brightness of the lights. May had stuck her head in the cupboard.

Albert spoke then, in a sarcastic drawl: "Well, an' wot's the matter wiv you, Mrs. Orstrich?"

No answer.

"Might I arsk wot brung you 'ome so bright an' hearly, I dunno?"

Silence. But she wondered that he did not hear her heart pounding.

"So you've turned narsty again, 'ave yer?" And he added, in a complaining tone: "If you 'ad some men to deal wiv, you'd get a good smack on the jor."

A titter came from the head in the cupboard but the body did not move. Albert threw his cap on a peg and