Page:Delight - de la Roche - 1926.djvu/201

 more than their mistress did. They had their boys, quiet-living, faithful boys, but how long would they remain faithful with Delight Mainprize in the house?

Delight looked longingly at these three women. No sensitive intuition told her of their unfriendliness. Folk were often stand-offish with a newcomer. She liked the little round heads and freckled faces of the sisters and their brisk movements. They worked together like two good stocky ponies. As for Mrs. Beemer. . . after Mrs. Bye's long-legged leaps across the kitchen, she seemed like an elephant ponderously going through the motions to which it had been trained. But presently she saw that Mrs. Beemer accomplished more than Mrs. Bye, for all her frenzy, and that, with the utmost economy of movement, she kept the machine of the kitchen running in deadly earnest.

After the big airy kitchen at The Duke and the animation of the occupants, this low-ceilinged room, these silent women were rather depressing. Even the children were odd, not a bit like Queenie Bye. They were fat, whey-faced urchins with clumpy boots and drab, tousled heads. They were eating their dinner at a table in a corner, and every now and again one would slide from his chair, come to the stove with an empty plate, and re-load it from the various platters and vegetable dishes. As they passed Delight they looked askance at her, resenting, like their mother, this new presence. One little fellow, bolder than the others, ran to her, and shutting his chubby fist, struck her on the side, then scuttled away to safety under the table.

"Here, Johnny, quit that!" said his mother, but a grim smile played about her lips.

Delight's face grew red from the heat of the stove, all her blood seemed to be singing in her head. It was