"What are you a-doing of?"
"Going," Cuckoo threw at her.
"Now?"
"Yes."
"Where to?"
No answer. Cuckoo was thrusting the few things still left to her into the
only box she now possessed in the world. Mrs. Brigg stood in the folding
doorway watching, and making mouths, as is the fashion of the elderly
when emotional.
"What are you going for?" she said presently, as Cuckoo, bending down,
stuffed a white petticoat into the depths.
"Can't pay," snarled Cuckoo.
"It don't matter--for a day or two," said Mrs. Brigg, reluctantly.
She stumped downstairs, torn by conflicting emotions. She had got
accustomed to Cuckoo, and then both Julian and Valentine, Cuckoo's
visitors, had taught her the colour of the British sovereign. They had
not been near 400 lately, but they might come again. And then Doctor
Levillier. Cuckoo had some fine friends, who would surely do something
for her. Mrs. Brigg had no other possible lodger in her eye. On the
whole, prudence dictated a day or two's patience, just a day or two,
or a week's, not more, not a moment more. Thus it came about that Cuckoo
had now been another week beneath the roof of Mrs. Brigg without paying
hard cash for the asylum. The previous evening the landlady had burst
out again into fury, refusing to get in any more food for Cuckoo, and
demanding the fortnight's rent.
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