(17)Abndrew the tall young gentleman killed; and Miss Prue with thefair hair, masses of it twisted round her head, dead too theysaid, with her first baby; but everyone had lost someone theseyears. Prices had gone up shamefully, and didn't come downagain neither. She could well remember her in her grey cloak.

"Good evening, Mrs. McNab," she would d say, and told cookto keep a plate of milk soup for her, quite thought she wantedit, carrying that heavy basket all the way up from town. Shecould see her now, stooping over her flowers, with a little boythere, (faint and flickering, like a yellow beam or the circleat the end of a telescope, a lady in a grey cloak, stooping, overher flowers went flickering, wandering, as Maggie stooped androse, over the bedroom wall, across the washstand, as Mrs.McNab hobbled and ambled, dusting, straightening.)

And cook's name now? Mildred? Marian? - some name likethat. Ah, she had forgotten - she did forget things. Fiery,like all red haired women. Many a laugh they had had. Shewas always welcome in the kitchen. She made them laugh, she did.Things were better then than now.

She sighed; there was too much work for one woman. Shewagged her head this side and that. Why, it was all damp in here;the plaster was falling. What ever did they want to hang abeast's skull there? gone mouldy too. And rats in all theattics. The rain came in. But they never sent; never came.Some of the locks had gone, so the doors banged. She didn'tlike to be up here at dusk alone neither. It was too much for
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