But why should you bother, and
you nearly seven months gone? I daresay you feels that 'eavy that you
never care to get out of your chair. But they says that them who works up
to the last 'as the easiest time in the end. Not that I've found it so."
The conversation paused. Esther threw her legs over the side of the sofa,
and still wrapped in the blanket, sat looking at her mother.
"You can't be over-comfortable on that bit of sofa," said Mrs. Saunders.
"Lor, I can manage right enough, if that was all."
"You is that cast down, Esther; you mustn't give way. Things sometimes
turns out better than one expects."
"You never found they did, mother."
"Perhaps I didn't, but that says nothing for others. We must bear up as
best we can."
One word led to another, and very soon Esther was telling her mother the
whole tale of her misfortune--all about William, the sweepstakes, the ball
at the Shoreham Gardens, the walks about the farm and hillside.
"Service is no place for a girl who wants to live as we used to live when
father was alive--no service that I've seen. I see that plain enough.
Mistress was one of the Brethren like ourselves, and she had to put up
with betting and drinking and dancing, and never a thought of the Lord.
There was no standing out against it. They call you Creeping Jesus if you
say your prayers, and you can't say them with a girl laughing or singing
behind your back, so you think you'll say them to yourself in bed, but
sleep comes sooner than you expect, and so you slips out of the habit.
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