in the newspapers, and if
you wanted to know anything else, why, where was your tongue? She
examined the paper again, but it conveyed no meaning to her anxious
eyes.

And then in a flash she saw Miss Perkins in a new light, The woman's
anxiety about her was a blind to save her money from dribbling out in
petty loans. Mrs Yabsley, knowing that banks were only traps, still
hid her money so carefully that no one could lay hands on it. So that
was the root of her care for Mrs Yabsley's appearance. She held up the
note, and regarded it with a grimly humorous smile. She knew the truth
now, and felt no desire to read what was written there--some lie, she
supposed--and dropped it on the floor.

Suddenly she felt old and lonely, and wrapping a shawl round her
shoulders, went out to her seat on the veranda. It was near eleven,
and the street was humming with life. The sober and thrifty were
trudging home with their loads of provisions; gossips were gathered at
intervals; sudden jests were bandied, conversations were shouted across
the width of the street, for it was Saturday night, and innumerable
pints of beer had put Cardigan Street in a good humour. The doors were
opened, and the eye travelled straight into the front rooms lit with a
kerosene lamp or a candle. Under the veranda at the corner the Push
was gathered, the successors of Chook and Jonah, young and vicious, for
the larrikin never grows old.

She looked on the familiar scenes that had been a part of her life
since she could remember. The street was changed, she thought, for a
new generation had arrived, scorning the old traditions. The terrace
opposite, sinking in decay, had become a den of thieves, the scum of a
city rookery. She felt a stranger in her own street, and saw that her
money had spoilt her relations with her neighbours. Once she could
read them like a book, but these people came to her with lies and many
inventions for the sake of a few miserable shillings. She wondered
what the world was coming to. She threw her thoughts into the past with
an immense regret. A group on the kerbstone broke into song:

Now, honey, yo' stay in yo' own back yard,
Doan min' what dem white chiles do;
What show yo' suppose dey's a-gwine to gib
A little black coon like yo'?
So stay on this side of the high boahd fence,
An', honey, doan cry so hard;
Go out an' a-play, jes' as much as yo' please,
But stay in yo' own back yard.

The tune, wit