I remember that
I repeated the word "common" in a whisper to myself, while I resolved
that I would learn its meaning in order that I might cease to be the
unknown thing that it implied.

My mother, who had gone into the kitchen with the dripping cloak in her
arms, returned a moment later with a cup of steaming coffee in one hand
and a mug of hot milk in the other.

"It's a mercy if you haven't caught your death with an inner chill," she
observed in a brisk, kindly tone. "'Twas the way old Mr. Cudlip, whose
funeral I'm going to to-morrow, came to his end, and he was as hale,
red-faced a body as you ever laid eyes on."

The woman received the cup gratefully, and I could see her poor thin
hands tremble as she raised it to her lips.

"Drink the warm milk, dear," she said pleadingly to the disagreeable
little girl, who shook her head and drew back with a stiff childish
gesture.

"I'm not hungry, thank you," she replied to my mother in her sweet,
clear treble. To all further entreaties she returned the same answer,
standing there a haughty, though drenched and battered infant, in her
soiled white cloak and her red shoes, holding her mop of a muff tightly
in both hands.

"I'm not hungry, thank you," she repeated, adding presently in a manner
of chill politeness, "give it to the boy."

But the boy was not hungry either, and when my mother, finally taking
her at her word, turned, in exasperation, and offered the mug to me, I
declined it, also, and stood nervously shifting from one foot to the
other, while my hands caught and twisted the fringe of the table-cloth
at my back. The big grey eyes of the little girl looked straight into
mine, but there was no hint in them that she was aware of my existence.
Though her teeth were chattering, and she knew I heard them, she did not
relax for an instant from her scornful attitude.

"We were just about to take a mouthful of supper, mum, an' we'd be proud
if you an' the little gal would jine us," remarked my father, with an
eager hospitality.

"I thank you," replied the woman in her pretty, grateful manner, "but
the coffee has restored my strength, and if you will direct me to the
hill, I shall be quite able to go on again."

A step passed close to the door on the pavement outside, and I saw her
start and clutch the child to her bosom with trembling hands. As she
stood there in her shaking terror, I remembered a white kitten I had
once seen chased by boys into the area of a des