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C H A P T E R X I I • A Sheaf of Sequels Within half an hour Esther was smiling pallidly and drinking tea out of Debby's own cup, to Debby's unlimited satisfaction. Debby had no spare cup, but she had a spare chair without a back, and Esther was of course seated on the other. Her bonnet and cloak were on the bed. "And where is Bobby?" inquired the young lady visitor. Debby's joyous face clouded. "Bobby is dead," she said softly. "He died four years ago, come next Shevuos."167 "I'm so sorry," said Esther, pausing in her tea-drinking with a pang of genuine emotion. "At first I was afraid of him, but that was before I knew him." "There never beat a kinder heart on God's earth," said Debby, emphatically . "He wouldn't hurt a fly." Esther had often seen him snapping at flies, but she could not smile. "I buried him secretly in the back yard," Debby confessed. "See! there, where the paving stone is loose." Esther gratified her by looking through the little back window into the sloppy enclosure where washing hung. She noticed a cat sauntering quietly over the spot without any of the satisfaction it might have felt had it known it was walking over the grave of an hereditary enemy. "So I don't feel as if he was far away," said Debby. "I can always look out and picture him squatting above the stone instead of beneath it." "But didn't you get another?" "Oh, how can you talk so heartlessly?" "Forgive me, dear; of course you couldn't replace him. And haven't you had any other friends?" "Who would make friends with me, Miss Ansell?" Debby asked quietly. "I shall 'make out friends'168 with you, Debby, if you call me that," said Esther, half laughing, half crying. "What was it we used to say in school? I forget, but I know we used to wet our little fingers in our mouths and jerk them abruptly toward the other party. That's what I shall have to do with you." 438 A SHEAF OF SEQUELS "Oh well, Esther, don't be cross. But you do look such a real lady. I always said you would grow up clever, didn't I, though?" "You did, dear, you did. I can never forgive myself for not having looked you up." "Oh, but you had so much to do, I have no doubt," said Debby magnanimously , though she was not a little curious to hear all Esther's wonderful adventures and to gather more about the reasons of the girl's mysterious return than had yet been vouchsafed her. All she had dared to ask was about the family in America. "Still, it was wrong of me," said Esther, in a tone that brooked no protest. "Suppose you had been in want and I could have helped you?" "Oh, but you know I never take any help," said Debby stiffly. "I didn't know that," said Esther, touched. "Have you never taken soup at the Kitchen?" "I wouldn't dream of such a thing. Do you ever remember me going to the Board of Guardians? I wouldn't go there to be bullied, not if I was starving. It's only the cadgers who don't want it who get relief. But, thank God, in the worst seasons I have always been able to earn a crust and a cup of tea. You see I am only a small family," concluded Debby with a sad smile, "and the less one has to do with other people the better." Esther started slightly, feeling a strange new kinship with this lonely soul. "But surely you would have taken help of me," she said. Debby shook her head obstinately. "Well, I'm not so proud," said Esther with a tremulous smile, "for see, I have come to take help of you." Then the tears welled forth and Debby with an impulsive movement pressed the little sobbing form against her faded bodice bristling with pinheads . Esther recovered herself in a moment and drank some more tea. "Are the same people living here?" she said. "Not altogether. The Belcovitches have gone up in the world. They live on the first floor now." "Not much of a rise that," said Esther smiling, for the Belcovitches had always lived on the third floor. "Oh, they could have gone to a better street...

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