A Girl of the People
L. T. Meade
Paperback
(CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, March 18, 2014)
"You have kept us waiting an age! Come along, Bet, do." "She ain't going to funk it, surely!" "No, no, not she,—she's a good 'un, Bet is,—come along, Bet. Joe Wilkins is waiting for us round the corner, and he says Sam is to be there, and Jimmy, and Hester Wright: do come along, now." "Will Hester Wright sing?" suddenly demanded the girl who was being assailed by all these remarks. "Yes, tip-top, a new song from one of the music halls in London. Now then, be you coming or not, Bet?" "No, no, she's funking it," suddenly called out a dancing little sprite of a newspaper girl. She came up close to Bet as she spoke, and shook a dirty hand in her face, and gazed up at her with two mirthful, teasing, wicked black eyes. "Bet's funking it,—she's a mammy's girl,—she's tied to her mammy's apron-strings, he-he-he!" The other girls all joined in the laugh; and Bet, who was standing stolid and straight in the centre of the group, first flushed angrily, then turned pale and bit her lips.