ABSTRACT
Just before that there Chris’mus time, when Mrs Simon was kind of gettin’ used to ’avin’ a baby same as other mothers, and the women was turnin’ up chippin’ ’er about it, and was lookin’ round for somethink fresh, we ’ad a rare set-out in our street by reason of somebody else turnin’ up unexpected. Leastways there wasn’t only one as was expecting ’im, and she’d kep’ on expectin’ for three years gone, so as yer couldn’t ’ardly reckon ’er as expectin’ no more. She was a queer-lookin’ woman with bright red ’air and a very white face, and a figure as neat and straight as Lina’s own. Same as all red-’aired people, ’er name was Ginger. But after she got married ’er proper name was Mrs Sissero, but she wasn’t never called that, only by the rent-collector and such as aimed at showin’ an extry respeck. The rest on us used to call ’er Mrs Kentucky, or Tennessee, or Timbuctoo, or Old Folks at ’Ome, or anythink else ’andy as ’ad connection with niggers. For the thing as made ’er famous was she’d married a nigger and couldn’t never get over it.
