{"product_id":"2940013755567","title":"Exit the Skeleton","description":"MOTHER AND DAUGHTER\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAMABEL LEIGH woke as her daily helper, elderly and stout, entered the\u003cbr\u003eroom with the tray.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Mornin', dearie. Ten o'clock to the tick and here's yer brekfus'. A nice\u003cbr\u003ekipper, seein' as it's Wednesday. Three letters for yer; two of 'em bills\u003cbr\u003eby the look of it. Hope the other makes up. No news in the papers. Strike\u003cbr\u003ein Belfast, sudden death of a Cab'net Minister, airyplane crash in\u003cbr\u003eAmerica, but no news what is news. I'll get yer bath in 'arf a hour.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"You are very good to me, Croonie.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Good to them as is good to me. That's my motter; always has been.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCroonie put the tray on a bedside table, straightened the coverlet and\u003cbr\u003epulled back the curtains. She seemed reluctant to go. She generally\u003cbr\u003eenjoyed a little chat, and this morning there was a special reason for\u003cbr\u003eone. Everybody called her Croonie. It was, not a nickname as many\u003cbr\u003esupposed, nor had it any reference, ironic or otherwise, to her evident\u003cbr\u003elack of a singing voice. It was simpler than that. She had married a man\u003cbr\u003enamed Croonie, who had left her when she ceased to support him in the\u003cbr\u003emanner to which he felt himself entitled.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"So Miss Valerie got back all right,\" she said.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"You have seen her?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Threw her arms round me the minute I got here, she did, and kissed me.\u003cbr\u003e'Good to be home, Croonie,' she said. My word, she has shot up, taller 'n\u003cbr\u003eyou now and nearly as pretty as you was at her age.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Prettier, I hope.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"She'll never be that, if she lives to a nundred. 'Tell Mummie I'll be\u003cbr\u003eback soon,' she says, and out she pops. A young man, I 'spose, but her\u003cbr\u003eonly home yesterday and early in the mornin'. She said somethin' about\u003cbr\u003ebathin' the Serpentine. There's the dratted bell. Bath ready in a' nour,\u003cbr\u003edearie.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe bustled from the room. Amabel knew she was lucky to have such a\u003cbr\u003efaithful servitor and friend. Croonie had been a dresser at the theatre\u003cbr\u003ewhen they first met. Now her mornings were spent at the flat, where she\u003cbr\u003elet herself in at eight o'clock on the tick, as she put it. She sometimes\u003cbr\u003e\"obliged\" other ladies in the afternoon, or for an occasional party, but\u003cbr\u003eher one job supplied her needs and she did not believe in work for work's\u003cbr\u003esake.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAmabel drank her tea and attacked her kipper. She did not immediately\u003cbr\u003eopen her letters; there was plenty to occupy her thoughts. Few would have\u003cbr\u003esupposed that her pleasant bedroom had for many years been the connubial\u003cbr\u003enest of an intemperate cabman and his tempestuous spouse. Yet such was\u003cbr\u003ethe case. An enterprising speculator, with some skill as an architect,\u003cbr\u003ehad purchased a mews that was falling into decay and had transformed it\u003cbr\u003einto a select colony of small flats. Outside, pebble-dash had disguised\u003cbr\u003ethe old brickwork; and inside, modern fitments and pretty lattice windows\u003cbr\u003ehad transformed stalls and coach-houses with the rooms over them into\u003cbr\u003esuites, each with two bedrooms, a lounge, a tiny kitchenette and a\u003cbr\u003ebathroom. The name, Russell's Mews, had burgeoned into Dowton Close and,\u003cbr\u003ethe position being near to South Kensington station, many fortunate\u003cbr\u003epersons with some fashionable or aristocratic aspirations had secured\u003cbr\u003ehomes in a convenient locality at a moderate rent. Amabel's was on the\u003cbr\u003efirst floor.","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47079660617968,"sku":"2940013755567","price":2.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013755567_p0.jpg?v=1763589820","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013755567","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}