Free Two for Three Farthings by Mary Jane Staples

‘Yer got to excuse ’im, mister, we been walkin’ two days, we been everywhere, lookin’ an’ walkin’, an’ all down the market too where a man on a stall let Orrice ’ave some oranges what ’e ’ad to make good. I ‘spect ’e’s tired, so yer got to excuse ’im lookin’ rude.’
    â€˜Crikey, she’s talkin’,’ said Orrice to the fire.
    â€˜That’s good for all of us, talking,’ said Jim, ‘but not too loud, of course.’
    â€˜Oh, no,’ breathed Effel, blanching at the thought of going back into the cold wet night because of loud talking.
    Jim made the cocoa and put in a little milk from the can.
    â€˜Effel, lay your clothes over the fender,’ he said, ‘then you can both drink your cocoa. And while you’re drinking it, tell me all about yourselves. I know you must both be very tired, it’s well after midnight, but I think I’d like to know a little about you before we get you tucked down.’
    â€˜Yes, mister,’ said Orrice. He and Effel received the hot cocoa gratefully, and they sat on the rug in front of the fire to drink it. He looked again at Jim’s empty sleeve.
    â€˜Our dad was in the war,’ he said.
    â€˜And I look as if I was too, do I?’ asked Jim.
    â€˜Was yer?’ asked Orrice.
    â€˜We all were, weren’t we, in our different ways?’ said Jim.
    Orrice, relishing the hot cocoa, said, ‘I dunno about that, mister. I mean about what everyone did in the war, except—’ He thought about what to say. ‘Except most people still got both their arms.’
    â€˜Oh, there are thousands worse off than me,’ said Jim. He sat down. ‘And it’s you two I want to hear about. So tell me.’
    They told him their story. Jim did not need to own great perception to sense the heartbreak. It was not only in the loss of both parents, it was also in their realization that their only relatives, Uncle Perce and Aunt Glad, could not permanently house them. But many aunts and uncles had children of their own, problems of their own, and a depressing lack of money. Jim could not condemn Uncle Perce and Aunt Glad. Nevertheless, he could understand why the heartbreak of the boy and girl was the more acute. He himself had been spared that kind of anguish, for at the age of three he would probably have suffered more from bewilderment than anything else. It was not until he was several years older that the sad moments had come, and with them a longing to have known his mother and father.
    Lily Downes had filled in many blanks for him. When he left the orphanage he was given his birth certificate. That told him what Lily told him. Mother, Betsy Margaret Miller, spinster. Father, John James Cooper, bachelor. He often thought that one day he would go to his mother’s birthplace, the village of Elderfield in Hampshire, and see if he had any relatives there. Something must have happened to the few personal possessions she had at the time of her death. Letters and so on. He had nothing of hers, not even a photograph.
    He fully understood why Orrice and Effel did not want to go to an orphanage. Every kid sensed that life at an orphanage was of a regimented kind. And there was no institution that could give this brother and sister what their parents had given them. He suspected they might have been a rough and ready couple, but affectionate for all that. Cockneys were typically of that kind, large-hearted and with great family loyalties.
    What to do with these kids, what to do about them? Jim knew what officialdom would expect him to do, but he took all officialdom with a pinch of salt. He had little time for rules and regulations that were supposed to be for the good of people, but in the main made things easier for those who administered them from the offices of town halls, county halls, government departments and institutions.
    â€˜Well, tomorrow we’ll