Visions of a workhouse infirmary for her child had haunted the old woman in the basement breakfast-room of the decayed Belgravian house.
"If you had not found such a good husband, my dear," she used to say to her daughter, "I don't know what would have become of that poor boy." Mr Verloc extended as much recognition to Stevie as a man not particularly fond of animals may give to his wife's beloved cat; and this recognition, benevolent and perfunctory, was essentially of the same quality.

Both women admitted to themselves that not much more could be reasonably expected.

It was enough to earn for Mr Verloc the old woman's reverential gratitude.

In the early days, made sceptical by the trials of friendless life, she used sometimes to ask anxiously: "You don't think, my dear, that Mr Verloc is getting tired of seeing Stevie about ?" To this Winnie replied habitually by a slight toss of her head.

Once, however, she retorted, with a rather grim pertness: "He'll have to get tired of me first." A long silence ensued.