At present, various little signs were beginning to
convince her that she had a rival, and the hints of her rejected
admirer, Jack Bartley, fixed her suspicions upon an acquaintance
whom she had hitherto regarded merely with contempt. This was
Pennyloaf Candy, formerly, with her parents, a lodger in Mrs.
Peckover's house. The family had been ousted some eighteen months
ago on account of failure to pay their rent and of the frequent
intoxication of Mrs. Candy. Pennyloaf's legal name was Penelope,
which, being pronounced as a trisyllable, transformed itself by
further corruption into a sound at all events conveying some
meaning. Applied in the first instance jocosely, the title grew
inseparable from her, and was the one she herself always used. Her
employment was the making of shirts for export; she earned on an
average tenpence a day, and frequently worked fifteen hours between
leaving and returning to her home. That Bob Hewett could interest
himself, with whatever motive, in a person of this description, Miss
Peckover at first declined to believe. A hint, however, was quite
enough to excite her jealous temperament; as proof accumulated,
cunning and ferocity wrought in her for the devising of such a
declaration of war as should speedily scare Pennyloaf from the
field.
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