“Barbe!” He cried out, as if wounded. “You’re 219 really too absurd. She’s a good little thing, and she’s had the devil’s own luck––”
“They always do have. That was one thing I learnt in Bleary Street. It was never a girl’s own fault. It was always the devil’s own luck.”
“Well, isn’t it, now, when you come to think of it? You can’t take everything away from people, and expect them to have the same standards as you and me. Think of the mess that people of our sort make of things, even with every advantage.”
“We’ve our own temptations, of course.”
“And they’ve got theirs—without our pull in the way of carrying them off. You should hear Steptoe––”
“I don’t want to hear Steptoe. I’ve heard him too much already.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“What can I mean by it but just what I say? I should think you’d get rid of him.”
Having first looked puzzled, with a suggestion of pain, he ended with a laugh. “You might as well expect me to get rid of an old grandfather. Steptoe wouldn’t let me, if I wanted to.”
“He doesn’t like me.”