“What have you all got against me anyhow?” Letty insisted, passionately. “What did I ever do to you? 92 What’s women’s hearts made of, that they can’t let a poor girl be?”
Mrs. Courage had so far recovered as to be able to turn from one to another, to say in pantomime that she had been misunderstood. Jane began to cry; Nettie to laugh.
“Even if I was the bad girl you’re tryin’ to make me out I should think other women might show me a little pity. But I’m not a bad girl—not yet. I may be. I dunno but what I will. When I see the hateful thing bein’ good makes of women it drives me to do the other thing.”
This was the speech they needed to justify themselves. To be good made women hateful! Their dumb-crambo to each other showed that anyone who said so wild a thing stood already self-condemned.
But Letty flung up her head with a mettle which Steptoe hadn’t seen since the days of the late Mrs. Allerton.
“I’m not in this house to drive no one else out of it. Them that have lived here for years has a right to it which I ain’t got. You can go, and let me stay; or you can stay, and let me go. I’m the wife of the owner of this house, who married me straight and legal; but I don’t care anything about that. You don’t have to tell me I ain’t fit to be his wife, because I know it as well as you do. All I’m sayin’ is that you’ve got the choice to stay or go; and whichever you do, I’ll do different.”
Never in her life had she spoken so many words at one time. The effort drained her. With a torrent 93 of dry sobs that racked her body she dropped back into her chair.
The hush was that of people who find the tables turned on themselves in a way they consider unwarranted. Of the general surprise Steptoe was quick to take advantage.
“There you are, girls. Madam couldn’t speak no fairer, now could she?”
To this there was neither assent or dissent; but it was plain that no one was ready to pick up the glove so daringly thrown down.