"What good are they to me? My mother used to be—Well, I'm only pretty, and she was a great beauty—but look at her now."
"But you don't have to go the same way."
"All women of our class go the same way. It's awful to spend your whole life toiling and aching and worrying and scraping and paring just on the hither side of starving to death; and yet, if it was only yourself, you could stand it. But when you see that your father and mother did it before you, and that your children will have to do it after you—"
"Not in this country, Jennie," he put in, sententiously. "This country gives everyone a chance."
She gave another of her comic little moans.
"This country is like every other country. It's a football field. If you're big enough and tough enough, with skin padded and conscience wadded, and legs to kick hard enough—you get a chance—yes—and one man in a hundred thousand is able to make use of it. But if you're just a decent, honest sort, willing to do a decent, honest day's work, your only chance will be to keep at it till you drop."
"Aren't you rather pessimistic?"
She ignored this question to pace up and down with little tossings of the hands which Wray found infinitely graceful.
"Look at my father. He's worked like a convict all his life, just to reach the magnificent top-notch of forty-five a week. We've been praying to God to give him a raise—"
"And perhaps God will."