The Widowing of Mrs. Holroyd: A Drama in Three Acts

by D. H. Lawrence

Now thank goodness they're all dried. It's only nine o'clock, so he won't be in for another two hours, the nuisance. (She sits on the sofa, letting her arms hang down in dejection. After a minute or two she jumps up, to begin rudely dropping the piles of washed clothes in the basket) I don't care, I'm not going to let him have it all his way—no! (She weeps a little, fiercely, drying her eyes on the edge of her white apron) Why should I put up with it all?—He can do what he likes. But I don't care, no, I don't—

[She flings down the full clothes-basket, sits suddenly in the rocking-chair, and weeps. There is the sound of coarse, bursting laughter, in vain subdued, and a man's deep guffaws. Footsteps draw near. Suddenly the door opens, and a little, plump, pretty woman of thirty, in a close-fitting dress and a giddy, frilled bonnet of pink paper, stands perkily in the doorway. Mrs. Holroyd springs up: her small, sensitive nose is inflamed with weeping, her eyes are wet and flashing. She fronts the other woman.

CLARA (with a pert smile and a jerk of the head)

Good evenin'!

MRS. HOLROYD

What do you want?

CLARA (she has a Yorkshire accent)

Oh, we've not come beggin'—this is a visit.

[She stuffs her handkerchief in front of her mouth in a little snorting burst of laughter. There is the sound of another woman behind going off into uncontrollable laughter, while a man guffaws.