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

by D. H. Lawrence

CLARA

Never mind. But as true as I'm here, missis, I should never ha' come if I'd thought. But I had a drop—it all started with your husband sayin' he wasn't a married man.

LAURA (laughing and wiping her eyes)

I've never knowed her to go off like it—it's after the time she's had.

CLARA

You know, my husband was a brute to me—an' I was in bed three month after he died. He was a brute, he was. This is the first time I've been out; it's a'most the first laugh I've had for a year.

LAURA

It's true, what she says. We thought she'd go out of 'er mind. She never spoke a word for a fortnight.

CLARA

Though he's only been dead for two months, he was a brute to me. I was as nice a young girl as you could wish when I married him and went to the Fleece Inn—I was.