“I mean to say that I find you here ironing, while she is downstairs, sitting at her ease on the sofa, reading.”
Luiza, bending over the clothes-basket in confusion, began to shake out the clothes and fold them with a trembling hand.
“You cannot imagine how much there is to be done,” she said. “The cleaning, the ironing, the waiting at table. And that poor sick creature—”
“If she is sick, let her go to the hospital!”
“No, you ought not to say that.”
This insistence in defending Juliana, who was taking her ease downstairs, exasperated him.
“But what does this mean? Are you depending upon her? Any one would think you were afraid of her!”
“Ah, if you have come home in that humor,” answered Luiza, with trembling lips, and ready to cry.
Jorge continued, with increasing vexation,—
“This indulgence must have an end! That this good-for-nothing should take her ease in my house, enjoying every comfort, stretching herself in my chairs, going out to amuse herself, and that you should take her part and do her work for her—no! an end must be put to this. Always excuses, and more excuses! Let her go to the hospital—or to the devil!”