Val shook her head, and then, in a stifled voice:
"The Comet has been kept dark, but there are other things—things I really care about."
"Is there something you care about more than about writing?"
"Writing?" she echoed, with limitless scorn. "I don't care that about writing. It just does to fill in. But the way she behaves about the Comet is just a sample. I really thought she was getting to be more liberal-minded. It's a long time since we've had a terrible scene like this; but it just shows you." She turned away and strode up and down. "The only thing she ever let me do was to take drawing lessons; and the only thing she ever took my part about was in defending me from learning cooking. But do you think I ever had piano lessons? No! Do you think I've ever had a private singing lesson in my life? No! Do you know what that means to me? No—because the piano's kept locked, or else I'm made to sing as if I were ashamed of myself, and you haven't a notion that I've got a voice that would make a singer's fortune. Now, have you?"
"N—no."
"Course not. How should you?"
"I suppose," he said, "they naturally don't want you to face the hardships of—"
"As if we didn't face hardships at home. Have you any notion how poor we are? I don't mean holes in the kitchen and rain through the roof—who cares about that? We're so poor"—she advanced upon him step by step—"that we can't have proper clothes, we can't have proper fires, and, except when you're here, we don't have proper food. And me with a voice of gold!—so people say. What's the good of a voice of gold with a grandmother like that?" She pointed a shaking finger of scorn in the direction of the long room. A black face was put shyly in at the opposite door. "Here's Venus to set the table."
Val tumbled down from her climax and stalked miserably out. Ethan followed her.