“Oh, I can't stand it no longer. He don't give me nothin' to git anything with, an' we can't live on nothin'. Whenever he gits mad he plagues me by keepin' everything out o' my han's, an' he won't answer when I ask him fer anything. I'd like to know if a woman an' five children kin live without money! Before I was married I used to earn some. I had enough to live on, but now, what with the cookin', an' washin' an' nussin' all these babies, I ain't no time ter earn a livin'!”
“I should say you were earning it! You earn more than he does!” exclaimed Nannie hotly.
“He don't look at it that way,” sobbed the woman. “He's ferever makin' me feel so beholten ter him fer every penny an' ter-day when I needed some money awful fer tea an' I went ter his pocket an' got it, he went on so afore ther children it seems like I can't never look them in ther face agin. He said—he said”—she stammered amid her sobs—“thet I was a thief—a low-down common thief—that's what he said, and the children heard him.”
Nannie rose from her chair with clinched hands and a flaming face.
“Where is he?” she asked under her breath.
“He's gone ter ther grocery. He ain't working ter-day. He said he'd 'tend ter the spendin' of the money. I couldn't be trusted with it. He said thet, he did, afore the children.”
And she broke down again.
Just then the man himself came walking in.
“What's up now?” he asked when he saw Nannie's face.
“You are!” she blazed, “and you're a contemptible brute!”