Girard. Well, what are you going to do about it?
Thérèse. We'll take your places.
Charpin [bringing his fist down with a bang upon the table] Well, I'm damned!
Deschaume [threateningly] If you do, we'll have to put you through it!
Constance. We'll do it!
Girard [to Thérèse] D'you understand now, Mademoiselle, why we socialists don't want women in the factory or in the workshop? The woman's the devil because of the low salary she has to take. She's a victim, and she likes to be a victim, and so she's the best card the employer has to play against a strike. The women are too weak, and if I might say so, too slavish—
Deschaume. Yes, that's the word, mate, slavish.
Berthe [very angry] Look at that man there, my husband, and hear what he's saying before me, his wife, that he makes obey him like a dog. He beats me, he does. You don't trouble about my being what you call slavish when it's you that profits by it! I'd like to know who taught women to be slavish but husbands like you.
Thérèse. You've so impressed it upon women that they're inferior to men, that they've ended by believing it.
Girard. Well, maybe there's exceptions, but it's true in the main.