There was a sound so impressive in his voice, short and blunt as his speech was, that the woman turned upon him sharply, but for a moment was silent. Then she said with coarse bravado—
“And who are you to talk to me? Why, t’ very mon as ought to take my part, if you had any spirit? But you leave it to me to pay out t’ pair on ’em. An’ Ah’ll do it. Ah’ll made ’em both smart for it, if Ah swing for it! Ah’ll show him the price he has to pay for treatin’ a woman like me the way he’s done. When Ah loved him so! Ay, ten times more’n than that little hussy could! Oh, my God, my God!”
Bram, child of the people that he was, was moved in the utmost depths of his heart by the woman’s mad, passionate despair. He felt for her as he could never feel for the cool, prim, little wife Christian had served so ill. He would have comforted her if he could. But as no words strong enough or suitable enough to the occasion came to his lips, he just put a gentle hand upon the woman’s shoulder as she bowed herself down and sobbed.
But Mr. Biron’s refinement was shocked by this scene. Seeing the woman less ferocious, now that she was more absorbed in her grief, he ventured to come a little nearer, and to say snappishly—
“But, my good woman, though we may be sorry for you, you have no right to force yourself into my house. Nor have you any right to speak in such terms of my daughter.”
Meg was erect in a moment, her eyes flashing, her nostrils quivering. With a wild, ironical laugh, she faced about, pointing at his mean little face a scornful finger.
“You!” cried she in a very passion of contempt. “You dare to speak to me! You as would have sold your daughter a dozen times over if t’ price had been good enoof! Why, mon, your hussy of a daughter’s a pearl to you! You’re a rat, a cur! Ah could almost forgive her when Ah look at you! It’s you Ah’ve got to blame for it all, wi’ your black heart an’ your mean, white face! You more’n her, more’n him!”
With a sudden impulse of indomitable rage, she stepped back, and raising her right hand quickly, flung something at his face.
With a sudden impulse of indomitable rage, she stepped back, and
raising her right hand quickly, flung something at his face.—Page 134.