"Are you? I'm not. Oh, it is dreadful, dreadful to lose one's home, any sort of home."
"But could you call that a home? A hole like that? Among people like this Mrs. Higgs and this Dick!"
"Oh, poor Dick! If they had all been like him it would not have mattered."
"What! A pickpocket!" cried Max in disgust.
"What difference did that make? Do you suppose the wives and daughters of the men in the city, financiers and the rest, love them the less because they pass their lives trying to get the better of other people? Isn't it just as dishonest to issue a false prospectus to get people to put their money into worthless companies as to steal a watch? It's nonsense to pretend it isn't."
Carrie spoke sharply. She had grown warm in defense of her felonious friend.
Max thought a little before he answered.
"But you're not this man's wife or his daughter."
"Well, no. But he wanted to marry me; and if he hadn't been caught yesterday, perhaps I should have let him."
"What?"