Mrs. Briarley made no more ado. She set the baby down upon an adjacent chair with a resonant sound, and then fell upon the miserable old woman and seizing her by the shoulders shook her until her cap flew off and danced upon her back and her mouth opened and shut as if worked by a spring.
"Tha brazent, hard-hearted besom, tha!" she cried as she shook. "Tha ill-farrant nowt, tha! as nivver did no good i' thy days an canna bear as no one else should. I dunnot care if I nivver see thy brass as long as I live. If tha wur noine i'stead o' ninety-five I'd give thee a hidin', tha brazent, hard-hearted owd piece!"
Her strength failed her and she loosened her hold and sat down and wept aloud behind the baby, and Mrs. Dixon fell back in her chair, an unpleasant heap, without breath to speak a word or strength to do anything but clutch wildly at her cap, and so remained shrunken and staring.
CHAPTER XXXI. HAWORTH'S DEFENDER.
Mrs. Haworth made her way along the streets with weak and lagging steps. She had been a brisk walker in the days of her country life, and even now was fonder of going here and there on foot than of riding in state, as her son would have preferred. But now the way before her seemed long. She knew where she was going.
"There's one of 'em as knows an' will tell me," she said to herself. "She can't have no cruel feeling against him, bein' a lady, an' knowin' him so well. An' if it's true—not as I believe it, Jem, my dear, for I don't—she'll break it to me gentle."
"Not as I believe, Jem, my dear, for I don't," she said to herself again and again.
Her mind went back to the first hour of his life, when he lay, a strong-limbed child, on her weak arm, the one comfort given to her out of her wretched marriage. She thought of him again as a lad, growing and thriving in spite of hunger and cold, growing and thriving in spite of cruelty and wrong which broke her health and threw her helpless upon charity. He had been sharper and bolder than other boys, and always steadfast to his determination.