“But I never thought it ’ud be so for worse as this,” said poor Mrs Tulliver, with the strange, scared look that had come over her of late; “and my poor father gave me away—and to come on so all at once——”
“Oh, mother!” said Maggie, “don’t talk in that way.”
“No, I know you won’t let your poor mother speak—that’s been the way all my life—your father never minded what I said—it ’ud have been o’ no use for me to beg and pray—and it ’ud be no use now, not if I was to go down o’ my hands and knees——”
“Don’t say so, Bessy,” said Mr Tulliver, whose pride, in these first moments of humiliation, was in abeyance to the sense of some justice in his wife’s reproach. “If there’s anything left as I could do to make you amends, I wouldn’t say you nay.”
“Then we might stay here and get a living, and I might keep among my own sisters,—and me been such a good wife to you, and never crossed you from week’s end to week’s end—and they all say so—they say it ’ud be nothing but right, only you’re so turned against Wakem.”
“Mother,” said Tom, severely, “this is not the time to talk about that.”
“Let her be,” said Mr Tulliver. “Say what you mean, Bessy.”
“Why, now the mill and the land’s all Wakem’s, and he’s got everything in his hands, what’s the use o’ setting your face against him, when he says you may stay here, and speaks as fair as can be, and says you may manage the business, and have thirty shillings a-week, and a horse to ride about to market? And where have we got to put our heads? We must go into one o’ the cottages in the village,—and me and my children brought down to that,—and all because you must set your mind against folks till there’s no turning you.”
Mr Tulliver had sunk back in his chair trembling.
“You may do as you like wi’ me, Bessy,” he said, in a low voice; “I’ve been the bringing of you to poverty—this world’s too many for me—I’m nought but a bankrupt; it’s no use standing up for anything now.”