MRS. FIELITZ

Just because you're an old feller you oughta be thinkin' about it all the more. How long are you goin' to be able to work along here. You don't get around to much no more now. You cobbled around on Wehrhahn's shoes! It took more'n two weeks.

FIELITZ

Well, mother, you needn't lie that way.

MRS. FIELITZ

That cobblin' o' yours—that ain't worth a damn. I ain't much good no more an' you ain't. That's a fact. I don't excep' myself at all. An' if people like us don't go an' get somethin' they c'n fall back on, they got to go beggin' in the end anyhow. You c'n kick against that all you want to.

FIELITZ

It's a queer thing about you, mother. It's just like as if the devil hisself got a hold o' you. First it just sort o' peeps up, an' God knows where it comes from. Sometimes it's there an' sometimes it's gone. An' then it'll come back again sudden like an' then it gets hold o' you an' don't let you go no more. I've known some tough customers in my time, mother, but when you gets took that way—then I tell you, you makes the cold shivers run down my back.

MRS. FIELITZ

[Has taken out her notebook again and become absorbed in it.] What did you think about all this? We're insured here for seven thousand.