"That's what you're doin'. You're drivin' me back to Charley's ... or some place like it...."
She moved from side to side, defiantly, and leaned further forward, resting her elbows on her knees, staring out into the darkened street below them.
"You come here, a married woman; you got one man now, an' he don't suit. So you think you're goin' to take mine. That's big business for a ... a respectable lady, like yourself, ain't it? Stealin' a man off a woman like me!"
She laughed shortly, and did not so much as look up as Ann tried to reply and could not make words frame coherent sentences.
"I've kept still until now, 'cause I ain't proud of my past, 'cause I thought you, havin' one man, had enough without meddlin' with mine. But I'm through keepin' my mouth shut now,"—menacingly. "I'm through, I tell you,"—wiping her hands along her thighs and straightening her body slowly as she turned a malevolent gaze on the silent Ann. "You're tryin' to take what belongs to me an' I won't set by an' let you walk off with him. I'll—
"Why, what'd this town say, if I was to tell 'em you're Ned Lytton's wife instead of his sister? They all know you've been havin' Bruce come here to your room; they all think he's your lover. First thing, they'd fire you out of th' hotel; then, they'd laugh at you as you walked along th' street! It'd ruin him, too; what with keepin' your man out at his ranch so's he can see you without trouble!"
Her voice had mounted steadily and, at the last, she rose to her feet, bending over the bewildered Ann and gesturing heavily with her right arm while the other was pressed tightly across her chest.
"That's what I come here to tell you to-night!" she cried. "That's what you know, now. But I want you to know that while I've been bad, as bad as women get, that I've been open about it; I ain't been no hypocrite; I ain't passed as a good woman an' ... been bad—"
"Nora, stop this!"
Ann leaped to her feet and confronted the girl, for the moment furious, combative. They faced one another in the faint light that came through the windows and before her roused intensity Nora stepped backward, yielding suddenly, frightened by this show of vigorous indignation, for she had believed that her accusation would grind the spirit, the pride, from Ann.