"Don't be disgusting, Martha. You make me ashamed. You ought to speak to Alice. It's not respectable, her going about like that."
Mrs. Hearty made an effort to speak; but the words failed to penetrate the barrage of bread-and-cheese—Mrs. Hearty did everything with gusto.
"Supposing I was to go out in a short skirt like that. What would you say then?"
"You—you ain't got the legs, Lizzie," and Mrs. Hearty was off into a paroxysm of gasps and undulations.
"Oh don't, don't," she gasped, as if Mrs. Bindle were responsible for her agony. "You'll be the death of me," she cried, as she wiped her eyes with a soiled pocket-handkerchief.
To Mrs. Hearty, laughter came as an impulse and an agony. She would implore the world at large not to make her laugh, heaving and shaking as she protested. She was good-natured, easy-going, and popular with her friends, who marvelled at what it was she had seen in the sedate and decorous Mr. Hearty to prompt her to marry him.
During her sister's paroxysm, Mrs. Bindle preserved a dignified silence. She always deplored Mrs. Hearty's lack of self-control.
"There are the neighbours to consider," she continued at length. Mrs. Bindle's thoughts were always with her brother-in-law. "Look how low her blouse was."
"It's 'ealthy," puffed Mrs. Hearty, who could always be depended upon to find excuses for a black sheep's blackness.
"I call it disgusting." Mrs. Bindle's mouth shut with a snap.