“Well, Joe . . . we’re your folks. . . .”
“Cut it out!” said Joe with a gesture. “I’ve been told often enough that I’ve got no natural feelings. All right; I’m not going to make out to have any now. Home Sweet Home never meant nothing to me but a place to git away from. As for my father. . . . Gee! it made me sore even as a young kid to think that I sprung from that! The dirty, whining Jew! I’d do something handsome for you, if you could prove to me he wasn’t my father!”
“You wouldn’t want him to be buried in Potters’ Field. . . .”
“Why not? The main thing is to get him buried. A dead man rests just as comfortable in Potters’ Field as in Woodlawn!”
“But the disgrace of it. . . .”
“Aah! talk sense to me!” cried Joe, screwing up his face in irritation. “I’m a realist! Do you know what that means? You used to be one yourself. What’s come over you?”
“I do’ know what’s come over me,” she muttered, wiping a hand over her face. “I don’t think about nothing no more. Don’t see no use in it. . . . I just go along. . . .”
“Well, I’ve climbed out of that pigsty!” said Joe. “All by myself, I climbed out. I don’t owe nothing to you!”
Without another word she turned to go.
“Wait a minute!” cried Joe, exasperated. “I didn’t say I wouldn’t do nottin’ for you. I just wanted to have it well understood you hadn’t no claim on me!”