Fanny did it one sunny afternoon in early spring when the streets were gay with folks all out to taste the first bit of gladness in the air. Fanny did it in her usual lengthy and thorough manner and permitted no interruptions. She was talking for the first time in her life with authority vested in her by a civic body. So there was a strength and a conscientiousness about her remarks that struck home.
Seth was standing alone on the hotel steps when Fanny began talking but all of Green Valley that was abroad was gathered laughingly about her when she finished and stood waiting for Seth's answer.
Seth had had a glass too much or he would never have done, never have said what he did and said that day. He would never have taken poor, harmless, laughter-loving, happy-go-lucky Fanny Foster, who had never done a mean, malicious thing in her life, who had let her world use her for all the little hateful tasks that nobody else would do and in which there was no thanks or any glory,—Seth in his senses would never have held up this dear though unfinished soul to the scorn, the pitiless ridicule of her townsmen.
If Fanny had been touched with fire and eloquence because she spoke with authority, Seth too talked with a bitter brilliance that won the crowd and held it against its will. With biting sarcasm and horrible accuracy Seth drew a picture of Fanny as made Green Valley smile and laugh before it could catch itself and realize the cruelty of its laughter.
Fanny stood at the foot of the wide flight of stairs like a criminal at the bar. As Seth's words grew more biting, his judgments more cruel, Fanny's face flushed with shame, then faded white with pain.
But Seth went too far. He went so far that he couldn't stop himself. And the crowd who had gathered to hear a little harmless fun now stood petrified and heartsick. No one stirred, though everybody was wishing themselves miles away. And Seth's voice, dripping with cruelty, went on.
Then all at once from the heart of the crowd a little figure pushed its way. It was Seth's wife, Ruth. She walked halfway up that flight of stairs and looked steadily at her husband. Seth stopped in the middle of a word.
"Seth Curtis," Ruth's face was as white as Fanny's and her voice rang out like a silver bell, "Seth Curtis, you will apologize, ask forgiveness of Fanny Foster, who is my friend and an old schoolmate, or before God and these people I will disown you as my husband and the father of my children. Fanny Foster never had an apple or a goody in her lunch in the old school days that she didn't share it with somebody. She has never had a dollar or a joy that she hasn't divided. No one in Green Valley ever had a pain or a sorrow that she did not make it hers and try to help in some way. And in all the world there can be no more willing hands than hers."
The silver voice stopped, choked with sobs, and Ruth's eyes, looking down on the shrunken, bowed figure of Green Valley's gossip, brimmed over with tears.
Seth, sober now, stared at his wife, at the broken, crushed Fanny, at the crowd that stood waiting in still misery.