"Of all the unbounded impudence, this is the worst!"
"I have been told," went on Mrs. Hammond haughtily, "that you are a foreigner—a Japanese." She pronounced the word as if speaking of something extremely repellent.
Sunny bowed, with an attempted smile, that faded away as Jerry's mother continued ruthlessly:
"You do not look like a Japanese to me, unless you have been peroxiding your hair. In my opinion you are just an ordinary everyday bad girl."
Sunny said very faintly:
"Aexcuse me!"
She turned like a hurt thing unjustly punished to the other woman, as if seeking help there. It had been arranged between the two women that Mrs. Hammond was to do the talking. Miss Falconer was having her full of that curious satisfaction some women take in seeing in person one's rival. Her expression far more moved Sunny than that of the angry older woman.
"No one but a bad woman," went on Mrs. Hammond, "would live like this in a young man's apartment, or allow him to support her, or take money from him. Decent girls don't do that sort of thing in America. You are old enough to get out and earn for yourself an honest living. Aren't you ashamed of yourself? Or are you devoid of shame, you bad creature?"
"Yes," said Sunny, with such a look that Jerry's mother's frown relaxed somewhat: "I are ashame. I are sawry thad I are bad—woman. Aexcuse me this time. I try do better. I sawry I are—bad!"
This was plainly a full and complete confession of wrong and its effect on the older woman was to arouse a measure of the Hammond compunction which always followed a hasty judgment. For a moment Mrs. Hammond considered the advisability of reading to this girl a lecture that she had recently prepared to deliver before an institution for the welfare of such girls as she deemed Sunny to be. However, her benevolent intention was frustrated by Miss Falconer.