"Now won't there be some excitement when they learn!"
Mildred laughed again, her mother joined her.
"But getting back to Ethel."
"Tell me about her."
"Oh, she was on the war path. 'You see,' she cried, standing over Orlean. 'You see what you've done by your hard-headedness. I told you all the time not to marry that man!'"
"Wouldn't that disgust you!"
"'But you would go ahead and marry him! You would go ahead and marry him, after all papa and I tried to persuade you not to! And now! You are going to kill your father; going to kill your poor old father.' Orlean just hung her head like a silly and took it. 'Yes,' went on Ethel, turning her little slender body around and twisting her jaws as if to grind it out. 'You got him all mixed up with that nigga', and here he comes in here and sues him. Think of it! Sues him! And now all the nigga's in Chicago have the laugh on us—we daren't show our faces in the street!
"'And what has he done it for?' 'But, Ethel,' Orlean protested, 'Papa isn't worth anything. He can't do anything with papa if he gets a judgment.' 'What do you know about judgments,' Ethel flew up. 'Well,' said Orlean, 'I recall hearing Jean say that if a man was worth nothing, then a judgment was of little or no good.' 'You heard Jean say it!' screamed Ethel, looking at Orlean severely. And then she turned to me. 'Do you know, Mildred,' she rang out, 'This fool woman loves that man yet. Yes. Y-e-s! Loves him yet and would go back to him tomorrow if it wasn't for us!'"
"Doesn't it beat anything you ever saw!"
Mildred laughed again as she paused for breath.