“Then you, Charlie, and Mimi are here, dear, to study?”
“As soon as de University is able to receibe us; but dair’s a waiting list already dat long.”
“And what do you do with all your spare time?”
“Goin’ round de shops takes up some ob it. An’ den ob course, dair’s de Cinés. Oh, I love de Lara. We went last night to see Souls in Hell.”
“I’ve not been!”
“Oh it was choice.”
“Was it? Why?”
“De scene ob dat story,” she told him, “happen foreign; ’way crost de big watteh, on de odder side ob de world ... an’ de principal gal, she merried to a man who neglect her (ebery ebenin’ he go to pahtys an’ biars), while all de time his wife she sit at home wid her lil pickney at her breas’. But dair anodder gemplum (a friend ob de fambly) an’ he afiah to woe her; but she only shake de head, slowly, from side to side, an’ send dat man away. Den de hubsom lose his fortune, an’, oh, she dat ’stracted, she dat crazed ... at last, she take to gamblin,’ but dat only make t’ings worse. Den de friend ob de fambly come back, an’ offer to pay all de expenses ef only she unbend: so she cry, an’ she cry, ’cos it grieb her to leab her pickney to de neglect ob de serbants (dair was three ob dem, an old buckler, a boy, an’ a cook), but, in de end, she do, an’ frtt! away she go in de fambly carriage. An’ den, bimeby, you see dem in de bedroom doin’ a bit ob funning.”
“What?”