"When you are mistress here, I will do what you bid me. I have no call to wait upon them."
"But they will not keep you for nothing, Martha."
"I don't want them. If you are not satisfied, give me my release and let me go. I could soon get a better place."
"Nonsense! You must do as I bid you, and see that you help that girl Polly in her work to-morrow."
"You would not wish me to help her, if you knew all the vile things she said of you," replied Martha, in an audible aside.
"Of me! What could she say of me? She knows nothing of me or my affairs."
"She did not say she did. But she said that you were old and ugly, and not to be compared with Miss Dolly. That you had not a single good feature in your face. What do you think of the picture?"
"The wretch! But how came she to say all this?"
"Just because I asked her who the plain dark girl was that Mrs. Rushmere called Dorothy. She fired up, like a vulgar vixen as she is, and defended her friend by abusing you. I thought we should have come from words to blows, for I could not sit by and hear my own mistress abused after that fashion. But if you wish me to help her of course I can."
"I'll tell Gilbert. I'll complain to Mr. Rushmere," sobbed Sophia, crying for rage. "If he suffers me to be insulted by his servant I'll leave the house. I've no doubt that Dorothy is at the bottom of it all—who, and what is she?"