“Look 'ere, don't yer b'lieve a word of it—I don't—I tell yer they're a 'umbuggin' lot, them doctors, all together. I know it. Yer take my word for that—yer'll git all right again. Yer'll be as well as I am, afore yer've done—Oh, Lord!—it's jest awful—I feel that upset—I'd like to cut my tongue out, for 'avin' told yer—but I jest couldn't 'elp myself.” She was retreating towards the door, wiping her eyes, and snorting out loud sobs—“An', don't you offer me that half quid—I couldn't take it of yer—that I couldn't.”
She shivered, sat up, and dragged the cloak tight round her shoulders. In her desire to get warm she forgot what had happened. She extended the palms of her hands towards the grate: the grate was delicious. A smoking lump of coal clattered on to the fender: she lifted the tongs, but the sickening remembrance arrested her. The things in the room were receding, dancing round: the fire was growing taller and taller. The woollen scarf chafed her skin: she wrenched it off. Then hope, keen and bitter, shot up, hurting her. “How could he know? Of course he couldn't know. She'd been a lot better this last fortnight—the other doctor said so—she didn't believe it—she didn't care——Anyway, it would be over before the end of February!”
Suddenly the crooning wail started again: next, spasms of weeping, harsh and gasping.
By-and-by she understood that she was crying noisily, and that she was alone in the room; like a light in a wind, the sobbing fit ceased.
“Let me live—let me live—I'll be straight—I'll go to church—I'll do anything! Take it away—it hurts—I can't bear it!”
Once more the sound of her own voice in the empty room calmed her. But the tension of emotion slackened, only to tighten again: immediately she was jeering at herself. What was she wasting her breath for? What had Jesus ever done for her? She'd had her fling, and it was no thanks to Him.
“'Dy-sy—Dy-sy——'”
From the street below, boisterous and loud, the refrain came up. And, as the footsteps tramped away, the words reached her once more, indistinct in the distance:
“'I'm jest cryzy, all for the love o' you.'”