"What could you do? I'll tell you what you could do. You could have taken the frying-pan and laid it over his head. That's what you ought to have done. Between us we could have managed the big brute."
"You know, Nathan, I couldn't have reached his head. Who is he? I never saw such a monster before in all my born days."
"He's the Norwegian giant at the circus. If he hadn't been a giant I could have managed him. There isn't a man in town but I can handle."
"Of course there isn't. What made him touch you?"
"It's all the fault of them bad Graham children that tramped across my fields when I'd told 'em not to. I was goin' to give the biggest one a lesson with a horsewhip, when that overgrown ruffian broke in and seized me. I wish I had him tied to a tree just for five minutes," said Tarbox, walking the room in his fury. "Big as he is I'd lash him till he bellowed for mercy."
"That would be nice, Nathan dear," said Mrs. Tarbox, complacently.
"Nice, Mrs. Tarbox!" exclaimed her husband, turning the vials of his anger upon her; "we might have done it, too, if you had had the courage to come out and stand by your husband. You could have seized him from behind, while I gave him a lashing. Instead of that you were standing at the window smirking in your foolish way, I've no doubt. A pretty wife you are!"
"O Nathan, I am sure you don't know what you are saying. You forget I am a weak, delicate woman."
Though Mrs. Tarbox was tall, strong, gaunt and bony, she was accustomed to consider herself delicate. It was fortunate that she was not so, and that she was not particularly sensitive, or the brutal temper of her husband would have worn upon her more than it did. She was fortunate in being a silly woman. It saved her much mental suffering.