The cobbler shook his head and retired.
Then there came slowly down the street, carrying a basket with vegetables, a young woman of five-and-twenty, and she stopped in front of the forge, and said softly, ‘Poor Tom! I heard her this morning.’
Tom looked up and shook his head. His eyes, which were soft and gentle, were full of tears.
And then ... then ... the wife rushed upon the scene. Her eyes were red, her lips were quivering, her whole frame shook with passion. For she was no longer simply in a common, vulgar, everyday rage; she was in a rage of jealousy. She seized the younger woman by the arm, dragged her into the middle of the road, and threw herself before her husband in a fine attitude. ‘Stand back!’ she cried. ‘You ... you ... Susan! He is my man, not yours—not yours.’
‘Poor fellow!’ said Susan. She was a young person with black hair and resolute eyes, and it was well known that she had regarded Tom as her sweetheart. ‘Poor fellow! It was a bad job indeed for him when he became your man.’
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
A war of words between an elderly woman, who may be taunted with her years, her jealousy, her lack of children, teeth, and comeliness, and a young woman, who may be charged with many sins, is at best a painful thing to witness, and a shameful thing to describe. Suffice it to say, that the elder lady was completely discomfited, and that long after she was extinguished, the girl continued to pour upon her the vials of her wrath. The whole village meanwhile—all the women, and such of the men as were too old for work—crowded round, taking part in the contest. Finally, the wife, stung by words whose bitterness was embittered by their truth, cried aloud, taking the bystanders to witness, that the husband for whose sake, she said, she had endured patiently the falsehoods and accusations of yonder hussy, was nothing better than a beater, a striker, a kicker, a trampler, and a cuffer of his wife.
‘I’ve borne it long,’ she cried, ‘but I will bear it no longer. To prison he shall go. If I am an old woman, and like to die, you shall never have him—do you hear? To prison he shall go, and for life.’
At these words a dead silence fell on all.
The blacksmith stood still, saying not a word, leaning on his hammer. Then his wife spoke again, but slowly.