“Bet you she’s been up to something. ’Eard of any fires down your way, Jack?”
“No. Think she’s one of them dirty militant sneaks?”
“I wouldn’t mind bettin’ you that’s what she is. Dirty, low-down game they’re playing. I’ve a good mind to follow her up, and tip a copper the wink.”
But the speaker remained to talk and to drink another cup of mahogany-coloured tea.
“That’s just it. These suffragette women ain’t got no notion of sport. Suppose they belong to the sort as scratches and throws lamps.”
The coffee-stall keeper interjected a question.
“What about the chaps who burnt ricks and haystacks before the Reform Bill, and the chaps who smashed machines when they first put ’em into factories?”
“Well, they burnt and broke, but they did it like men.”
“Women ain’t in the same situation.”
“Ain’t they? They can make ’emselves ’eard. Do yer think my ol’ woman goes about the ’ouse like a bleatin’ lamb? Garn, these militants are made all wrong inside. Fine sort of cause you’ve got when yer go sneakin’ about at three in the mornin’, settin’ empty ’ouses alight. That’s ’eroic, ain’t it?”