"Well, you don't have to stand and talk like I
warrant you do. There's something deep about her
look."

"I've taken care of myself for some years, and
I guess I can keep on."

"You can if you want to go to ruin, like you were
when I married you, and you only had one shirt to
your name."

"Throw it up to me. It's no wonder a man
drinks here, he's got more to forget than to think
about." He stepped from the porch, preparing to
leave.

"Wait!" she commanded; "I'll put up with being
left, and having you drink all night with the
beasts, and fooling my money away, but," her voice
rose and her eyes burned over dark shadows, "I
won't put up with another woman, I won't put up
with that thin thing making over my husband. I
won't! I won't!, do you understand that... I -- I
can't."

He went around the corner of the house with her
last words ringing in his ears, kicking angrily at the
rough sod. His house, between Mrs. Caley's glum
silence and Lettice's ceaseless complaining, was becoming
uninhabitable. And, as Rutherford Berry
had pointed out, the latter would only increase,
sharpen, with the years. Lettice was a good wife,
she was not like Nickles' old woman, worthless but

[[236]]

p235 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p236w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p237

v?