e married over the broomstick? Come an' behave yerself like a
decent woman. What'd Father Dumphy say to _this_, think yuh?"

"He's a man. I know what he'd say. He'd tell me to go back to Cregan.
I'll niver go back. Niver!"

"Yuh won't! What'll yuh do, then? Where'll yuh go to?"

"I'll niver go back. Niver! He's broke me best chiny--an' kicked the leg
off the chair--an' overtoorned the table--an' ordered me out o' the
little bit o' home I been all these years puttin' together. The teapot
th' ol' man brought from Ireland--the very teapot--smashed to
smithereens! An' the little white dishes with the gilt trimmin's I had
to me weddin' day, Mrs. Byrne! There was the poor things all broke to
bits!" She stopped to point at the sidewalk, as if the wreckage lay
there before her. "All me little bit o' chiny. All of it. All of it,
Mrs. Byrne. Ev'ry bit! Boorsted!"

Her tears choked her. She could not express the piercing irreparability
of the injury. It would not have been so bad if he had beaten her; a
hurt will heal. But the innocent, wee cups--and the fat old brown
teapot--and the sweet little chair with its pretty legs, carved and
turned so daintily! She had washed them and wiped them, and dusted and
polished them, and been so careful of them and felt so proud of them,
for twenty years past. And, now, there they were lying, all in
bits--past mending--gone forever. And they so pretty and so harmless.

The crash as they fell on the floor had sounded in her ears like the
scream of a child murdered.

She started forward again, determinedly. "I'll niver go back to 'm. He
can have his house to himsilf.... What do I care for Father Dumphy? He
wants nothin' but the dime I leaves at the choorch doore, an' the dime I
drops on the plate! Whin me poorse's impty, he'll not bother his head
about me!"

"Shame _on_ yuh!" Mrs. Byrne wheezed, with her eye on the house she was
passing. "Yuh talk no better than a Prod'stunt."

"An' if I _was_ a Prod'stint," she cried, "I'd not have to pay money
iv'ry time I wanted to hear mass. I'd not be out on the street here, not
knowin' where I'm goin' to, ner how I'm to live. It's _thim_ that knows
how to take care o' their own--givin' the women worrk, an' takin' the
childer off to the farrms, an' all the like o' that. You Dogans----"

Mrs. Byrne glanced about her fearfully, "Stop yer talk, now. Stop yer
talk. Stop it before someone hears yuh makin' a big fool o' yerself."

"I'll not stop it. What