and I looked over the other eight or ten women and
catalogued them at once as Mrs. Laney's type, and suddenly I decided
to give myself a treat. I reached calmly over and selected a handful
of sandwiches and cakes and gave them to the youngsters and sent them
up to the nursery, and then, my dears, with what solid satisfaction
you cannot possibly guess, I told my mistress exactly what I thought
of her. She was aghast and scared; she thought I was a maniac, a
desperate fanatic.

"Edna, Edna," she gasped, "be quiet! My guests--these ladies----"

"Ladies! _Ladies!_" I pounced on it. "Do you know what 'ladies'
means? Of course you don't,--you're much too ignorant. It
means--'loaf-givers', providers, dispensers of bounty, care-takers,
home-makers. You--all of you--with your lazy, thick bodies trussed
into your straight fronts and your fat feet crammed into bursting
pumps and your idle hands blazing with jewels" (I know I was
bromidic there, but my Phillipic was too swift to be polished) "and
your empty heads dyed and marcelled, you're not loaf-givers,--you're
not givers at all, you're takers! You're loafers--cumberers of the
earth--fat slugs, that's what you are, each and every one of you!
_You_"--I pointed to Mrs. Laney--"you don't even see that your
children are properly fed! You don't make home livable, let alone
lovable for your husband, and at this moment"--I swept the feast
with a fierce and baleful eye--"you're a thief!"

She shrieked at that and all the women got to their feet. It was as
if I'd thrown a bomb--and I daresay they thought I might at any
instant.

"A thief," I said, "takes what doesn't belong to him, and this
doesn't belong to you! You're deep in debts,--bills that your poor,
harassed husband cannot pay!"--and before she could emit the furious
words on her lips--"Oh, no, you're not going to discharge me! You
can't, for I've left already! I wouldn't stay another night in your
wretched house, I wouldn't eat another of your wretched meals. You
may keep my week's wage. I wish you'd buy the children beefsteak with
it but I've no doubt it will go for cocktails and henna!"

Then, while they gasped and jibbered with rage and got behind each
other and shook in their bulging pumps, I turned on my heel and made
a stunning exit, gathered up my belongings and came away.