That cobblin' o' yours--that ain't worth a damn. I ain't much good no more an' you ain't. That's a fact. I don't excep' myself at all. An' if people like us don't go an' get somethin' they c'n fall back on, they got to go beggin' in the end anyhow. You c'n kick against that all you want to. FIELITZ It's a queer thing about you, mother. It's just like as if the devil hisself got a hold o' you. First it just sort o' peeps up, an' God knows where it comes from. Sometimes it's there an' sometimes it's gone. An' then it'll come back again sudden like an' then it gets hold o' you an' don't let you go no more. I've known some tough customers in my time, mother, but when you gets took that way--then I tell you, you makes the cold shivers run down my back. MRS. FIELITZ [_Has taken out her notebook again and become absorbed in it._] What did you think about all this? We're insured here for seven thousand. FIELITZ What I thought? I didn't think nothin'. MRS. FIELITZ Well, there ain't any value to this place excep' what's in the lot itself. FIELITZ [_Gets up and puts on his coat._] You just leave me alone, y'understand? MRS. FIELITZ Well, ain't it true? You just stop your foolin'. I seen that long ago, before we was ever married. Schmarowski told me that ten times over, that this here is the proper place for a big house. An' anybody as has any sense c'n see that it's so. Now just look for yourself: over there, that's the drug shop! An' a bit across the way to the left is the post office. An' then a little ways on is the baker an' he's built hisself a nice new shop. Four noo villas has gone up and if, some day, we gets the tramway out here--we'll be right in the midst o' things. FIELITZ [_About to go._] Good evenin'. MRS. FIELITZ Are you goin' out this time o' day? FIELITZ Yes, 'cause I can't stand that no more.--If I'd known the kind of a crittur you are ... only I didn't know nothin' about it ... I'd ha' thought this here marryin' over a good bit--yes, a good bit. MRS. FIELITZ You? Is that what you'd ha' thought over, eh? FIELITZ Is I goin' to let myself be put up to things like that?... MRS. FIELITZ A whole lot o' thinkin' over you'd ha' done! You ain't done any thinkin' all the days o' your life. A great donkey like you ... an' thinkin'. Well! A fine mess would come of it if you took to thinkin'. FIELITZ Mother, I axes you to consider that ... MRS. FIELITZ Put you up? To what? What is I puttin' you up to?--This here old shed is goin' to burn down sometime. It's goin' to burn down one time or 'nother, if it don't first come topplin' down over our heads. It's squeezed in here between the other houses in a way to make a person feel ashamed, if he looks at it. FIELITZ Mother, I axes you to consider ... MRS. FIELITZ Aw, I wish you'd clear out o' the front door this minute! I'm goin' to pack up my things pretty soon too. An' you c'n go over to the justice for all I care. I been puttin' you up to things, you know! FIELITZ