The next moment, however, even her self-possession had quailed before the terrible Martha Jane that came swooping upon her. This was, in fact, the very same Martha Jane that had damaged the lady of Lame Lane. In the midst of her moral darkness a gem of pure feeling had shone for once, and now it was being tarnished by the touch of a mean hand. “It’s true as God’s Death!” she cried in a terrible voice, and swore another great oath in the next breath, one of those Tudor corruptions of God’s Name which survive in a shrivelled distortion even to-day. “If it’s proof you’re wanting,” she went on, as soon as this effort had sunk in, “they’ll repeat t’ message when you like; but to say as I’ve let wit because of yon house is a b—y lie!” “I don’t say I wasn’t set on it, though,” she added, more quietly, though with a touch of bitterness in her tone. “It meant a deal more to me than you folks think. I’d ha’ been right glad of a chance for starting afresh. But all the same I’d ha’ held my tongue if it hadn’t been for them poor children. Things was sad enough as it was without owt as might make ’em worse.” “Them’s just words—!” Emma began on a vicious burst, but the other snapped the speech at the stem. “I’ll swear it on t’ Book, if you like,” she flung at her—“ay, and a deal more!” Advancing to the table, she laid a hand on the Bible, challenging Mrs. Clapham. “If you’ll promise me what I ax, I’ll swear I’ll refuse t’ house!” For a long moment they stood facing each other without speaking, the respectable, honest-lived woman, and the graceless, immoral slattern. Across the table of scrubbed deal their two hands almost touched, Mrs. Clapham’s plump fingers bent to support her weight, and Martha Jane’s long, thin ones resting on the Book. The frizzled fringe of the one foiled the clean silver of the other’s hair; her trailing and tawdry garments flared at the other’s sober gown. At such close quarters that they almost met, each stared in the other’s face, the one ravaged but wholesome, the other fevered and flushed and hard. There seemed no point at which they could possibly have anything in common, not even a mutual language which could mean anything in their ears; and yet the spark of true feeling which burnt in the heart of the drab reached out to the same spark in the heart of the good woman. The huddle against the wall watched breathlessly, mouths open, eyes wide. Even Mrs. Tanner could not have spoken if she had wished. Emma, unnoticed, uncared-for, a-quiver from head to foot, was also held in leash by some outside power. The gods had ordained this to be Martha Jane’s special moment.