HOLROYD (_getting down from the table and putting his hand forcibly on her shoulder_) No. Come on, let's shift. CLARA (_struggling_) Hands off! [_She fetches him a sharp slap across the face. Mrs. Holroyd is heard coming downstairs. Clara, released, sits down, smoothing herself. Holroyd looks evil. He goes out to the door._ CLARA (_to Mrs. Holroyd, penitently_) I don't know what you think of us, I'm sure. MRS. HOLROYD I think nothing at all. CLARA (_bubbling_) So you fix your thoughts elsewhere, do you? (_Suddenly changing to seriousness_) No, but I _have_ been awful to-night. MRS. HOLROYD (_contralto, emphatic_) I don't want to know anything about you. I shall be glad when you'll go. CLARA Turning-out time, Laura. LAURA (_turtling_) I'm sorry, I'm sure. CLARA Never mind. But as true as I'm here, missis, I should never ha' come if I'd thought. But I had a drop--it all started with your husband sayin' he wasn't a married man. LAURA (_laughing and wiping her eyes_) I've never knowed her to go off like it--it's after the time she's had. CLARA You know, my husband was a brute to me--an' I was in bed three month after he died. He was a brute, he was. This is the first time I've been out; it's a'most the first laugh I've had for a year. LAURA It's true, what she says. We thought she'd go out of 'er mind. She never spoke a word for a fortnight. CLARA Though he's only been dead for two months, he was a brute to me. I was as nice a young girl as you could wish when I married him and went to the Fleece Inn--I was. LAURA Killed hisself drinking. An' she's that excitable, she is. We s'll 'ave an awful time with 'er to-morrow, I know. MRS. HOLROYD (_coldly_) I don't know why I should hear all this. CLARA I know I must 'ave seemed awful. An' them children--aren't they nice little things, Laura? LAURA They are that. HOLROYD (_entering from the door_) Hanna you about done theer? CLARA My word, if this is the way you treat a lady when she comes to see you. (_She rises_) HOLROYD I'll see you down th' line. CLARA You're not coming a stride with us. LAURA We've got no hat, neither of us. CLARA We've got our own hair on our heads, at any rate. (_Drawing herself up suddenly in front of Mrs. Holroyd_) An' I've been educated at a boarding school as good as anybody. I can behave myself either in the drawing-room or in the kitchen as is fitting and proper. But if you'd buried a husband like mine, you wouldn't feel you'd much left to be proud of--an' you might go off occasionally. MRS. HOLROYD I don't want to hear you. CLARA (_bobbing a curtsy_) Sorry I spoke. [_She goes out stiffly, followed by Laura._ HOLROYD (_going forward_) You mun mind th' points down th' line. CLARA'S VOICE I thank thee, Charlie--mind thy own points.