MRS. O'FLAHERTY AND
LIZZ
27
her arms as she walked, holding her nose in the air. "Just do that,"
she said, again sitting down. "Walk by him like you didn't know him
from Adam. Pass him by like he wasn't even there. And after you get
by him, turn around and spit on the sidewalk where he walked.
That's the way to fix the likes of him."
"His end will be a bad one, burning in Hell. Evil comes to him
who evil does," Mrs. O'Flaherty said.
Lizz went to the wood stove, and returned with a pot of tea.
"You need some fresh tea in your cup, Mother," she said, filling
both cups. She returned the pot to the stove. Turning around from it,
she said, "And so, Peg got the air from him!"
"There she is at home now, walking the floor, wringing her
hands, crying her eyes out. She says she's nervous. She is in a pig's
backside!" Mrs. O'Flaherty said, while Lizz again sat down.
"Mother," Lizz said leaning f~rward with an insinuatingly in-
timate and confidential manner. "Mother, when she starts bellyaching
about nerves, don't listen to her. If ~he had to work like I did, like
you had, the way your mother did, she wouldn't have time to have
nerves. She and her lady like nerves1" Lizz put her hands on her lips,
smirked, swung her soulders from side to side. "Nerves! She makes
me laugh with her nerves."
"She does be walking up and down the house, pale as a ghost,
like a ghost," Mrs. O'Flaherty said.
"Let her! It'll do her good. Let her pay for her sins. If she had
little ones like I have, she wouldn't have time to be having nerves.
You never had time for nerves when you were bringing us all up, did
you, Mother?"
"Sure in the old country, we wouldn't be having nerves," Mrs.
O'Flaherty said, and then, she took a sip of tea.
"The airs she puts on! Who is she? What is she? Mother even
if she is my own sister, even if she is your daughter, she's a hussy.
That's what she is. A hussy! A dirty hussy! Her and her nerves!
When my Jim hears speak of her nerves, he always says that a good
crack in her behind, and she wouldn't go on bellyachin' that she has
nerves," Lizz said.
"There she is, pale as a ghost, walking up and down the house,
smoking cigarette after cigarette," Mrs. O'Flaherty said.
"If she was as poor as I am, she couldn't afford to be smoking
cigarettes like a hussy," Lizz said.
"I never saw the beat of her, 'pon my soul, I never did. In the
old country, we never saw such carrying-ons, the like of which she
doesbe doing," the mother said.
"Mother, you should have married her off to a good man when
shewas a girl the way you married me off," Lizz said.
