i f6c06dd9cf3fe221 Unknown (pride and prejudice read .TXT) 📖

own, was a group of women, who were gesticulating and pointing towards them. There was no doubt in Kate's mind that they were bent on further destruction.

"Get away, Jessie, as quickly as you can! Look, there's a tram coming; you'll just get it!"

"I can't go on the tram like this, Kate," gasped Jessie, desperately;

"I'll walk."

"You must get the tram," said Kate.

"The way they are feeling, some of them would likely follow you to the docks. Surely you know them by now."

A stone hurtled past them, and Kate pulled Annie dose to her. It decided Jessie. Sobbing afresh, she took to her heels and ran, boarding the tram just as the women came up with Kate, frustration and hate predominant in all their faces. They paused a moment, breathless, watching the tram roll away.

"Yer wanter give that' un a wide berth," said one of them, turning to Kate, "she's a real wrong 'un."

"I'm surprised you speak to her, filthy bitch that she is," said another, hitching up her enormous breasts with her forearms.

"She's shameless, bloody well shameless. If I'd got me hands into her hair instead of grabbing that hat I'd have let her see, the!"

Kate looked at the last speaker coldly, an anger that was only stirred by injustice rising in her. How dare this woman whom she had known from childhood, and who had always shocked her with her obscenities, in spite of having been brought up under the specialised language of Tim!

How dare she, who delighted in exchanging the filth of her mind with any man so interested, appoint herself judge of another woman!

She was feared, and consequently fawned upon by most of her associates;

she was Kate's idea of corruption; there was no tempering of judgement here, Mrs. Luck was bad! Her mind was a sewer; she could defile by a look. She had eleven children alive, which made Kate shudder at the productive power of evil. Kate's distaste and anger showed clearly in her face as she looked at the- little crowd before her, and it wasn't lost on them. There was a moment of hostile silence as they stared back at her and the child, pressed dose to her side. A moment ago they had felt protective towards her, warning against the contamination of Jessie . but now, with her looking at them like that, and her dressed up to the knocker like a goddam queen or some such . their attitude changed . and if all the tales were true she was a damn sight as bad as that whore just gone.

"I don't think it's for you to judge Jessie Daley, it be hoves us all to mind our own business," said Kate scorn fully.

They gasped, speechless with surprise at her daring, and listened, fascinated by her tone, for Kate was unconsciously speaking to them much as Miss Tolmache would have done.

"You'll never right wrongs by the methods you are using. Can't you see you'll only make matters worse? A little kindness from one of you would have had much more effect than all your horseplay ... but then, of course," Kate's eyes swept them with disdain, "you wouldn't have enjoyed it so much."

As she stooped to pick up her case there was a murmur of, "By damn, who the hell does she thing she is?... We're coming to something now, ain't we?" but nothing really audible until she had passed through the midst of them, with Annie dinging to her hand.

She had walked a few yards ahead when the first voice reached her, which she recognised as Dorrie Clarke's:

"Birds of a feather, lasses 1' Dorrie yelled.

"Only this one picks on professional blokes; they can pay more; look at her clothes. What did I tell you?"

Kate jerked to a halt as if a bullet had struck her in the back. She had no time to think before Mrs. Luck screamed words that seemed to freeze her blood; all the hard-won beauty in her life was darkened from this moment, never to fully return to its previous brightness; her real misfortunes seemed to date from the moment Mrs. Luck shouted:

"It's coming to something ... by God it is! Who jer think yer talking to ... brazen hussy! No wonder yer baim brags in the street that the doctor is her 101 da. She gets her barefaceness from the right one, you bloody upstart you!"

All the terror Annie had known in her short life paled before this new terror. As she lifted her eyes to Kate's her heart seemed to leap from her body by way of her mouth, for she saw there something that chilled her and turned her stomach over as never Tim's look had done. Kate's face was white, and her blue eyes black and deep and full of that something that made Annie want to hide her face. But she had to go on looking up into Kate's eyes for they wouldn't let her's go. Slowly Kate turned her face away, and with it her body, and she was facing the women again.

The women were all quiet now, some a little awed at the length Nell Luck had gone, and growing uneasy. Why couldn't Nell keep her mouth shut? This Kate Hannigan wasn't Jessie Daley. Besides, having the doctor for a fancy man she was in with the toffs. Best keep dear of them, money was power; and most of the houses around here were owned by the Westoe toffs. You could be put on the street and never know 'he reason why. Well, why didn't she say something instead of standing there like that? She certainly was putting up a good bluff; but it had taken the wind out of her sails, she looked like a corpse, but not a frightened one .