The street was covered with slimy mud. It oozed out from under Bernice's
rubbers in unpleasant bubbles until it seemed to her as if she must kill
herself. Hot air coming out from a steam laundry. Hot, stifling air.
Bernice didn't work in the laundry but she wished that she did so that
the hot air would kill her. She wanted to be stifled. She needed torture
to be happy. She also needed a good swift clout on the side of the face.
A drunken man lurched out from a door-way and flung his arms about her.
It was only her husband. She loved her husband. She loved him so much
that, as she pushed him away and into the gutter, she stuck her little
finger into his eye. She also untied his neck-tie. It was a bow
neck-tie, with white, dirty spots on it and it was wet with gin. It
didn't seem as if Bernice could stand it any longer. All the repressions
of nineteen sordid years behind protruding teeth surged through her
untidy soul. She wanted love. But it was not her husband that she loved
so fiercely. It was old Grandfather Twilly. And he was too dead.