human
Calloway was pretty near to being a gentleman--not a born one, like your papa, dearie, but real genteel in his instincts, and he did a whole lot to make a lady of me. He always insisted on us having the best of everything, company especially. When he knew he had to die, poor boy! --her lips trembled--
gpt
And so you came here?
human
Yes. I'd always liked the place. It seemed sort of friendly and homelike, and it's small enough so that your money counts for something. It wouldn't be lost, I thought, like in New York or Chicago--But I was kind of lonesome at first--always been used to having a man around--and I didn't know anybody. And then your mama died, and I saw my way clear. You didn't know I knew your mama, did you, dearie?
gpt
Well, I did. Not to speak to, of course. But I used to watch her out of my back windows, and think what a lady she was to be so poor, and wished I knew how to scrape acquaintance with her. And once she caught me watching her, and smiled up, just as sweet, as if she'd known me always and liked me. (Sort of the way _you_ smile, dearie, when you're real pleased.)--And when she died the idea came to me, all of a sudden, that I was the person to look after them she'd left.
human
Oh, Gawd! Think of where I'd got to, and look where I'm at now!
gpt
Lightfoot Ef, as they called her, struggling to better her condition, sturdily trying to find some tenable place of her own in life, even as she, Joan, was trying--but under what hopeless handicaps! She thought of the cocaine-drugged mother with ambitions; of the evil, treacherous creature with whom the child had chosen to
human
But I heard you tell my father you had buried two husbands! she said sharply.
gpt
If you really felt that you were 'good as any of them,' that--that you had practically been married--why didn't you make a clean breast of it all?
human
Because I'm no fool! gulped Effie May.
gpt
There are some things a man won't stand for--though God knows why _they_ should be so all-fired particular! And it seemed the only chance I'd ever get to marry a real gentleman. Besides, there was you.
human
Me?
gpt
Why, yes, dearie. I'd never had any children, and I always thought if I could have I'd like 'em all to be girls, that I could dress up, and do for, and bring up nice.... Oh, Gawd, Gawd! she moaned, suddenly flinging herself across the bed, face down.
human
Here I am in a grand house, with a limousine, and servants of my own, and a husband like a king, and a young lady daughter in society, and me giving parties to the pick of the land!... And now to go down again, back to the gutter!