The head, with its grey hair parted down the
centre, is well-shaped; the forlorn-looking eyes are a pale-blue, like
faded forget-me-nots; the thin, flexible nose, which is always moist,
and the long, firm chin incline towards the formation known as the
nut-cracker. But for her abbreviated trunk, and those few pathetic
inches of twisted leg--chiefly feet--she might have passed for a
matronly-looking and rather handsome old harridan, half Scotch and half
Irish.
"What with the cat," she says, and then, letting her voice run up to a
screech, she proceeds furiously, "and that devil of a woman downstairs!
Oh! she's a wicked woman, she is, a _wicked_ woman, a _very_ wicked
woman; she's got some of my things because I'm behind-hand in my rent,
and she says she won't give them up; but she _shall_. I'll see that she
do. Ah! I'll have the law on her--the nasty, swearing, beastly--Oh!
she's a _wicked_ woman."
* * * * *
Think of the majesty of the English law which enables this pathetic yard
of twisted womanhood to hold her own in a foul court against "a wicked
woman" with arms like a bluejacket! But Miss Stipps is used to fighting
her own battles. When children yell after her, "Old Goody Witch!" she
swings about and takes her stick to them, pouring out such a flow of
imprecation upon their young heads that they run away in a panic of
alarm.
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