The angry landlady rehearsed our sins like a prophet foretelling doom.

We owed so many weeks' rent; we were too lazy to work; we never intended to pay; we lived on others; we deserved to be put out without warning.

She reproached my mother for having too many children; she blamed us all for coming to America.

She enumerated her losses through nonpayment of her rents; told us that she did not collect the amount of her taxes; showed us how our irregularities were driving a poor widow to ruin.
My mother did not attempt to excuse herself, but when Mrs.Hutch began to rail against my absent father, she tried to put in a word in his defence.

The landlady grew all the shriller at that, and silenced my mother impatiently.