as clean as they might be.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Ah, loyal to your sex, I see. But you and Mrs Wright
were neighbors. I suppose you were friends, too.

MRS HALE: (_shaking her head_) I've not seen much of her of late years.
I've not been in this house--it's more than a year.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: And why was that? You didn't like her?

MRS HALE: I liked her all well enough. Farmers' wives have their hands
full, Mr Henderson. And then--

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Yes--?

MRS HALE: (_looking about_) It never seemed a very cheerful place.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: No--it's not cheerful. I shouldn't say she had the
homemaking instinct.

MRS HALE: Well, I don't know as Wright had, either.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: You mean that they didn't get on very well?

MRS HALE: No, I don't mean anything. But I don't think a place'd be any
cheerfuller for John Wright's being in it.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: I'd like to talk more of that a little later. I want to
get the lay of things upstairs now. (_He goes to the left, where three
steps lead to a stair door_.)