Salka Valka by Halldor Laxness

"Ugh, how vile he can be, that man with the burned head," said the girl from beneath the duvet, after such a long silence that her mother had begun to think she had fallen asleep. Sigurlína herself was still sitting up in her knitted petticoat, the only one of her garments that could justify her existence in this chilly world, darning their stockings, which had holes in the toes and heels. To be sure, it was only by chance that the woman had gotten a roof over their heads for the night, yet she was not particularly troubled, as a woman on her own night after night might commonly be imagined to be; no, as she darned, she smiled again and again at the stockings in her hands, and now and then, in the middle of a stitch, she laid her hands in her lap and stared dreamily into space.

"How can you think to speak in such a way about someone, Salka dear, after having said the Lord's Prayer and commending yourself to God? What do you think the blessed Savior thinks when he hears you speak like that?"