Nettie is the black maid whom Ed hires to clean for Mrs. Morse when she gives up her former domestic life and moves to an apartment near the train station. She is not named until the final section of the story when she becomes pivotal to the plot. Nettie comes in to clean and discovers Mrs. Morse’s unconscious body. It is Nettie who summons help and she who tends to Mrs. Morse in her recovery. While Nettie saves Mrs. Morse on a literal level, her role is more ambiguous when considered symbolically. Mrs. Morse looks to Nettie as someone who might understand her suffering, and reaches out to her by asking if she ever thinks of committing suicide. Nettie declines and echoes the words of so many of Mrs. Morse’s male companions, telling her to cheer up. The story ends with Mrs. Morse toasting Nettie, whom she has bribed with a drink in order to get her to pour her one, with the false cheer of the refrain “Here’s mud in your eye.”