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"Remember to get those overshoes while I'm having my hair done," she said. "I don't need overshoes," said Mitty. She put her mirror back into her bag. "We've been all through that," she said, getting out of the car. "You're not a young man any longer." He raced the engine a little. "Why don't you wear your gloves? Have you lost your gloves?"
Mrs. Mitty tells Mitty what to do and what to wear, despite Mitty’s meek objections. Mrs. Mitty dominates Mitty in the same way that a mother might treat a child. The two have already discussed the overshoes, and Mrs. Mitty’s will has prevailed. To ensure compliance, she reminds him of his age. A younger man might go without gloves, but he, Mitty, will not, since he is middle-aged and under her thumb. She ignores his minor act of rebellion, revving the car’s engine, pivoting the conversation to another point of contention between them, his gloves. She wants him to wear his gloves, and assumes that since he does not, he must have lost them.
Pandemonium broke loose in the courtroom. A woman's scream rose above the bedlam and suddenly a lovely, dark-haired girl was in Walter Mitty's arms. The District Attorney struck at her savagely. Without rising from his chair, Mitty let the man have it on the point of the chin. "You miserable cur!"
In Mitty’s courtroom fantasy, women are minor characters, there only to reinforce Mitty’s manhood. One woman is reduced to just a disembodied scream. The “lovely, dark-haired girl” is his damsel in distress. In a show of traditional male dominance, Mitty and the District Attorney fight over her. The District Attorney strikes her “savagely,” while Mitty defends her safety and honor. In his fantasy, Mitty takes on the traditional male role as protector of women, a role he cannot occupy in real life.
