the crooked stitches in the quilt, and the dead bird. They piece together a very unhappy life for the young girl. Minnie loved to sing but her song had been stifled, just like her canary. Her husband would not put in a telephone for her, preferring to keep her isolated and trapped. Her husband was a man capable of violence (as demonstrated by the wrung neck of the bird), but mostly he was just an insensitive, selfish, and rather brutish man who was unconcerned about Minnie's feelings, wishes, or desires. None of these bits of evidence in the house is particularly disputable, and the women's observations about Minnie complete the picture.

The women conclude that Minnie did kill her husband, which may be the same conclusion the men will eventually draw; the difference is that the women will understand what prompted her to do it. The fact that they choose to hide some of the evidence to protect Minnie (knowing that male authorities and a male jury would never empathize or understand Minnie's motives) is the only thing that makes us suspect Mrs. Hale's reliability. In every other area we trust her.

When she says that the men discount women's opinions, we know she is right because we hear them say such patronizing and dismissive things as this: 

"Well, women are used to worrying over trifles.... And yet, for all their worries, what would we do without the ladies?"

When she suggests that the men do not understand what they see, we hear it in their conversation. For example, when the county attorney disparages Minnie's housekeeping, he assumes it is because she is a slovenly housekeeper:

"Dirty towels! [Kicks his foot against the pans under the sink.] Not much of a housekeeper, would you say, ladies?"

Mrs. Hale looks at the same evidence and sees it this way:

"Those towels get dirty awful quick. Men's hands aren't always as clean as they might be." 

Clearly Mrs. Hale is reliable in that she sees everything--and more--that the men see. The difference is her interpretation of the facts. Though she certainly has a bias toward Minnie and her unfortunate circumstances, Mrs. Hale faithfully reports to us what she sees, though of course she does not share everything she learns and knows with the authorities. 

This is a fascinating question to consider. On the one hand, it appears that there is no obvious reason for Mrs. Hale to be unreliable in the information that she supplies about Minnie Wright. She doesn't appear to be a deceitful character, and she gives the impression of being a well-thought-of member of her society. However, as the play develops, it is possible to see that her impression of Minnie Wright and also of what happened in this house concerning the murder of John Wright is shaped by her own personal guilt for not having visited Minnie Wright for so long. Note what she says in the following quote:

Oh, I wish I'd come over here once in a while! That was a crime! That was a crime! Who's going to punish that!

Note the emphasis that is implied through the italicised word "wish" and also the repetition of the exclamatory phrase, "That was a crime!" It could be argued that this quote reveals a possible area of bias in Mrs. Hale. She feels so guilty about her own failings in not visiting her former friend and abandoning her to a marriage that she suspected would be very hard for Minnie, and now this shapes the information she gives Mrs. Peters about both John Wright and Minnie Wright. It is therefore possible to argue that Mrs. Hale's account is shaped more by her own feelings of regret and guilt than by any objective reality.