Overlaying the flush of rose in her cheeks, seen only when she stood against the sunlight, was a faint sheen of down, a lustrous floss, delicate as the pollen of a flower, or the impalpable powder of a moth's wing.She was moving to and fro about her work, alert, joyous, robust; and from all the fine, full amplitude of her figure, from her thick white neck, sloping downward to her shoulders, from the deep, feminine swell of her breast, the vigorous maturity of her hips, there was disengaged a vibrant note of gayety, of exuberant animal life, sane, honest, strong.She wore a skirt of plain blue calico and a shirtwaist of pink linen, clean, trim; while her sleeves turned back to her shoulders, showed her large, white arms, wet with milk, redolent and fragrant with milk, glowing and resplendent in the early morning light.
On the threshold, Annixter took off his hat.
"Good morning, Miss Hilma."
Hilma, who had set down the copper can on top of the vat, turned about quickly.
"Oh, GOOD morning, sir;" and, unconsciously, she made a little gesture of salutation with her hand, raising it part way toward her head, as a man would have done.
"Well," began Annixter vaguely, "how are you getting along down here?""Oh, very fine.To-day, there is not so much to do.We drew the whey hours ago, and now we are just done putting the curd to press.I have been cleaning.See my pans.Wouldn't they do for mirrors, sir? And the copper things.I have scrubbed and scrubbed.Oh, you can look into the tiniest corners, everywhere, you won't find so much as the littlest speck of dirt or grease.
I love CLEAN things, and this room is my own particular place.
Here I can do just as I please, and that is, to keep the cement floor, and the vats, and the churns and the separators, and especially the cans and coppers, clean; clean, and to see that the milk is pure, oh, so that a little baby could drink it; and to have the air always sweet, and the sun--oh, lots and lots of sun, morning, noon and afternoon, so that everything shines.You know, I never see the sun set that it don't make me a little sad;yes, always, just a little.Isn't it funny? I should want it to be day all the time.And when the day is gloomy and dark, I am just as sad as if a very good friend of mine had left me.Would you believe it? Just until within a few years, when I was a big girl, sixteen and over, mamma had to sit by my bed every night before I could go to sleep.I was afraid in the dark.Sometimes I am now.Just imagine, and now I am nineteen--a young lady.""You were, hey?" observed Annixter, for the sake of saying something."Afraid in the dark? What of--ghosts?""N-no; I don't know what.I wanted the light, I wanted----" She drew a deep breath, turning towards the window and spreading her pink finger-tips to the light."Oh, the SUN.I love the sun.
See, put your hand there--here on the top of the vat--like that.
Isn't it warm? Isn't it fine? And don't you love to see it coming in like that through the windows, floods of it; and all the little dust in it shining? Where there is lots of sunlight, I think the people must be very good.It's only wicked people that love the dark.And the wicked things are always done and planned in the dark, I think.Perhaps, too, that's why I hate things that are mysterious--things that I can't see, that happen in the dark." She wrinkled her nose with a little expression of aversion."I hate a mystery.Maybe that's why I am afraid in the dark--or was.I shouldn't like to think that anything could happen around me that I couldn't see or understand or explain."She ran on from subject to subject, positively garrulous, talking in her low-pitched voice of velvety huskiness for the mere enjoyment of putting her ideas into speech, innocently assuming that they were quite as interesting to others as to herself.She was yet a great child, ignoring the fact that she had ever grown up, taking a child's interest in her immediate surroundings, direct, straightforward, plain.While speaking, she continued about her work, rinsing out the cans with a mixture of hot water and soda, scouring them bright, and piling them in the sunlight on top of the vat.
Obliquely, and from between his narrowed lids, Annixter scrutinised her from time to time, more and more won over by her adorable freshness, her clean, fine youth.The clumsiness that he usually experienced in the presence of women was wearing off.
Hilma Tree's direct simplicity put him at his ease.He began to wonder if he dared to kiss Hilma, and if he did dare, how she would take it.A spark of suspicion flickered up in his mind.
Did not her manner imply, vaguely, an invitation? One never could tell with feemales.That was why she was talking so much, no doubt, holding him there, affording the opportunity.Aha!
She had best look out, or he would take her at her word.
"Oh, I had forgotten," suddenly exclaimed Hilma, "the very thing I wanted to show you--the new press.You remember I asked for one last month? This is it.See, this is how it works.Here is where the curds go; look.And this cover is screwed down like this, and then you work the lever this way." She grasped the lever in both hands, throwing her weight upon it, her smooth, bare arm swelling round and firm with the effort, one slim foot, in its low shoe set off with the bright, steel buckle, braced against the wall.
"My, but that takes strength," she panted, looking up at him and smiling."But isn't it a fine press? Just what we needed.""And," Annixter cleared his throat, "and where do you keep the cheeses and the butter?" He thought it very likely that these were in the cellar of the dairy.
