“Finished? Naa, let’s see,” and he led back. Grasping Polly’s tail low down with his left hand he curved it up, holding it under the weight of his hand on her haunch, and reached down with his right hand. For a moment he massaged Polly’s bag, then began to draw. His hand was huge and thick, but Flo, watching intently, got only an impression of its sensitiveness; it was a caressing hand, which surprised her by the instant, strong spurt of milk it induced. “Oo’s non quite dry, you see,” he said, not unkindly. “Fetch your bucket.”
He crouched holding the bucket with his left hand. Immediately Polly had her tail free she clouted him boldly, but he took no notice. The milk rang the bucket bottom. Flo felt chagrined; evidently, she thought, she was not a born milker. But after half a dozen good draws all that the farmer got were a few drippings.
“Best part of the milk,” he told her. “Creamy. You’ve non done so bad. Oo kept that drop up a purpose.”
Flo at once felt proud once more, for there was a subtle suggestion of approval greater than the words in their simple meaning expressed. And immediately after that the farmer abandoned her as it were. He said no more but went along by the buildings and turned in at another door. After a moment or two he came out and went farther along and in at a third door. In there he stayed. Of Clem or Bert there was no sign, and Flo, standing by the big can with her empty bucket, felt that none of them cared what she did. She wondered whether she ought still to go after Bert, but she decided to go back to the house. As she approached doubtfully Mrs. Nadin seemed to bounce into the doorway.
“Where’ve you bin?” she demanded. “Did you get him?”
“No,” Flo confessed, feeling guilty. “I’ve been learning to milk.”
“Milkin’ . . . there might be nowt else but milkin’ as mattered. You were taken on ta help in th’ house. Happen he’d like me ta milk an’ all. He’d like me ta run the whole ditherin’ place, outside as well as in, I reckon.”
“I’m sorry,” Flo murmured.
“You! What are you sorry about?” demanded the irate little woman. “You’ll have enough to be sorry about ’bout being sorry for someone else’s sorrers. I’ve bin waitin’ ta show you your bedroom.”
She bustled up the flagged passage that divided the house. From near the front door a steep stairway ran backward and took them on to a narrow landing with a long window at one end. There was exceedingly shiny oilcloth carrying a miniature turkey carpet design, brilliant in crimson and blue. Along it lay a narrow strip of grey matting bordered with a red line and two thinner green lines. Just by the top of the first flight a second lot of stairs, even narrower and steeper, took them to a small square landing. A single step on the left put them into a dark room with a single window at the far side, through which Flo saw the lake. The ceiling went up to the ridge like the side of a tent. There was a double bed with a pink counter-pane, a yellow painted dressing table with drawers, and an ottoman dressed in chintz with a design of little mauve-and-orange daisies.
“You con hang your best things here,” said Mrs. Nadin, in the corner opposite to the door, drawing aside on little brass rings a length of similar chintz, disclosing a triangle board fixed into the angle of the walls. Under the board was a hook like a tiny anchor with three tines. “If there’s anythin’ else you want, dunna be feart of opening your mouth. You’ve got a tongue, havena you?”
“Yes,” said Flo meekly.
“Most folks has. The old man’ll waken you of a mornin’, so dunna think as it’s hell’s bell.”
Immediately over the bed head Flo saw an iron bell as big as a four-pound jar, with a solid iron knob nearly as big as a golf ball on the end of the clapper. The bell hung on a spring which looked as if it were made of hoop iron. It was evidently rung by a wire that came through a slot in the wall.
“My, I shall be afraid of it falling,” exclaimed Flo.
“An’ if it does it’ll give you a rare clout. It’ll waken you, any road.”
“I’m a pretty good getter up.”
“So are most of us . . . when it comes ta gettin’ upstairs for bed,” said Mrs. Nadin drily. She was still a bit short of breath from the climb. She dropped down the single step and bobbed up on the far side and turned right along a narrow landing between a blank wall on the left and a handrail to prevent anyone from falling downstairs. At the end were two doors, one on the left into a long unlighted garret under the rafters (“Rubbish dump,” said Mrs. Nadin), and the other into a surprising room more than twice as long as it was broad. It ran the whole length of the house, for there was a window at either end, and at no place was the ceiling more than nine feet high, falling away to five feet high at the other side. Had the two beds which were pushed against the wall there not had low heads they would not have gone under. The beds were ten yards apart, apparently not wishing to have anything to do with one another.