He opened a little gate into the central stall and pushed his way between two cows. When Flo followed they seemed both to lean on her, and for an instant she was afraid. As she escaped a tail slashed her neck. The unexpected touch of the coarse hair made her flinch; then she laughed, relieved.
“Do they sleep here?” she asked, looking at the sodden sawdust.
“Yes.”
“I—I thought they had straw.”
“They do, when we have any; we’ve run out,” and he marched on as if there was nothing in sleeping on a brick floor. Flo wondered if it was something that the cruelty people ought to be told about, only somehow she could not think that the farmer would deliberately wrong the cows.
“You never know,” he said partly to himself. “You conna look at ’em too often.” Flo wondered what he meant, but she did not like to ask. He latched the lower door, but left the tipper part open carefully halfway.
“Bin ta Moss for him?” demanded Mrs. Nadin tartly the moment they got in.
“She mun come out milking wi’ me tomorrow mornin’,” said the farmer slowly, but with a certain finality.
“You’d best stay in an’ help me then,” his wife retorted. “A fine kettle o’ fish you’d make on it.”
He seemed not to hear. Clem had a
“It’s in th’ oven,” said Mrs. Nadin scarcely interrupting her eating. “If you conna come, you mun look after yoursel’s; it’s non a boarding-house.”
Flo got out for the pair of them. As after the early morning porridge neither of the sons moved till Mr. Nadin finished, and at once got up and half-filled a bucket with steaming water from the sink.
“Dunna be taking all that,” Mrs. Nadin warned, getting up briskly.
After that Flo was never given a moment’s rest. It was what Mrs. Nadin called “Upstairs morning”. To Flo it seemed like a spring-cleaning, for everything had to be lifted out, the carpets taken up and beaten; and finally all the furniture had to be polished as if it had never been polished before, though it was as bright as glass.
“Wearing ourselves out,” said Dot. “I wish you’d some sense, Ma.”
“Mucky house, mucky mind,” retorted the little woman, working with energy that never flagged. “A fine midden-hole you’ll have if there’s any fool as’ll give you chance.”
Then Flo peeled potatoes. Not till afternoon did she get a minute alone. Just before three Mrs. Nadin unexpectedly explained that she always took a “two-three minutes shut-eye; when you get to be an old hen like me you’ll find as you con do wi’ it”, and off she stumped upstairs as vigorously as she had set off in the morning to the cleaning. Flo was apprehensive of what would happen while Dot had charge, but almost at once Dot went up the passage, too, and then the house went quiet and still, except for the tick-tock of the grandfather in the corner. It was such a lazy tick-tock that Flo wondered whether the clock were forgetfully taking a snooze also and getting terribly slow. Certainly it seemed a long time since she first came downstairs; a long day. She idled a little over the washing-up, stirring the grease slowly round without thinking of it. She tried to imagine what her mother would be doing; the time when they said “Good-bye” seemed a much longer way back than the day before.
The silence made her nervous all at once whether Mrs. Nadin might be listening, so she clashed two plates together and began to wipe. Then a timid mew made her look down. The grey barred cat purred and lifted its tail vertically all except two inches at the tip and rubbed its flank against her leg. She selected three pieces of mutton gristle and the cat’s purr became louder, almost like the sound of sawing. She stooped and played her finger-tips in the fur of the animal’s crown. When she stood to the sink again she was surprised to see a strange float entering the yard. The driver was young with very prominent cheek-bones and very light cream hair very short and upright. He walked briskly up the path, and after the least knock lifted the latch and stood square in the kitchen doorway.
“Clem about?”
“I—I don’t know,” said Flo, staring.
“He’s got a cawfe; said he’d have it ready,” the newcomer explained without any sign of being put out. “You’re new here, aren’t you? Are you from round about?”
“No.”
“I thought not; I reckon to know pretty well everybody hereabouts . . . an’ there’s non many as don’t know Jack Knight.” He smiled, showing big regular teeth. “I wonder if he’s left it somewhere.”
“I can look,” said Flo, hesitant, then going towards the door.
He moved out and waited just outside. She noticed that he had clogged boots. He was no taller than she was, but he walked in almost a military way, with short quick steps.
“What did you say it was?”
“A calf . . . bull; roan, I think.”
“Oh,” muttered Flo. “That wasn’t what you said.”