parted as if to smile at the first provocation. On either side of her
temples a short brown curl had rebelled and was kissing her cheek.
The sparkle in her eyes told of capacity to enjoy life. Behind her a
coil of smoke rose from the deck-house chimney. She had left the midday
meal she was cooking, and ought to be back looking after it.
Instead, she lingered and looked upon the three men at work below.

Two of them were old, round-shouldered with labour, their necks burnt
brown with stooping in the sun. The third was a young giant--tall,
fair, and straight--with yellowish hair that curled up tightly at the
back of his head, and lumbar muscles that swelled and sank in a pretty
rhythm as he pitched his ballast and sang--

"There goes nine.
Nine there is gone . . ."

It was upon this man that the woman gazed as she lingered.
His shirt-collar was cut low at the back, and his freckled neck was
shining with sweat. She wanted him to look up, and yet she was afraid
of his looking up. She wondered if he were married--"at his age," she
phrased it to herself--and, if so, what manner of wife he had. She told
herself after a while that she really dreaded extremely being caught
observing these three labourers; that she hated even in seeming to lose
dignity. And still she bent and heard the song to the twentieth and
last verse.

The young giant, when the spell was over, leant on his shovel for a
moment and then reached out a hand for the cider-keg. One of his
comrades passed it to him. He wiped the orifice, tilted his head back
and drank as a man drinks at midday after a long morning. Some of the