"Why not? If they knew at the office, they'd simply talk--unpleasantly."

"Yes," she admitted hesitatingly after reflecting. "So you mustn't come
again. I don't like some kinds of secrets."

"But your father will know," he urged. "Isn't that enough for--for
propriety?"

"I can't explain. I don't understand, myself. I do a lot of things by
instinct." She, standing with her hands behind her back and with clear,
childlike eyes gravely upon him, looked puzzled but resolved. "And my
instinct tells me not to do anything secret about you."

This answer made him wonder whether after all he might not be too
positive in his derisive disbelief in women's instincts. He laughed.
"Well--now for your father."

The workshop proved to be an annex to the rear, reached by a passage
leading past a cosy little dining room and a kitchen where the order and
the shine of cleanness were notable even to masculine eyes. "You are
well taken care of," he said to her--she was preceding him to show the
way.

"We take care of ourselves," replied she. "I get breakfast before I
leave and supper after I come home. Father has a cold lunch in the
middle of the day, when he eats at all--which isn't often. And on
Saturday afternoons and Sundays I do the heavy work."

"You _are_ a busy lady!"