"Of all people! I just knew something nice was going to happen to-day." Hilda trilled with a gay laugh, for Anne rarely came in the morning, and Hilda adored all-day visits.
"You were going out, mamma."
"Not any place I had to. I just couldn't stay in alone to-day." They went upstairs hand in hand.
"I thought, perhaps, we might finish that gingham. The idea of it's hanging round half done has gotten on my nerves."
"Never felt more like sewing. A nice long day ahead always seems to have so much more time in it than the same number of hours chopped up during the week. You ought to be glad Roger doesn't come home to lunch, Anne. When I was working at Belle's baby clothes it seemed to me as soon as I got started it was time to stop and fix lunch. I'll just put these dishes out of the way and we'll get right at it."
She took off her things, carried the unwashed breakfast dishes into the pantry and closed the door on them. The broken egg-shell and scraps of toast on the stove she swept into the coal-scuttle, the crumbs from the oilcloth-covered breakfast table followed, and the scuttle was deposited on the back porch. While she rolled the sewing-machine in from the hall, Anne swept the floor.
"This is nice." Hilda's eyes danced; even the gray curls on her neck seemed to bob merrily. "Now, if you'll just slip off your dress, I'll fit it."
When it was pinned to the right length, Hilda leaned back on her heels and admired.
"That's a fine pattern. Wonderful how they get things regulated now—no riding up in front as you get bigger. Why, you won't scarcely show in that at all, right up to the end."
Anne felt the same touch of distaste she always did when her mother referred to her physical condition. There was something in Hilda's manner that stripped the miracle to its physiological basis, and, although she tried not to, Anne always felt naked before it. She had endured a really difficult half-hour when she had first told Hilda of Roger Mitchell Barton.