I raked, handling the rake with ease and rhythm; I scarcely realized who walked just in front of me, or that the two shirt-sleeved figures—one with an absurdly slim waist!—were Captain Holiday and Colonel Fielding.
Steadily the storm was coming up, but steadily we worked.
"We shall do it!" declared little Mrs. Price, as she passed me once, "we shall have time for tea and all!"
Presently, as I raked in front of the road-gate, I saw our organizing secretary fling herself off her bicycle and run up.
"Mrs. Price!" she called. "What can I do to help?"
"Cut bread and butter if you like!" laughed the farmer's wife. "It's tea-time, and we've earned it! I'm just going to bring out a white cloth and two big loaves, and a huge bowl of butter, and the kettle, and tea in bags! Yes, come on!"
Twenty minutes later the last load of hay was carried. The haymakers sat down on the grass in the corner of the field to feast their achievement, farmfolk groups and little clusters, friends, families together. Mr. Price seated himself in triumph on the cutter, waving a cup at the threatening purple skies.
"We've done it!" he cried. "We have, indeed!"
I had cast myself down in the nearest shady patch, had thrown off my hat, and dried my streaming forehead. Life was extraordinarily good at that moment; I felt it surging in fulness through every vein. I was heated and spent for the instant; but how happy! Work is an anodyne; but it must be the right kind of work. This had been splendid. I'd forgotten everything else!
I stuffed my handkerchief into my sleeve, and came to myself to find that in my shady corner I was one of a group of four.