His favourite work was wood-carving. The first thing he made for her was a butter-stamper. In it he carved a mythological bird, a phoenix, something like an eagle, rising on symmetrical wings, from a circle of very beautiful flickering flames that rose upwards from the rim of the cup.
Anna thought nothing of the gift on the evening when he gave it to her. In the morning, however, when the butter was made, she fetched his seal in place of the old wooden stamper of oak-leaves and acorns. She was curiously excited to see how it would turn out. Strange, the uncouth bird moulded there, in the cup-like hollow, with curious, thick waverings running inwards from a smooth rim. She pressed another mould. Strange, to lift the stamp and see that eagle-beaked bird raising its breast to her. She loved creating it over and over again. And every time she looked, it seemed a new thing come to life. Every piece of butter became this strange, vital emblem.
She showed it to her mother and father.
“That is beautiful,” said her mother, a little light coming on to her face.
“Beautiful!” exclaimed the father, puzzled, fretted. “Why, what sort of a bird does he call it?”
And this was the question put by the customers during the next weeks.
“What sort of a bird do you call that, as you’ve got on th’ butter?”
When he came in the evening, she took him into the dairy to show him.
“Do you like it?” he asked, in his loud, vibrating voice that always sounded strange, re-echoing in the dark places of her being.
They very rarely touched each other. They liked to be alone together, near to each other, but there was still a distance between them.