Gerald stood waiting, if perchance there might be another verse, and wondered, while waiting, at the sounds he heard in the room, easy to recognize, but difficult to explain. When it seemed certain that the music was at an end, he, after hesitating for some minutes longer, gently tapped.
“Oh, come in!” was shouted from inside. “Entrez, will you? Avanti!”
He opened the door a little way, discreetly, and put in his head, ready to draw it back at once should he see his morning call as befalling inopportunely.
Aurora was so far from expecting him that for a second or two she actually did not recognize him, and waited to understand what was wanted of her. Her head was tied in a white cloth, her sleeves were turned back, she had on an apron, and she held a broom. The furniture was pushed together out of the corners, some of it covered with sheets; the windows were open. No mistake possible. Aurora was sweeping.
A burst of laughter rang; the broom-handle knocked on the floor.
“Yes, I’m sweeping,” she cried. “Come right in! You find me practising one of my accomplishments. I can’t play the piano, I can’t speak languages, I can’t paint bunches of flowers on black velvet; but I can sweep, I can 141cook, I can wash dishes–or babies, one just as well as the other, and I can nurse the sick.”
“I am afraid I have come at an inconvenient moment.”
“Not at all. I’m glad to see you. I was most through, anyhow.”
She had pulled the cloth off her head, and was patting her hair before the glass. She turned down her cuffs, untied her apron, and came to shake hands, smiling as usual.
“You caught me,” she said. “When I feel a certain way, I’ve got to work off steam, and there’s nothing that does it like sweeping.”