The grey girl smiled. “It is rather awful sometimes. I've been at it six months now. You get used to it. I've had all the worst things said to me by now, I should think.”
Thyme shuddered.
“You see,” said the grey girl's faintly smiling lips, “you soon get the feeling of having to go through with it. We all realise it's got to be done, of course. Your cousin's one of the best of us; nothing seems to put him out. He has such a nice sort of scornful kindness. I'd rather work with him than anyone.”
She looked past her new associate into that world outside, where the sky seemed all wires and yellow heat-dust. She did not notice Thyme appraising her from head to foot, with a stare hostile and jealous, but pathetic, too, as though confessing that this girl was her superior.
“I'm sure I can't do that work!” she said suddenly.
The grey girl smiled. “Oh, I thought that at first.” Then, with an admiring look: “But I do think it's rather a shame for you, you're so pretty. Perhaps they'd put you on to tabulation work, though that's awfully dull. We'll ask your cousin.”
“No; I'll do the whole or nothing.”
“Well,” said the grey girl, “I've got one house left to-day. Would you like to come and see the sort of thing?”
She took a small notebook from a side pocket in her skirt.
“I can't get on without a pocket. You must have something that you can't leave behind. I left four little bags and two dozen handkerchiefs in five weeks before I came back to pockets. It's rather a horrid house, I'm afraid!”