Somewhat comforted by the kindly tone and motherly bearing of Mrs Lilly, Hester went into one of the dark cellar-like rooms of the interior of her new home, and found it to be a sort of kitchen, which borrowed its light from the outer room by means of a convenient wall that was white-washed for the purpose of transmitting it. This reflector was not an eminent success, but it rendered darkness visible. At the time we write of, however, the sun having set, the kitchen was lighted by a smoky oil-lamp of classic form and dimness. Here she found Sally busy with her evening meal.
Sally was apparently about as little of a human being as was consistent with the possession of a human form and the power of speech. Most of her qualities seemed to be negative—if we may say so. She was obviously not unamiable; she was not unkind; and she was not sulky, though very silent. In fact, she seemed to be the nearest possible approach to a human nonentity. She may be described as a black maid-of-all-work, but her chief occupation was the pounding of roasted coffee-beans. This operation she performed in the pit in the floor before mentioned, which may be described as a hole, into which you descended by four steps from the front room. As the front room itself was below the level of the street, it follows that the “pit” penetrated considerably deeper into the bowels of the earth. In this pit Sally laboured hard, almost day and night, pounding the coffee-beans in an iron mortar, with an iron pestle so heavy that she had to stand up and use it with both hands. She had got into the habit of relieving herself by an audible gasp each time she drove the pestle down. It was not a necessary gasp, only a remonstrative one, as it were, and conveyed more to the intelligent listener than most of the girl’s average conversation did. This gasp was also one of the disagreeable sounds which had saluted the ears of Hester on her first entrance into the new home.
“Mrs Lilly is very kind,” said Hester, as she sat down at a small table beside her fellow-slave.
Sally stopped eating for a moment and stared. Supposing that she had not understood the remark, Hester repeated it.
“Yes,” assented Sally, and then stopped the vocal orifice with a huge wooden spoonful of rice.
Judging that her companion wished to eat in undisturbed silence, Hester helped herself to some rice, and quietly began supper. Sally eyed her all the time, but was too busy feeding herself to indulge in speech. At last she put down her spoon with a sigh of satisfaction, and said, “Das good!” with such an air of honest sincerity that Hester gave way to an irresistible laugh.
“Yes, it is very good indeed. Did you cook it?” asked Hester, anxious to atone for her impoliteness.
“Yes. I cook ’im. I do all de cookin’ in dis yar ouse—an’ most ob de eatin’ too.”
“By the way, Sally, what is it that you keep pounding so constantly in that—that hole off the front room?”
“Coffee,” answered Sally, with a nod.