She never asked Stud to kill chickens for her. She went to the chicken house herself, chased down a pair of plump friers, and chopped off their heads without more ado. These she scalded, plucked, singed, drew, washed in cold well water, rolled in egg and flour, and fried to a crisp golden brown. It made Stud's mouth fairly water to think of those chicken dinners: hot biscuits, mashed potatoes, lots of chicken gravy, coffee with Jersey cream, and hot mince pie for dessert.
Such roasts, fries and stews! Such homemade bread, dumplings, pies and cakes! Her cooking was better than hotel dinners, Stud averred. There was a tang to everything she cooked and everything she did.
Stud had never before been completely aware of the work a woman must do around a farm. He had rather thought that Sarah was having the best of the bargain all these years. Now, perversely, he was conscious of every task a farm-wife must perform.
He noticed how from Monday morning when she started pumping cistern water for the week's washing, until Saturday night when she put over water for baths Early Ann never sat down to rest. He noticed particularly how clean she kept the house and milk house; how shining and sweet-smelling were the milk pails and separator; how the meals were always on the dot and the dishes cleared away promptly after the meal. She canned, churned, carried in cords of wood.
Stud found himself wondering if there were not some way to heat flatirons save over a roaring cook stove. Somehow the mountains of dishes seemed unnecessary.
But Early Ann did not complain. She sang as she worked.
Watching her now, as with hair and dress blowing she fed five hundred snowy chickens, Stud told himself she was a "darned good hired girl and would make some lucky fellow a good wife."
The phone rang two longs and three shorts the following Saturday. It was Gus calling jubilantly from Janesville. He had squandered a quarter to inform the family that Napoleon was not only the greatest Jersey bull in the county, but, according to the judges who awarded him a silver loving cup, the greatest bull of any variety. Teddy, the stallion, had won a blue ribbon, while Sarah's raspberry preserves had been judged the best in their class. Peter's pumpkin was three pounds and four ounces heavier than its nearest rival, and Gus had won a kewpie doll for Early Ann by hitting a nigger baby with a baseball.
Stud could hear the subdued exclamations from every kitchen on the party line.