"What is it like?"
"It's dreadful."
"How dreadful?"
Mildred's large blue eyes popped at me with sincere sorrow.
"Well, there's no plumbing, and no furnace."
"Is it in a village?"
"It isn't 'in' anything. It's a mile and a half from a station called Hebron. You have to change three times to get there. It's half-way up a hill—the house is—and there are mountains all about, and the barn is connected with the house by a series of rickety woodsheds, and there are places where the water comes through the roof. They put pails under to catch it. There are queer little contraptions they call Franklin stoves in most of the rooms and a brick oven in the kitchen. When they want anything from the village, Joel Blake gets it, if he doesn't forget. Ditto wood, ditto everything except meat. Some other hick brings that along when he has 'killed.' They can only see one house from the front yard, and that is precisely a mile away by the road. Joel Blake lives nearer, but you can't see his house. You can't see anything—except the woods and the 'crick' and the mountains. You can see the farmers when they are haying, but that doesn't last long."
"Is it a beautiful view?"
"My dear man, don't ask me what a beautiful view is. My education was neglected."
"Does Kathleen Somers think it beautiful?"