* * *
The whole day alone, she promised to herself. Lucy in the other rooms would intervene a little: nothing was perfect. Yet Fanny felt that this was good. She was at ease in her armchair. Soon the sun would sweep into her place. And Lucy had the musical quiet of her folk, she really did not interfere more than a cat might ... a useful cat who would bring her her lunch on the portable table and her drops every three hours. Lucy had a soothing grain, almost like sunlight ... a sort of saffron practicable sunlight.
“Ev’thing a’right now, Mis’ Fanny?”
“Yes, Lucy. Thank you.”
The girl swayed on her little haunches, holding her hands across her breast.
“It’s gone to be a fine day. That’ll mak’ you fine, Mis’ Fanny, right soon again.”
“I wish I was as fine as you.”
“Aw Mis’ Fanny!” Her hands beat out in protest ... glad gaunt hands stripped by their work of flesh, and yet the music of them lived in their bone and their gesture. Lucy went off, her soft shoes patting like the cushioned feet of a tamed panther.
The door closed to the kitchen; Fanny was alone. Lucy would seek her den and fill it with steam and suds, wrap a red rag around her head and fall to work with an occasional cry like a wild beast musing: lost in a sort of virginal ecstacy which Fanny loved, of work and dreaming.
—She’s diligent! If she were German, wouldn’t I say: No one but a German could be so thorough? And she’s a negress. White blood yes ... but it dilutes, that’s all, the mellow flow of her life. O you superior Lucy! Yet she’s colored.