She looked extraordinarily serious, as Hamer had said, and not only serious but anxious; not only anxious but even--just a little--dishevelled. Her butter had been a long time in coming, and though she had it on the worker by now, it would be a race to finish it. She had seen Lanty when his head first topped the hill, and after that she had done everything wrong, forgotten her plug, made a thorough hash of lifting out the butter and had then over-salted it, so that the marks against her were totting up like a washing-bill, to the distress of the examiner, who admired her exceedingly. That poor four pounds was worked and overworked until it didn’t know itself, and was received for weighing with grunted contempt. With flushed cheeks and escaping hair, Dandy took it back to finish, and tried to console herself with a perfectly-executed pattern. Lanty watched her with interest, and decided that he liked her--just a little--dishevelled. And then at last came a stir of relief from the patient audience, and the white figures retreated to a form, looking excited and hot. The examiner prefaced his report with a short lecture upon butter in general, keeping a nervous eye on Harriet the while. She was on the point of argument more than once, but Wiggie, close at hand, always seemed to know when the explosion was due, and conjured up a Quetta-ling to distract her. The examiner was very pleased to be there that day, and very pleased with results, and everything that had gone wrong had, of course, been pure accident or a passing spasm of forgetfulness or sheer evil fate. Because everybody had meant excellently, and that, of course, was the main thing, as where there was a will there was a way, and the person who made a mistake to-day would most certainly correct it to-morrow, etc., etc. Still, mistakes that day were in such negligible quantity that they were really not worth mentioning. Indeed, he was happy to say that he had been able to place the whole of the competitors in the first-class, with one exception only. Here he looked with such agonised care at least six feet over Dandy’s head that everybody else instantly looked six feet lower. This, of course, did not imply that the aforesaid competitor was hopelessly behind the rest; it only meant that her work was not quite up to the standard. Indeed, any one who had watched this particular competitor could see with half an eye that she knew perfectly well how to make butter, only she had been unfortunate. Everybody knew that butter could turn nasty if it liked, and it had treated her badly. She had had other misfortunes, too--little troubles connected with the plug, etc.--but it was really hardly worth while to dwell upon them. He was most decidedly pleased to be there! And this time he looked six feet down and straight at Dandy, so adoringly that all the audience who had really nice feelings instantly looked six feet up.