Year in and year out she had spent the summer evenings like this on the dike—ever since she had been seventeen and a bride. Her husband had shouted to come out of the house and up to the dike. She had come, blushing and twisting her hands together to hide among the women, while the men roared at her and made jokes about her. All the same, they had liked her. “A pretty piece of meat in your bowl,” they had said to her husband. “Her feet are a trifle big,” he had answered, trying to make her seem less special. But she could see that he was pleased, and so, gradually, her shyness went away.