Mrs Beaten washes her windows thoroughly even though she knows that the chickens she keeps will undermine her work as soon as she stops. They are very tall chickens and they have the nasty habit of flicking things around.

“Dirty, disgusting things!” she says to the chickens, who do not care in the slightest about her judging them.

“Filthy creatures.” Which they are, and in their red eyes there are far too knowing looks.

Aside from the chickens, there isn’t a great deal to see from the window in her kitchen. Aside from the chickens, no one looks in through the window except for Mrs Beaten herself. Sometimes she likes to stand outside and view her kitchen as a stranger would see it if they came into her garden for the specific purpose of spying on her.

Today they would see the bones sticking out of the top of her soup pan, and they might wonder what kind of monster had died that there might be broth. Something whose bones were very long, and slender enough to break easily. The imaginary onlooker could take in the gleaming perfection of each kitchen surface, should they so desire.

Of course, standing here she cannot see how she herself might appear to an onlooker. She cannot be both the observer and the observed. On the whole, she dislikes people and wishes they would stay well away from her but there is something appealing in the idea of the remote and silent viewer. To be admired from a significant distance is an idea with some charm. After all, if no one is impressed by her efforts, what exactly is the point? It is essential to have standards for one’s own personal dignity, she thinks. But it would also be pleasing to have those standards seen and respected.

Mrs Beaten catches sight of herself reflected in the glass. Hardly more than a dark shape, she offers little to her own gaze.

“You are wanton,” she says to her own reflection, “Imagining someone looking at you and your beautiful, shining kitchen. How debased!” 

There is increasing satisfaction for her in the process of judging herself harshly. But the windows are very clean and ready for no one else to look through them.