The Spinners Part 13

"If you'd come to me instead of to the mill people."

"You don't know their side."

"Much better than you do. I've talked with our father often and often about it. He was no tyrant and n.o.body could ever accuse him of injustice."

Raymond flashed; but he kept his mouth shut on that theme. The only bitter quarrels between the brothers had been on the subject of their father, and the younger knew that the ground was dangerous. At this moment the last thing he desired was any difference with Daniel.

"I'll keep it all in mind, Dan. I don't want to do anything to annoy you, G.o.d knows. Is there any more? I must go and look after young Estelle."

"Only one thing; and this is purely personal, and so I hope you'll excuse me. I've just been seeing Uncle Ernest, and n.o.body wished us better fortune than he does."

"He's a good old boy. I've learned a lot about spinning from him."

"I know. But--look here, Raymond, I do beg of you--I implore of you not to be too friendly with Sabina Dinnett. You can't think how I should hate anything like that. It isn't fair--it isn't fair to the woman, or to me, or to the family. You must see yourself that sort of thing isn't right. She's a very good girl--our champion spinner Best says; and if you go distracting her and taking her out of her station, you are doing her a very cruel turn and upsetting her peace of mind. And the others will be jealous, of course, and so it will go on. It isn't playing the game--it really isn't. That's all. I know you're a sportsman and all that; so I do beg you'll be a sportsman in business too, and take a proper line and remember your obligations. And if I've said a harsh, or unfair word, I'm sorry for it; but you know I haven't."

Seeing that Sabina Dinnett was now in paramount and triumphant possession of Raymond's mind, he felt thankful that his brother, by running on over this subject and concluding upon the whole question, had saved him the necessity for any direct reply. Whether he would have lied or no concerning Sabina, Raymond did not stop to consider. There is little doubt that he would. But the need was escaped; and so thankful did he feel, that he responded to the admonishment in a tone more complete and with promises more comprehensive than Daniel expected.

"You're dead right. Of course I know it! I've been a silly fool all round. But I won't open my mouth so wide in future, Dan. And don't think I'm wasting my time. I'm working like the devil, really, and learning everything from the beginning. Best will tell you that's true. He's a splendid teacher and I'll see more of him in future. And I'll read all about yarn and get the hang of the markets, and so on."

"Thank you--you can't say more. And you might come into Bridport oftener, I think. Aunt Jenny was saying she never sees you now."

"I will," promised Raymond. "I'm going to dine with you both on my birthday. I believe she'll be good for fifty quid this year. Father left her a legacy of a thousand."

They parted, and Raymond returned to Estelle, who was now watching the warping, while Daniel went into his foreman's office.

Estelle was radiant. She had fallen in love with the works.

"The girls are all so kind and clever," she said.

"Rather so. I expect you know all about everything now."

"Hardly anything yet. But you must let me come again. I do want to know all about it. It is splendidly interesting."

"Of course, come and go when you like, kiddy."

"And I'm going to ask some of them to tea with me," declared Estelle.

"They all love flowers, and I'm going to show them our garden and my pets. I've asked seven of them and two men."

"Ask me, too."

She brought out a piece of paper and showed him that she had written down nine names.

"And if they like it, they'll tell the others and I shall ask them too,"

she said. "Father is always wanting me to spend money, so now I'll spend some on a beautiful tea."

Raymond saw the name of Sabina Dinnett.

"I'll be there to help you," he promised.

"Nicholas Roberts is the lover of Miss Northover," explained Estelle, "and Benny Cogle is the lover of Miss Gale. That's why I asked them. I very nearly went back and asked Mister Baggs to come, because he seems a silent, sad man; but I was rather frightened of him."

"Don't ask him; he's an old bear," declared Raymond.

Thus, forgetting his brother as though Daniel had ceased to exist, he threw himself into Estelle's enterprise and planned an entertainment that must at least have rendered the master uneasy.

CHAPTER IX

THE PARTY

Arthur Waldron did more than love his daughter. He bore to her almost a superst.i.tious reverence, as for one made of superior flesh and blood. He held her in some sort a reincarnation of his wife and took no credit for her cleverness himself. Yet he did not spoil her, for her nature was proof against that.

Estelle, though old for her age, could not be called a prig. She developed an abstract interest in life as her intellect unfolded to accept its wonders and mysteries, yet she remained young in mind as well as body, and was always very glad to meet others of her own age. The mill girls were indeed older than she, but Mr. Waldron's daughter found their minds as young as her own in such subjects as interested her, though there were many things hidden from her that life had taught them.

Her father never doubted Estelle's judgment or crossed her wishes.

Therefore he approved of the proposed party and did his best to make it a success. Others also were glad to aid Estelle and, to her delight, Ernest Churchouse, with whom she was in favour, yielded to entreaty and joined the company on the lawn of North Hill House. Tea was served out of doors, and to it there came nine workers from the mill, and two of Mr. Best's own girls, who were friends of Estelle. Nicholas Roberts arrived with his future wife, Sarah Northover; Sabina Dinnett came with Nancy Buckler and Sally Groves from the Carding Machine, while Alice Chick brought old Mrs. Chick; Mercy Gale came too--a fair, florid girl, who warped the yarn when it was spun.

Mr. Waldron was not a ladies' man, and after helping with the tea, served under a big mulberry tree in the garden, he turned his attention to Mr. Roberts, already known favourably to him as a cricketer, and Benny Cogle, the engine man. They departed to look at a litter of puppies and the others perambulated the gardens. Estelle had a plot of her own, where grew roses, and here, presently, each with a rose at her breast, the girls sat about on an old stone seat and listened to Mr.

Churchouse discourse on the lore of their trade.

Some, indeed, were bored by the subject and stole away to play beside a fountain and lily pond, where the gold fish were tame and crowded to their hands for food; but others listened and learned surprising facts that set the thoughtful girls wondering.

"You mustn't think, you spinners, that you are the last word in spinning," he said; "no, Alice and Nancy and Sabina, you're not; no more are those at other mills, who spin in choicer materials than flax and hemp--I mean the workers in cotton and silk. For the law of things in general, called evolution, seems to stand still when machinery comes to increase output and confuse our ideas of quality and quant.i.ty. Missis Chick here will tell you, when she was a spinner and the old rope walks were not things of the past, that she spun quite as good yarn from the bundle of tow at her waist as you do from the regulation spinners."

"And better," said Mrs. Chick.

"I believe you," declared Ernest, "and before your time the yarn was better still. For, though some of the best brains in men's heads have been devoted to the subject, we go backwards instead of forwards, and things have been done in spinning that I believe will never be done again. In fact, the further you go back, the better the yarn seems to have been, and I'm sure I don't know how the laws of evolution can explain that. The secret is this: machinery, for all its marvellous improvements, lags far behind the human hand, and the record yarns were spun in the East, while our forefathers still went about in wolf-skins and painted their faces blue. You may laugh, but it is so."

"Tell us about them, Mister Churchouse," begged Estelle.

"For the moment we needn't go back so far," he said. "I'll remind you what a girl thirteen years old did in Ireland a hundred years ago. Only thirteen was Catherine Woods--mark that, Sabina and Alice--but she was a genius who lived in Dunmore, County Down, and she spun a hank of linen yarn of such tenuity that it would have taken seven hundred such hanks to make a pound of yarn."

He turned to Estelle.

"Sabina and the other spinners will appreciate this," he said, "but to explain the marvel of such spider-like spinning, Estelle, I may tell you that seventeen and a half pounds of Catherine's yarn would have sufficed to stretch round the equator of the earth. No machine-spun yarn has ever come within measurable distance of this astounding feat, and I have never heard of any spinner in Europe or America equalling it; yet even this has been beaten when we were painting our noses blue."

"Where?" asked Estelle breathlessly.

"In the land of all wonders: Egypt. Herodotus tells us of a linen corselet, presented to the Lacedemonians by King Amasis, each thread of which commanded admiration, for though very fine, each was twisted of three hundred and sixty others! And if you decline to believe this--"

"Oh, Mister Churchouse, we quite believe it I'm sure, sir, if you say so," interrupted Mrs. Chick.

"Well, a later authority, Sir Gardiner Wilkinson, tells us of equal wonders. The linen which he unwound from Egyptian mummies has proved as delicate as silk, and equal, if not superior, to our best cambrics. Five hundred and forty threads went to the warp and a hundred and ten to the weft; and I'm sure a modern weaver would wonder how they could produce quills fine enough for weaving such yarn through."

"There's nothing new under the sun, seemingly," said old Mrs. Chick.