THE PARTY
Arthur Waldron did more than love his daughter. He bore to her almost a
superstitious 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 quantity. 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.
"Indeed there isn't, my dear, and so, perhaps, in the time to come, we
shall spin again as well as the Egyptians five or six thousand years
ago," declared Ernest.
"And even then the spiders will always beat us I expect," said Estelle.
"True--true, child; nor has man learned the secret, of the caterpillar's
silken spinning. Talking of caterpillars, you may, or may not, have
observed--"
It was at this point that Raymond, behind the speaker's back, beckoned
Sabina, and presently, as Mr. Churchouse began to expatiate on Nature's
spinning, she slipped away. The garden was large and held many winding
paths and secluded nooks. Thus the lovers were able to hide themselves
from other eyes and amuse themselves with their own conversation.
Sabina praised Estelle.
"She's a dear little lady and ever so clever, I'm sure."
"So she is, and yet she loses a lot. Though her father's such a great
sportsman, she doesn't care a button about it. Wouldn't ride on a pony
even."
"I can very well understand that. Nor would I if I had the chance."
"You're different, Sabina. You've not been brought up in a sporting
family. All the same you'd ride jolly well, because you've got nerve
enough for anything and a perfect figure for riding. You'd look fairly
lovely on horseback."
"Whatever will you say next?"
"I often wonder myself," he answered. "This much I'll say any way: it's
meat and drink to me to be walking here with you. I only wish I was
clever and could really amuse you and make you want to see me,
sometimes. But the things I understand, of course, bore you to tears."
"You know very well that isn't so," she said. "You've told me heaps of
things well worth knowing--things I should never have heard of but for
you. And--and I'm sure I'm very proud of your friendship."
"Good Lord! It's the other way about. Thanks to Mister Churchouse and
your own wits, you are fearfully well read, and your cleverness fairly
staggers me. Just to hear you talk is all I want--at least that isn't
all. Of course, it is a great score for an everyday sort of chap like me
to have interested you."
Sabina did not answer and after a silence which drew out into
awkwardness, she made some remark on the flowers. But Raymond was not
interested about the flowers. He had looked forward to this occasion as
an opportunity of exceptional value and now strove to improve the
shining hour.
"You know I'm a most unlucky beggar really, Sabina. You mightn't think
it, but I am. You see me cheerful, and joking and trying to make things
pleasant for us all at the works; but sometimes, if you could see me
tramping alone over North Hill, or walking on the beach and looking at
the seagulls, you'd be sorry for me."
"Of course, I'd be sorry for you--if there was anything to be sorry
for."
"Look at it. An open-air man brought up to think my father would leave
me all right, and then cut off with nothing and forced to come here and
stew and toil and wear myself out struggling with a most difficult
business--difficult to me, any way."
"I'm sure you're mastering it as quickly as possible."
"But the effort. And my muscles are shrinking and I'm losing weight.
But, of course, that's nothing to anybody but myself. And then, another
side: I want to think of you people first and raise your salaries and
so on--especially yours, for you ought to have pounds where you have
shillings. And my wishes to do proper things, in the line of modern
progress and all that, are turned down by my brother. Here am I thinking
about you and worrying and knowing it's all wrong--and there's nobody on
my side--not a damned person. And it makes me fairly mad."
"I'm sure it's splendid of you to look at the Mill in such a high-minded
way," declared Sabina. "And now you've told me, I shall understand
what's in your mind. I'm sure I thank you for the thought at any rate."
"If you'd only be my friend," he said.
"It would be a great honour for a girl--just a spinner--to be that."
"The honour is for me. You've got such tons of mind, Sabina. You
understand all the economical side, and so on."
"A thing is only worth what it will fetch, I'm afraid."
"That's the point. If you would help me, we would go into it and
presently, when I'm a partner, we could bring out a scheme; and then
you'd know you'd been instrumental in raising the tone of the whole
works. And probably, if we set a good example, other works would raise
their tone, too, and gradually the workers would find the whole scheme
of things changing, to their advantage."
Sabina regarded this majestic vision with due reverence. She praised his
ideals and honestly believed him a hero.
They discussed the subject while the dusk came down and he prophesied
great things.
"We shall live to see it," he assured her, "and it may be largely thanks
to you. And when you have a home of your own and--and--"
It was then that she became conscious of his very near presence and the
dying light.
"They'll all have gone, and so must I," she said, "and I hope you'll
thank Miss Waldron dearly for her nice party."
"This is only the first; she'll give dozens more now that this has been
such a success. She loves the Mill. If you come this way I can let you
out by the bottom gate--by the bamboo garden. You've bucked me up like
anything--you always do. You're the best thing in my life, Sabina. Oh,
if I was anything to you--if--but of course it's all one way."
His voice shook a little. He burned to put his arms round her, and
Nature shouted so loud in his humming ears that he hardly heard her
answer. For she echoed his emotion.
"What can I say to that? You're so kind--you don't know how kind. You
can't guess what such friendship means to a girl like me. It's something
that doesn't come into our lives very often. I'm only wondering what the
world will be like when you've gone again."
"I shan't go--I'm never going. Never, Sabina. I--I couldn't live without
you. Kiss me, for God's sake. I must kiss you--I must--or I shall go
mad."
His arms were round her and he felt her hot cheek against his. They were
young in love and dared not look into each other's eyes. But she kissed
him back, and then, as he released her, she ran away, slipped through
the wicket, where they stood and hastened off by the lane to Bridetown.
He glowed at her touch and panted at his triumph. She had not rebuked
him, but let him see that she loved him and kissed him for his kiss. He
did not attempt to follow her then but turned full of glory. Here was a
thing that dwarfed every interest of life and made life itself a
triviality by comparison. She loved him; he had won her; nothing else
that would be, or had been, in the whole world mattered beside such a
triumph. His head had touched the stars.
And he felt amazingly grateful to her. His thoughts for the moment were
full of chivalry. Her life must be translated to higher terms and new
values. She should have the best that the world could offer, and he
would win it for her. Her trust was so pathetic and beautiful. To be
trusted by her made him feel a finer thing and more important to the
cosmic scheme.
In itself this was a notable sensation and an addition of power, for
nobody had ever trusted him until now. And here was a radiant creature,
the most beautiful in the world, who trusted him with herself. His love
brought a sense of splendour; her love brought a sense of strength.
He swung back to the house feeling in him such mastery as might bend the
whole earth to his purposes, take Leviathan with a hook, and hang the
constellations in new signs upon the void of heaven.