“Just carry on as long as they can, and then I don’t know what. It doesn’t matter so much for father. He can take to his hand-loom again, and now I’m so much stronger I hope to be a help to him. I can spin wonderful. But it will be a sad blow for Tom. His whole heart and soul were in the mill. Not for the money. I never knew anyone care less for money than Tom. But the hands were so contented and father says it was to prove a social and economic revolution, whatever that may mean.”
“It means apparently,” said Dorothy “ruining yourself for the general good. Does Tom,—Mr. Pinder, take it much to heart?”
“He pretends not to, always tries to put a cheerful face on when he talks to mother. But I know it’s just crushing the youth out of him. But it’s because those that went in with him may have to lose their money. And father says there’ll be no room for Tom in these parts if th’ Co-op’s stopped. The other manufacturers are sure to side with your uncle, and they’ll none of them give Tom a job if he asked for it.”
“Oh! they wouldn’t, eh?” Then suddenly. “Is Tom very dear to you, Lucy?”
Lucy flushed, and her eyes fell before Dorothy’s questioning look. But her voice, though low, was very steady as she spoke.
“I love him very much, Dorothy. Next to the love I have for mother and father there is no one in the world to me like Tom. He is my big brother, you know,” she added, with a faint smile.
“Oh! Those big brothers have a way of turning into big lovers,” said Dorothy. “That’s just their artful way. They get a poor innocent confiding girl to feel like a sister, and then when she begins to feel she cannot very well do without him, nothing will do but a ring and a parson. I know them,” said Dorothy viciously.
“Tom will never be my lover, Dorothy,” said Lucy, quietly.
“And why pray, Miss Pale-face?”
“Because he loves someone else. He has loved her for years.”