“No! I must take some one to work the engine and the locks,” returned Thrale.
“I’ll come!” announced Eileen, with glee.
Thrale shook his head. “You’ll have to run this place,” he said.
Since that night in September no reference had been made by either of them to his strange revelation of fear. They had worked together as two men might have worked. Neither of them had exhibited the least consciousness of sex. Thrale believed that he had put the fear away from him, and Eileen was content to wait. She was barely twenty.
“Blanche could run the mill,” she suggested. “There isn’t much to do now.”
Thrale turned away from her with a touch of impatience. “Blanche had better come with me,” he said.
“I want to come,” pleaded Eileen.
“Why?” he asked.
“It’ll be sport.”
“I don’t care to trust Blanche with the mill,” he persisted.