'It's dinner-hour now; but if you will stop and have lunch with us we shall be very glad, and we will go after lunch. It won't be a Balmoral lunch,' said George, smiling at her.
'All the better; we shall be finished the sooner,' said Horatia,' and the mills take an awfully long time to see.'
'Then will you come and see father? He does not come down yet, and mother has her lunch with him; she can't bear to leave him,' said Sarah.
Horatia accordingly went off with Sarah, and found the mill-owner looking very different; but it was Mrs Clay who seemed the most changed. She looked years younger, and so quietly happy. Horatia could not understand it at all, not being given to troubling her head about people's characters.
After lunch—which, after all, was a very good one, and served in Sykes's best style, to do honour to the guests—the party drove down to the mills.
Sarah could not help thinking what a good thing it would be if Lady Grace Cunningham should take a fancy to this new cloth, she was such a striking-looking woman, and a well-known figure in society; but the girl determined not to suggest it, though her heart beat a little quicker when they were coming to the dyeing-rooms.
Before this they passed the warehouses, and George good-naturedly opened the doors to let Horatia see more blankets than she would ever see again in her life.
'How full it is! This place was quite empty when I last came,' she cried innocently.
George blushed like a girl. 'It's a slack time with us,' he said, and hastily shut the door.
But Mr Cunningham stopped a moment. 'They are not sold, then?' he inquired.