He nodded, making no comment.
She waited for an instant, as if expecting a word of condolence, and then went on. “But, Luke—I thought we were not going to work nights this week?”
He turned on her with more anger and impatience than he had ever displayed in all the history of their friendship, their courtship. Why wouldn’t they work nights? Weren’t they far behind and snowed under? Didn’t they have to get out those rush orders or throw up their hands? Was he working anybody any harder than he worked himself? Hadn’t she common sense enough to see the necessity of it?
It was not so much a matter of ugly words as ugly voice and manner; not so much the substance of what he said, but the sound of it—the snarl in his tone, the hot bitterness in his eyes. He caught himself up suddenly, muttered something—a scrap of apology, perhaps—and flung himself into the spinning room.
Mrs. Eugenia Parker looked after him with grave displeasure. “What a very morose and ill-tempered young man!”
The ancient loyalty reared its head, in spite of embarrassment and chagrin. “He is not like that, usually,” said the girl. “He has never spoken to me like that in all my life. It is just that he is under a dreadful strain. I don’t know how much you understand about this situation, Mrs. Parker, but the mill is in a very bad way. Mr. Carey is—not efficient, and the old superintendent, a man who’d been here forever and was absolutely trusted, had been systematically robbing the Altonia for years.”
“My word!” said the lady, impressed.
“Yes. It was a dreadful blow to Mr. Carey. It caused his stroke, the doctors thought. And you can imagine what a state things were in when Luke Manders took charge!”
“And my husband, and later my son, as absentee owners, shirking their share of responsibility,” the Federation President admitted sturdily.
“Yes,” Glen was honest about it, “that has made it much harder, of course. I don’t know the details; Luke has never really had time to explain to me, and he insists on carrying all the burdens himself.” Pride warmed in her voice again. “You can’t picture how hard he works—harder than any other three people under this roof!”