He was silent a minute, and went on gravely—
'You wanted to know why I interfered the other night as I did; and I promised, I believe, to explain it to you when I had an opportunity. I will, if you bid me; but I may do the people injustice, and I would rather you took the view of an unprejudiced person—Mr. Falkirk, for instance. But if you wish it, I will tell you myself.'
'No,' she said; 'I do not wish it.'
Rollo was quite as willing to let the matter drop; and in a few minutes more they were at the mill he had proposed to visit. There they dismounted, the horses were sent on to the bend in the valley, beyond the mills; and presenting a pass, Rollo and Wych Hazel were admitted into the building, where strangers rarely came. One of the men in authority was known to Mr. Rollo; he presented himself now, and with much civility ushered them through the works.
They made a slow progress of it; full of interest, because full of intelligent appreciation. Perhaps, in the abstract, one would not expect to find a gay young man of the world versed in the intricacies of a cotton mill; but however it were, Rollo had studied the subject, and was now bent on making Wych hazel understand all the beautiful details of the machinery and the curiosities of the manufacture. This was a new view of him to his companion. He took endless pains to make her familiar with the philosophy of the subject, as well as its history. Patient and gentle and evidently not in the least thinking of himself, his grey eyes were ever searching in Wych Hazel's face to see whether she comprehended and how she enjoyed what he was giving her. As to the relations between them, his manner all the while, as well as during the ride, was very much what it had been before the disclosure made by Mrs. Coles had sent Wych Hazel off on a tangent of alienation from him. Nothing could exceed the watch kept over her, or the care taken of her; and neither could make less demonstration. There was also the same quiet assumption of her, which had been in his manner for so long; that also was never officiously displayed, though never wanting when there was occasion. And now, in the mill, all these went along with that courtier-like deference of style, which paid her all the honour that manner could; yet it was the deference of one very near and not of one far off.
Wych Hazel for her part shewed abundant power of interest and of understanding, in their progress through the mill; quick to catch explanations, quick to see the beauty of some fine bit of machinery; but very quiet. Her eyes hardly ever rose to the level of his; her questions were a little more free to the conductor than to him. Even her words and smiles to the mill people seemed to wait for times when his back was turned, as if she were shy of in any wise displaying herself before him.
Their progress through the mill was delayed further by Rollo's interest in the operatives. A rather sad interest this had need to be. The men, and the women, employed as hands in the works, were lank and pale and haggard, or dark and coarse. Their faces were reserved and gloomy; eyes would not light up, even when spoken to; and Rollo tried the expedient pretty often. Yet the children were the worst. Little things, and others older, but all worn-looking, sadly pale, very hopeless, going back and forth at their work like so many parts of the inexorable machinery. Here Rollo now and then got a smile, that gleamed out as a rare thing in that atmosphere. On the whole, the outer air seemed strange and sweet to the two when they came out into it, and not more sweet than strange. Where they had been, surely the beauty, and the freedom, and the promise, of the pure oxygen and the blue heaven, were all shut out and denied and forgotten.
'There is work for somebody to do,' said Rollo thoughtfully, when the mill door was shut behind them.
The girl looked at him gravely, then away.
'Do all mill people look so?' she said. 'Or is it just Morton
Hollow?'