Mim just smiled and said, “Welcome to the family.”
“Excellent,” said Miss Olive, turning around. She fanned her face, now flushed with heat and exertion. “Now, off with the lot of you before you’re late.”
On the rush back to the mill, the mist was still so thick that Ethel’s ghostly bonnet bobbed as if on an ocean. Briar would have pointed this out to Mim for a laugh, but when she turned to say something, Mim avoided her eyes. With a pang of guilt, Briar realized Pierre must have been more than the usual entertainment. Could Mim’s heart be broken, too?
Well, if the past was an indicator of the future, Mim would soon have a new love to occupy her affections. Besides, Briar had something else on her mind. How was she going to share a room with Sadie? The last thing she wanted to hear about was Sadie mooning over Wheeler. What was Miss Olive thinking? Now she’d have a room with two sets of people at odds with one another.
“Terrible weather, ain’t it?” asked Sadie.
Briar jumped. She’d almost forgotten they’d left at the same time.
“Sure is.”
“It’ll be fun being room-mates. Who did Ania share with?”
“Mim.”
“Too bad. If we were together we could talk about Wheeler all night. You must be curious about him, aren’t you?” She blinked innocent eyes at Briar, which weren’t innocent at all. She was sending a message.
Briar slowed her pace, letting Sadie flounce ahead even if it meant Briar would end up late to her station for the second time that day. Her room-mates were the best part of working at the mill. The girl before Ania had been great fun to be around, too, until she got married. And now she had to room with Sadie?
That afternoon she worked as quickly and efficiently as possible, keeping track of her new doffer Maribelle, helping the young girl juggle the full bobbins that her little hands were too small to manage easily. Small hands were good for reaching in the frames to fix thread breaks and clean, but troublesome for keeping a grip on the full bobbins until they learned the proper balance.
The overseer continuously paced the floor, setting everyone on edge. Briar fumbled through keeping her frames going, which seemed to delight her new boss. Why would her becoming a trembling wreck be the only thing that pleased him? She’d heard about bad overseers before, those who looked down on the women they managed. He must be one of those.
As she worked, Briar’s thoughts spun back to the peddler’s cart and his solution for her problem. A wooden spindle. Could something so simple fix her frame? If only Henry were here, he would know. Plus, he wouldn’t make fun of her idea, no matter how far-fetched it was.
She couldn’t use the drop spindle by itself to earn a living. No one sold hand-spun thread anymore. Industrialization saw to that. She paced in front of her factory frames, noting there was nothing beautiful about them. They were made from impersonal metal, powered by the loud belts overhead transferring the might of the river and steam into her hands. They made the room alive with their motion, yet not alive. They were noisy and relentless and gave her headaches more often than not.
When she first started in the spinning room, she was fascinated how the thicker cotton strands called roving wound down to the bobbins below, pulled and twisted into thin but strong thread. The transformation happened so quickly compared to a hand spindle or even a spinning wheel. And all this by the thousands of spindles at the cotton mill. It was dizzying and exciting at first. But now, the job was monotonous. It left too much time for thinking.
Ethel told her the looms were more interesting to care for. Whether Briar moved up in this factory, or in the new one at Burlington, the change would be welcomed.
Briar got so caught up in her thoughts that she forgot to keep on number four, and before she knew it, threads had snapped all over the place. Not again. Plus it was time for doffing and the girl was nowhere to be seen. Now all her frames were down as Briar quickly tied knots to fix the breaks before the overseer noticed.
By the time she’d worked her way to the last frame, Maribelle ran in, with an excited, flushed face. Evidently it had been a good game of tag outside. The fog probably made it easy to dart away and be hidden.
“Maribelle! Now look what you’ve done,” she snapped. “You’ve got to pay attention. I need you in here every forty-five minutes.” Even as she chastised Maribelle, Briar knew the words were meant for herself.
Maribelle bobbed her head, staring down at her own bare feet, splotchy-black with grease. “Yes, miss.”
“What’s going on?” The overseer was once again at Briar’s elbow. He grabbed Maribelle by the ear and squeezed.