Briar glanced over Miss Olive’s shoulder. The paleness of Sadie’s face reminded Briar of how her mother looked after the boys were born. Near death. She ran out of the room.
Intermittently throughout the rest of the day, the girls kept checking themselves and others to see if they, too, had fevers. Briar touched her own forehead and thought it was warm, but it was a hard thing to tell, given the stifling air on their floor anyway. By the end of the day Annie was also complaining about a piercing headache. The operatives passed worried looks behind her back.
When Briar got home, she found Miss Olive coming out of the isolation room. “Doctor’s been and says he’ll know more in the morning. I’ve got to stay here with her; do you think you girls can serve yourselves? Food’s ready.”
“Of course,” Briar said. “Do you want me to get anything started for breakfast?”
“Kind of you, but there is nothing to do tonight. Check with me in the morning.”
The mood was somber around the table that night. The rumor, whether exaggerated or not, had spread that Sadie was on the verge of death. When one of the girls told a joke, those around her laughed, but the laughter died quickly under withering gazes of the others.
“What happened to her?” asked Mim from the floor of their bedroom. She refused to sleep in the same bed Sadie had slept in, and Ethel wouldn’t let her squeeze in with her and Briar. “I heard she fell and cracked her head open on her frame. And I also heard that she licked the grease on the spindles? Why would she do such a thing? That would make anybody sick.”
The spindle! Briar’s heart sank. Could the spindle have made Sadie sick, even if she didn’t prick her finger?
“She didn’t hit her head, but she did faint.” Briar searched her memory for the chain of events. “I’ve never felt someone with such a fever. She couldn’t even walk back to the house. Wheeler had to carry her here.” But that’s not dying and it’s not falling asleep for a hundred years. It could be a coincidence. A summer flu, perhaps.
“Well, I better not get it,” said Mim. “Wish we still had Ania living with us.”
In the morning, Ethel checked in on Sadie first thing and reported back. “Oh, girls. She’s in an awful state. Worse than yesterday. Miss Olive is pacing, waiting for the doctor. I’ve never seen her so worried before.”
On the way to work, they peeked down the hallway on the first floor, but the door to the isolation room was closed. Maybe the doctor was in there now.
They looked at each other grimly. Maybe there would be news at dinner. Until then, they’d better hustle to be through the mill gate before it closed.
When Briar got to her station, she noticed immediately that Annie wasn’t at work, either. The overseer assigned Briar and two others to cover for the missing operatives before he started the pulleys. The spinning machines whirled to life and the girls were too busy covering the extra frames to gossip about anything.
Briar’s fourth frame hummed along perfectly all morning, giving her plenty of time to wonder how Annie was doing, and if she had the same fever Sadie had.
At the dinner bell, Briar shut down her machines and sought out one of Annie’s friends.
“She’s feelin’ real bad,” the girl said. “Last night she was moanin’ so loud she woke up the whole house. Doc’s coming by today.”
“Tell her I hope she feels better soon. We’re tending her frames for her.” Briar waved to the girl, then turned and raced home to find the doctor still in with Sadie.
In the dining room, the girls ate in silence, which wasn’t that unusual, since they were always in such a hurry, but a pall hung over the table as everyone’s thoughts were with Sadie. None of them were strangers to illness. In fact, family illness was often the very reason girls like Briar were working in the mills.
The doctor walked past the dining room, his face grim. After Miss Olive had seen him out the front door, the girls gathered round, risking being late and having their pay docked.
“What did he say?”
“He has narrowed it down to one of two things but is still not clear. It’s either a bad case of rheumatic fever or something called poliomyelitis. Let’s hope it’s rheumatic.” Miss Olive looked meaningfully at the girls. “The doctor heard of two cases of polio down in Rutland: a farm boy who is paralyzed and won’t walk again; another, well, they’re still waiting to see if he recovers. His infection attacked the muscles used in swallowing and breathing. Very serious.”
“When will the doctor know about Sadie?” Briar asked, relieved the illness was confirmed to be a case of something going around and not from the spindle.
Before Miss Olive could answer, Mim said, “We share a bed. And Briar helped carry her here. Is it catchy? Are we going to get it, too?”
“How are you feeling, Mim? Briar? Any symptoms?”