8. The Master of Marlborough Mills
Chapter 8
The Master of Marlborough Mills
A t last, we turned a corner and it opened into a yard of bustling life, activity, workers walking to and fro, minding their work or minding themselves.
“This is the mill?” We gasped.
“Aye, it is,” the overseer said, “this way, if you please. Mr. Thornton would be in the main part of the factory. Little happens in the factory that escapes his notice.”
“He sounds like a hawk,” I related. “I wouldn’t be surprised if his nose was straight and sharp as a flint of stone.”
“Come to think of it,” he considered, “his nose is as such.”
“Even I wonder at me being that correct.”
“Before you notice his nose, you will notice his eyes. That’s where the real hawk lies. Nose smells danger. But it’s his eyes that see it before it even comes.”
Margaret and I gave each other a look and I had to suppress my laughter. His overseer was enamored by his master. I had heard such arguments before.
When we entered the factory, the overseer took us to his office, where he was met by an assistant.
“Where is Mr. Thornton?” the overseer asked.
“He’s in the spinner’s hall,” the assistant informed him.
“Call him here and tell him that it pertains to two ladies who wish to inquire about the residence in Crampton.”
“Fine, sir.”
The assistant left, with the overseer remaining with us.
“How long have you been working for Mr. Thornton?” I asked.
“Five happy years.”
“You think very well of him.”
“He is a strong man. You need to be with this line of work. Especially with workers who are always thinking away about how they shall organize their next set of strikes. The fools! Illiterate and unintelligent lot!”
Margaret and I looked at each other, uneasily.
“Strikes?” I repeated. “Have those occurred here?”
“They are the common nuisance for any master who runs a factory. Mind you, they often end the same way: disorganized and self-destructive. Soon, the soldiers come and disband them really quickly.”
“Soldiers?” Margaret repeated. “They arrest these strikers?”
“That never does much good because they play the martyr act if you do that. Rather, more excessive influence is often used.”
It was very evident what he meant and the harsh idea of it was alarming. Margaret and I did not respond after that. A worker entered, with a problem in another part of the factory. Excusing himself, the overseer left us alone.
“Happy that he is gone?” I asked.
“A little,” Margaret admitted.
Soon the assistant returned.
“Mr. Thornton says that if any discussion of a solid sale on the house holds interest, he will discuss it with Mr. Hale when they meet.”
“So, he will not come?” Margaret asked, with a slightly raised eyebrow.
“He is overseeing the spinners and weavers.”
“Well, then that settles it, doesn’t it?” I noted. “If he does not wish to come to us, then we shall go to him.”
“Right,” Margaret responded. “Please take us to the spinners and weavers’ area.”
“Miss?”
“If you please.”
This frank plea was enough. The assistant proved not to be immovable and led us through the factory.
When we entered the main room, it was large, and fluff of cotton was everywhere in the air. It looked as if it was snowing down on the workers, who diligently were tending to the spinners’ and weavers’ machines. Due to the fluff of cotton, Margaret and I were soon coughing, for it had gotten into our throats. We dismissed this immediately, because we were both so very amazed by the spectacle before us.
I had spent time in my Uncle Gardiner’s factory before, and it was most industrious. However, this was a different scene altogether. It was still a new experience, seeing the workers toiling away, with white bits of cotton floating in the air.
“Elizabeth,” Margaret said, her voice higher than a whisper as her eyes widened, “look at this all.”
“I know,” I responded, “I know.”
For her, it must have been altogether quite the novelty. She had never seen the like. Also, knowing Margaret’s apprehensions to the Northern ways of industry, she might have viewed this scene of labor as oppressive toward the workers’ energy.
“Come forward, miss,” the assistant said, “Mr. Thornton is this way.”
We moved down along the room, with the workers and cotton moving around us. The men were attentive to us, in the way that a man’s eyes would be when looking upon a new and strange woman in their midst, but mostly we went ignored by those around us. As we moved slowly down the aisles, a man emerged from one of the rooms in the back, stumbling backwards before he fell on the floor.
This sudden and dramatic movement broke the spell that we felt as we had been gazing on all that was new to us, and we felt reality come rushing in. The man who had fallen appeared to be thin, in his mid-twenties, and wore the gray clothing of a laborer. It was even more startling when a well-dressed man rushed in, looming over the fallen man.
“What did I say, Custer!” the well-dressed man shouted. “Never come back here again!”
“Please, sir!” the worker cried, crawling backwards on the floor. “I didn’t mean to do what I did, sir.”
“That’s always the excuse,” the other man said, grabbing the penitent man by the shirt and raising his hand. Balling his fingers into a fist, he proceeded to punch the fallen one in the face.
“I tell you that you were gone and gone for good!”
He punched him again.
This all happened so quickly that I felt frozen in shock, but soon I remembered myself.
“Can’t you stop this?” I begged the assistant.
“He deserves it,” the assistant replied. “The Master is teaching him a proper lesson.”
The Master? Then…that was Mr. Thornton?
“There’s nothing proper about that!” Margaret responded. Without caring for the history of the situation, she moved forward. Following her, we rushed up to Mr. Thornton, and Margaret touched his arm, gently, but urgently.
“Please, sir, stop this!” she cried.
Mr. Thornton stopped striking the penitent man and looked down at the hand on his arm. His eyes traveled from her hand, up her arm and at last, his eyes rested on her face. For a second, I had assumed that his eyes were filled with wonder, but that was not the proper explanation of it. Whatever amazement that he experienced by Margaret, who had grabbed his arm, now wore off and it was replaced by a wrathful expression and a severity in his eyes. There was madness; there was rage! Worried that he might exude violence upon Margaret, I ran up and stood behind her.
“Who the devil are you?” Mr. Thornton spat. “And what are you doing here?”
“I came to speak to you about the price of an estate that you are organizing with my family,” she rushed out, without even thinking. “My name is Margaret Hale.”
Now that I saw that he was not going to exact any sort of vehemence on her, I leaned down and looked at the man who Mr. Thornton held in his grip.
“Sir,” I protested, “you must let him go now.”
“Don’t tell me what I have to do or not do,” he spat at me.
“Please do not speak to my friend in such a manner,” Margaret defended me.
“This man is hurt,” I added, “he could be very much harmed.”
“He deserves it, and once more, don’t order me in my own business. Go about your own!”
“Sir,” Custer wailed, “I am sorry. I won’t ignore my duties!”
“You’ve caused enough damage!”
Mr. Thornton struck the man again.
“Please, this violence is not necessary!” Margaret argued.
“Neither of you are supposed to be here! Watson!”
The overseer who had tended to us before, had now come rushing up to us.
“I am sorry, sir,” he urged, “I left them with Edwards.”
“Get them out of here!”
Watson turned to us.
“Missuses,” Watson urged us, standing in between our persons and Mr. Thornton, blocking us with his arms. “Please, come with me.”
“We cannot just stand here and?—”
“You must, missuses’,” he urged, “please.”
“He won’t kill him?” I extoled, “we can’t just?—”
“Custer will be fine. Please, I beg of you to follow me. Please!”
Seeing the desperate look in Watson’s eyes, we felt compelled to obey, for his sake, if not for our own. Allowing ourselves to be escorted out of the mill, there was a change in everything.
First, all the workers were now looking on us in wonder and interest.
Second, the image of the mill, on the way out of it, was entirely different than how it looked when we entered it. Now the white fluff in the air felt ominous, the machinery sounded diabolical and the whole experience felt as if we were being expelled by an inferno of belligerence and severity.
Despite ourselves, we couldn’t help but turn around and see Custer’s fate. After delivering his last punch, Mr. Thornton moved away from Custer and had his assistant help Custer up to remove him from the mill.
When we left the main hall, I could not help but appeal to Watson, the overseer.
“You said that Custer deserved that punishment?” I asked him.
“Because he did.”
“I cannot believe such,” Margaret refuted.
“Believe it, miss. Custer kept making mistakes since he began working here. He didn’t tend to the machinery properly and could have broken it, due to his lack of attention to it. Also, there were other workers who could have been harmed by his negligence. With how this mill runs, if one worker shirks his responsibilities, the whole set can suffer.”
“But not that way,” Margaret objected. “Not in that way.”
“I take it that you don’t want to listen to Mr. Thornton now?”
“I do not believe that either of us would wish to be in each other’s presence,” Margaret deduced.
“Well, seeing as how this meeting took a sour turn, I’ll just have to do the duty myself,” the overseer said. “The rent at Crampton will be twenty-five pounds a year. Mr. Thornton will speak with your father if he is interested.”
“I don’t believe that we may wish to live under such a man,” Margaret pointed out, “but thank you.”
We had left the mill entirely and now were standing outside, in the courtyard. The mill was surrounded by a gate, and Watson had escorted us there. Seeing how we had taken to the scene that had occurred, Watson rubbed his lips, nervous, and scratched his chin.
“You saw my master at a bad moment,” he explained.
“Did we?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Yes, you did,” he pressed. “You must understand, he has to be hard, because when incompetence occurs here, it can be dangerous. Custer had proven to be an incompetent worker.”
“He could have been dismissed quietly,” Margaret pointed out.
“I say this,” Watson said, with innocent firmness, “you caught him at a bad moment. And again, his line of work requires a man with a temper.”
He bid us a good day and we were left at the gate, perplexed at what we had just experienced.
As we walked, our conversation focused solely on what we had just experienced.
“We cannot live there,” Margaret urged me to believe, “for how can we rent lodgings that have to do with such a man as he?”
“I see the situation you are in,” I sympathized with her. “From the little that I have seen, he is a frightful and belligerent man. His overseer is obviously speaking from a place of extreme prejudice and preference. This Mr. Thornton gives him income, therefore, he naturally must make excuses for his master’s behavior. Although, I suppose it is only natural, and it is a form of loyalty. When you are the one giving a living to someone, they always have a sense of debt. I do not despise Watson, but his obsequiousness and natural blind attachment is something that I have seen in another individual that I do not like.”
“And who is that?”
“My dreaded cousin, Mr. Collins.”
“He is not worthy of Longbourn.”
“No, Margaret, he very much is not. Now, let’s talk about this horrid Mr. Thornton. For it brings a glow to my cheeks.”
“You are jesting. That means that you are trying to make me feel better.”
“Is it working?”
“I wish that it was, but it cannot. Still, thank you, either way.”
We walked on, and once more Milton had not given a proper impression.
That night, I lay in bed, while Jane was on the other side of me.
As I lay there, in the darkness, all the memories of tragedy rushed back upon me, and I was forced to reflect on everything.
The death of our parents, so suddenly snatched from us!
The loss of Longbourn.
Mr. Collins coming in with his new wife to uproot us from our home.
Lydia’s quick rushing into marriage.
Mary taking work in a factory.
Jane having to become a governess.
Kitty becoming a chambermaid.
Our first sight of Milton.
The gray of the skies that antagonized us all.
The smoke, the bustle, the downtrodden look on some of their faces.
To discover what Mr. Thornton was, and how he was customary of Milton Masters.
And Mr. Darcy was here! Mr. Darcy of Pemberley, who now knew everything about our misfortunes.
I could have born it all with fortitude, if the turn our lives had taken was known only to my family. But now, with its fundamental truths being laid bare at the feet of the wealthy man whose proposal I had rejected?
I felt so naked, so exposed to everything.
And it all came upon me so suddenly that all self-control left me.
Before I knew it, I was weeping. The emotion filled my eyes, and the sobs could not be contained.
I tried to keep it quiet, but it was impossible.
Soon after my lamentations began, I felt Jane’s hand on my shoulder.
“Lizzy?”
“Don’t mind me,” I rushed out, “I am being foolish.”
“No, you are not,” she insisted, wrapping her arms around me, like a mother did with their frightened child. In her arms, I wept even harder. “It is well, Elizabeth. Do not be scared to cry.”
“I can’t help it,” I uttered, my voice broken from the emotion that poured forth. “When I came here, I tried to put on a brave face. I always do. It never leaves me. But now, I can’t. I just can’t. We’ve lost everything, Jane. We’ve lost everything and I feel so forlorn, as if I am cracking from within and I don’t know if I can carry on. When seeing this place, I felt as if we have fallen into a form of hell. And I don’t see the light out of it. Now, more than ever, I am certain. I just don’t know! What is happening to me? Why am I like this?”
“You are afraid that your strength and courage are leaving you, don’t you?”
“Yes! I feel it, and I hate it.”
“Elizabeth, my strong little sister, I will tell you a truth that you do not want to hear. You are weak now because you have no choice. So much has been taken from us, and it was not taken slowly. It was taken so swiftly away, and all our security was removed from us to the point where it blinded us. We had no choice but to crack from within.”
Her voice calmed me down and while I was still pained, at least my cries ceased.
“You are not alone with how you feel,” she urged me to believe. “When I first moved here, I wept every night. Especially on the nights that I had to remain at the Kirkpatrick’s home. I felt as if I had been forced to leave paradise and make my way as a stranger in a strange land. Kitty was in despair as well, as you know. But like me, every day that we wake up, we put one foot in front of the other and we learn to walk again. Every day, we do this, and the pain lessens even more. I will not tell you that the pain will end eventually, because I don’t think it is meant to. But I promise you this; you are not weak for crying. You are human. We are allowed to be so, no matter what this godforsaken world tells us to do otherwise.”
“Jane?”
“Yes?”
“Keep telling me that from time to time.”
“I will.”
“Good. Because, by doing so, one day, I might believe it.”
Eventually, I fell asleep.