Chapter 20
Chapter twenty
As the longer days of June progressed, the lace curtains in her mother’s sitting room waved in the breeze of open windows.
Margaret had found some beautiful pink and white peonies at the market and brought them home to sit in a wide vase for her mother’s pleasure.
The flowers made Margaret long to be in Helstone, where the vicarage garden would be blooming and the wildflowers would cover the landscape of her childhood home.
She did not let such yearnings fill her mind for too long, for there were challenges enough in Milton that needed her full attention. Pining for the past did her no good in the present. She must take courage to meet each day with as happy a disposition as possible.
One of her pleasures at this time was to walk across town to visit Bessy.
As she became more familiar with the parts of town she crossed—the high street markets, the mills, and the neighborhoods of row houses and lodgings—she began to feel she was a part of this teeming town.
Having a connection to the Higgins family gave her a heartfelt interest in the people who made the town what it was.
Arriving at Bessy’s one afternoon, she was pleased to find her friend sitting up and smiling from ear to ear.
“Yo’ll not guess who has been to visit us the other night,” Bessy prodded.
“Why, I’m afraid I don’t know many other people here. Who?” Margaret answered, perplexed at Bessy’s apparent eagerness.
“The Master—that’s who!” she announced triumphantly.
“The Master?... Mr. Thornton?” Margaret stammered.
Bessy took pleasure in witnessing her surprise. “He came the other night to speak with father. “He as much as said he’d made a promise to yo’ to do it,” she said, excited to tell the story she’d finally waited days to tell.
Margaret was speechless, so Bessy continued, “He didn’t stay long. Father’s temper put him in a mood to take his leave.” She sighed heavily.
“What did Mr. Thornton say?” Margaret demanded.
“He tried to explain why he couldn’t pay more wages, but Father wouldn’t hear it.”
They were silent for a moment. “I am glad he came, nonetheless,” Margaret remarked. “I had not expected—“
“I’ve not told you all,” Bessy interrupted, a smile again appearing on her face.
“While he were here, I had one of my coughing spells. He wished me well when he left. But that’s not the end of it…
” She could scarcely contain her wonder over what she would reveal next.
“He sent a doctor to see me yesterday. A doctor!” she repeated, still incredulous.
Bessy’s head drooped and she grew somber. “Of course, he said I had the cotton lung, which we all knew. And that there wasn’t any cure for it. But he gave me this bottle of laudanum to take if the pain gets bad,” she said, holding the brown bottle in her hand as some precious relic.
She looked up at Margaret with an expression of amazement. “Imagine, such as me gettin’ a doctor to come and see me. And this…” she held the bottle up, “he gave to me and said there was no charge.”
Margaret’s eyes filled with tears to see Bessy so affected by this simple act of care.
Bessy studied her friend for a moment. “He must think a good deal of yo’ to come as he did. None of the other masters would have done it.”
Margaret looked down, feeling a blush rise to her face. “I asked him to try talking to your father in hopes that all this talk of striking might be quelled. But perhaps Mr. Thornton is right, and I don’t understand.”
“But you tried to get these men to see reason,” Bessy reassured her, laying her hand on Margaret’s arm. “Sometimes I think they’re all fools. I’m so tired of all their fighting.”
Margaret’s mouth quirked in a wry smile. “Now,” she exclaimed in a brighter tone, breaking the sullen strain of conversation. “I have not told you all,“ she said with a secretive smile. “My family has been invited to dinner at the Thorntons.”
“Oh! But it’s for the masters and the like. And sometimes the mayor or a parliament member will attend,” the Milton girl replied.
“So you think I am not worthy to attend?” Margaret teased her friend.
“Ah no, but I’m telling yo’ that as yo’r father is no master or dignitary, yo’re getting invited must count for something else,” Bessy said, giving Margaret a knowing look. “I knew he had eyes for yo’, that day in mill. Yo’ll marry him if he asks yo’, won’t yo’?”
“Bessy!” Margaret protested, her heartbeat quickening. If only Bessy knew that he had already asked as much.
“I long to end my suffering here and think on how it will be in the life everlasting, but it would make me happy to see yo’ marry the master before I go!
” Bessy lay back in her bed and looked dreamily at the ceiling, imagining it.
She propped herself up on her elbows. “What will you wear to the dinner?” she asked.
Margaret was glad to drop the subject of marriage. “I told you I have several nice dresses from London. I’ve not chosen what to wear yet, but you shouldn’t worry about that,” she mock scolded.
“Aye, but other girls there will dress to catch Mr. Thornton’s eye, and yo’ must carry over all.”
“Bessy! You are truly scandalous!” Margaret exclaimed. “I’ve not said if I would marry him.”
“But why wouldn’t yo’?” Bessy was perplexed. “I can see now how he might bend more to the workers if yo’re to be his wife,” she said.
“I doubt a man like Mr. Thornton would by influenced by any woman, let alone me, who is a southern-bred woman with little knowledge of how this town runs.”
“But he’s already come to talk to Father, hasn’t he? The likes of Slickson or Hamper would never have come as Thronton did. And after all Father’s insults he still took pains to send a doctor to me.”
Margaret was struck by Bessy’s words. She wondered how much influence she could hope to have over Mr. Thornton’s attitude toward his workers.
She had been wrong to assume Nicholas would be receptive to Mr. Thornton’s explanations. Perhaps she was wrong to assume Mr. Thornton was unmovable in his opinions and practices.
Margaret was still pondering everything Bessy had said when she arrived home much later. Her mother was awake when she came in and called for her. Ever since they had received the invitation to the Thornton dinner party, the idea of attending had animated Mrs. Hale.
“Just think, Margaret,” she had enthused, “we haven’t been invited to a proper dinner in years! Oh, but I have nothing to wear!” she suddenly recalled, with a corresponding frown.
“You can wear one of my dresses, mamma. We can shorten the skirts, and take in the bodice a little,” Margaret had suggested brightly.
Her mother then wanted Margaret to parade in front of her in the dresses Margaret herself might wear, so that they could choose which would suit best for the occasion.
Although she was a trifle tired from her walk, Margaret cheerfully obliged, giving a twirl and curtsy with each frock for her mother’s amusement.
And with Dixon’s added opinions, it was decided that Mrs. Hale would have the pink dress altered for herself while Margaret would wear the gown of pale green satin.
“Do you think it may be too much for a Milton dinner party?” Margaret queried, standing in the off-the-shoulder dress that had elicited praise from her mother and the family servant.
“No, my dear. It is just what a young woman should wear to an elegant evening affair,” her mother assured her. “Now, I wonder what necklace I might have that would set it off perfectly.”
Margaret gave an agreeing smile, but the thought of presenting herself in such a gown before Mr. Thornton made her insides churn with apprehension.
A dress of this fashion was meant to capture the attention of men, and she was certain it would accomplish its task in attracting Mr. Thornton’s notice.
What she still could not decipher, however, was whether she truly wished to secure his interest in her.
Mr. Hale told Margaret at dinner that evening that Mr. Thornton would come to his lesson on Thursday. The thought of seeing him again made her muscles tense as a flood of conflicting emotions coursed through her. She had not yet spoken to him about his meeting with Nicholas.
She had sent him on a fool’s errand, and he would be displeased with her.
She wondered if his interest in her would wane because of her meddling.
A discomforting feeling pressed down on her.
She tried to will it away by telling herself that she would not be affected at the change of his affections, for she had not been certain of her own.
Thursday evening came on the heels of a warm day. The windows and doors of the Hales’ row house were open to let air circulate. Upstairs with her mother and Dixon, Margaret was distracted by the expectation of Mr. Thornton’s arrival.
When the doorbell rang, she listened intently for sounds from below—the muffled voice of her father’s welcome and the deeper tones of a reply.
She stayed upstairs with some impatience, giving short replies to Dixon’s commentary on how the weather in Milton differed from that in Hampshire.
When it was time for Dixon to brush her mother’s hair, Margaret escaped to her father’s study on the first floor.
She stepped quietly through the doorway as they talked.
The discourse halted, and both men looked up at her entrance.
A lantern lit the center of the book-filled room, leaving the perimeter in shadows.
Her father smiled his welcome, but Margaret could not read the expression on Mr. Thornton’s face.
His glance swept over her entire form with a glint in his eye, his lips almost a smile.
He had taken off his frock coat, and was wearing only his waistcoat and shirtsleeves, as she had seen him in the mill.
A wave of warmth spread through her to see him thus, and she almost turned to leave.
But she falteringly took a seat by the door as they resumed their discussion.
Her father had also taken off his frock coat this warm evening.
Margaret kept her head bowed over her needlework, occasionally taking surreptitious glances at Mr. Thornton’s profile—the way his dark hair brushed behind the white collar of his shirt, and the mesmerizing form of his arms that could be seen through the billowy cotton sleeves in lamp light.
When Mr. Thornton stood to leave, Margaret swiftly put her work into her basket and stood, ready to see him out as he put his coat on. Student and tutor shook hands, and Margaret walked the short distance behind her father’s pupil to the front door.
“Bessy tells me that you talked with her father. I am sorry Nicholas was not more agreeable, but I am glad you went to see him nonetheless,” she said as he gathered his hat from the hook on the wall and gave it to him.
He turned to study her deferential manner, the folded hands in front of her, the bowed head and faint blush on her cheeks.
“I must apologize for my rough manner—“ he began.
“No, I was too forward in coming to you. Let us not speak of it,” she returned, wringing her hands and lowering her eyes from his gaze.
He was silent.
“It was good of you to send the doctor to see Bessy,” she began again. “It did her much good just to be visited, I am certain.”
“I am sorry your friend is suffering. Hamper cares nothing about the health of his workers. If she had only worked at my mill from the start, she might have been spared such trouble,” he said with a creased brow. “How is your mother?” he asked.
“She is fairly well at present, thank you. Although there are other times when she is put out. She likes to sit by her window where she can see some wildflowers beyond the canal.”
“Would she like to go to them?” he asked.
“It is too far—“
“I should be happy to take her there—to take your family there sometime when she is well enough to enjoy it. Would she enjoy a carriage ride to the meadows beyond?” he offered.
Margaret blinked her surprise, unable to speak for a moment. “Why yes, I believe that would be very fine. But please do not go to any trouble over—“
“It is no trouble at all. If you believe it would do her good,” he insisted.
“Yes, I believe it would. Thank you,” she replied.
He hesitated a moment, hat in hand, as if to say something else, but then changed his mind and nodded goodbye before heading out.
She stood in the darkened hallway for several moments, contemplating his kind offer. How was it that he always surprised her? She had long relegated his kind to a category of men she could not admire. Yet he continued to wrest from her the satisfaction of dismissing him as an unworthy suitor.