Last of all they kept sober company with two or three lame persons and
a cheerful delayed little group of new doffers, the children who
minded bobbins in the weave-room and who were young enough to be tired
and even timid. One of these doffers, a pale, pleasant-looking child,
was all fluffy with cotton that had clung to her little dark plaid
dress. When Mrs. Kilpatrick spoke to her she answered in a hoarse
voice that appealed to one's sympathy. You felt that the hot room and
dry cotton were to blame for such hoarseness; it had nothing to do
with the weather.
"Where are you living now, Maggie, dear?" the old woman asked.
"I'm in Callahan's yet, but they won't keep me after to-day," said the
child. "There's a man wants to get board there, they're changing round
in the rooms and they've no place for me. Mis' Callahan couldn't keep
me 'less I'd get my pay raised."
Mrs. Kilpatrick gave a quick glance at Mary Cassidy. "Come home with
me then, till yez get a bite o' dinner, and we'll talk about it," she
said kindly to the child. "I'd a wish for company the day."
The two old companions had locked their brooms into a three-cornered
closet at the stair-foot and were crossing the mill yard together.
They were so much slower than the rest that they could only see the
very last of the crowd of mill people disappearing along the streets
and into the boarding-house doors. It was late autumn, the elms were
bare, one could see the whole village of Farley, all its poverty and
lack of beauty, at one glance.
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