"They'll be wanting me with odd jobs;
we'll be after getting along some way," she said with satisfaction.
"March is a long month, so it is--there'll be plinty time for change
before the ind of it," said Mary Cassidy hopefully. "The agent will be
thinking whatever can he do; sure he's very ingenious. Look at him how
well he persuaded the directors to l'ave off wit' making cotton cloth
like everybody else, and catch a chance wit' all these new linings and
things! He's done very well, too. There bees no sinse in a shut-down
anny way, the looms and cards all suffers and the bands all slacks if
they don't get stiff. I'd sooner pay folks to tind their work whatever
it cost."
"'Tis true for you," agreed Mrs. Kilpatrick.
"What'll ye do wit' the shild, now she's no chance of pay, any more?"
asked Mary relentlessly, and poor Maggie's eyes grew dark with fright
as the conversation abruptly pointed her way. She sometimes waked up
in misery in Mrs. Kilpatrick's warm bed, crying for fear that she was
going to be sent back to the poorhouse.
"Maggie an' me's going to kape together awhile yet," said the good old
woman fondly. "She's very handy for me, so she is. We 'on't part with
'ach other whativer befalls, so we 'on't," and Maggie looked up with a
wistful smile, only half reassured. To her the shut-down seemed like
the end of the world.
Some of the French people took time by the forelock and boarded the
midnight train that very Saturday with all their possessions.
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