The Silk Factory by Judith Allnatt Page B

hatred: a deep seam of hate like coal in rock, dark, thick fuel on which she could draw.
    Many tales were told about the master. Some said in his youth he had been an adventurer, and had sailed on a voyage to find the Northwest Passage, some that he was nothing but a Spitalfields mercer who had made his money from the labour of families in weaving garrets and had moved north after a brush with the law, leaving them to starve. Others said that he had devised an instrument for discovering new mines and had made his fortune in the Americas. All that was known for sure was that ten years ago he had bought up a bundle of property in the village: a row of cottages, two inns – the Harp and the Bull – the silk manufactory and the High House at the end of the street, where he lived with his wife, Tabitha, and his daughter, Hebe. Beulah had caught sight of the same fear in their eyes that she was determined to check in her own. For all their full bellies, fine clothes and feathered bonnets, she wouldn’t want to change places and live under their roof; no, not for one day. Fowler by name and foul-tempered by nature, she thought as she rested her arm for a moment before threading another spool.
    In the workshop, muted conversation began again amongst the weavers and drawboys, adding a background hum to the clack of the looms. The room began to lose the worst of its clammy chill with the labour of its inmates, regaining its usual smell of sweat and human breath. The girl next to her, Biddy, said in a low voice, ‘What did the master do?’
    ‘Threw one of they weights at my head,’ she said, ‘but his aim was out of true.’ She finished off the pirn she was filling and put it in her tray. She glanced round at Alice and saw her busy with her own winding. ‘Do you want to see?’ She pulled up her sleeve to reveal a swollen forearm already turning blue and they inspected it together.
    ‘It’s a bad ’un,’ Biddy said. ‘You’d best keep out of his way.’
    Alice stood up, placed her palms in the small of her back and stretched. She began to check the trays, working her way along the row of children, picking out any pirns that were badly wound and giving the child the sharp side of her tongue. Jonas, a clumsy boy with big hands more suited to ploughing or building, had clearly spoiled several as Alice fetched him a stinging blow on the side of his head that left him snivelling.
    Biddy glanced down at Beulah’s half-empty tray. Quickly she picked up a few of the pirns from her own full tray and dumped them into Beulah’s. She signed to Thomasin, the girl working on the other side of Beulah, to do the same. Thomasin hesitated, frowning, and then grudgingly passed a handful of spools over while Biddy made a great fuss of bending to set up another bobbin so that her body blocked Alice’s line of sight.
    All three girls were busily winding again by the time Alice reached them; they held their breath as she peered and poked into each tray with her quick eyes and her veiny hands. She hesitated at Beulah’s as if puzzled by its contents when Beulah had clearly been struggling along at half-speed. She looked suspiciously at the three of them, her mouth set in a hard line. As she passed on to the rest of the row, Beulah mouthed her thanks to Biddy, who gave a tiny nod, and to Thomasin, who muttered, ‘Never mind that. Bread at dinner is what you owe me.’
    Jonas was sent round to collect the trays and deliver them to the weavers and the task of filling more began again.
    Lieutenant Jack Stamford reined in his horse from a trot to a walk as they left the snow-covered fields and turned out on to a cart track, where ice showed dark and glassy in the ruts. The mare’s breath steamed on the air as she snorted and side-stepped, dancing a little at the treacherous feeling of ice beneath her hooves. ‘Shh, gently now, Maisie, gently.’ He held her firm, leant forward and laid his hand on her neck until he brought her to a standstill,