Chapter 10 - Page 2

hours, though now a smoldering one, might at any hour become a
burning one, only there was the coming war. If the men went on strike,
he could then reasonably lock his factory gates. No, he could not. The
inner John Hatton would not permit the outer man to do such a thing. His
looms must work while he had a pound of cotton to feed them.

This resolution, warm and strong in his heart, cheered him, and he
hastened home. Then he wondered how it would be with him there, and a
feeling of unhappiness conquered for a moment. But John's mental bravery
was the salt to all his other virtues, and mental bravery does not quail
before an uncertainty.

He hoped that Jane would, as was her usual custom, meet him at the
door, that she would hear his step and answer the call of it. But she
did not. Then he remembered that the night had turned chilly and that it
was near to dinner-time. She was probably in her dressing-room, but this
uncertainty was not cheerful. Yet he sang as he prepared himself for
dinner. He did not know why he sang for the song was not in his
heart--he only felt it to be an act of relief and encouragement.

When he went to the dining-room Jane was there. She roused herself with
a sleepy languor and stretched out her arms to him with welcoming
smiles. For a moment he stood motionless and silent. She had dressed
herself wonderfully in a long, graceful robe of white broadcloth, rich
and soft and shining as the white satin which lay in folds about the
bosom and sleeves and encircled her waist in a broad belt. Her hair,
freed of puffs and braids, showed all its beauty in glossy smoothness
and light coils, and in its meshes was one large red rose, the fellow of
which was partly hidden among the laces at her bosom. Half-asleep she
went to meet him, and his first feeling was a kind of awe at the sight
of her. He had not dreamed she was so beautiful. Without a word he took
her hands and hiding his emotion in some commonplace remark, drew her to
his side.

"You are lovelier than on your bridal morning, most sweet Jane," he
whispered. "What have you been doing to yourself?"

"Well, John," she laughed, "Mrs. Tracy sent me word she was going to
call between four and five to give me a few points about the girls'
sewing-class, and I thought I would at the same time give her a few
points about dressing herself. You know she is usually a fright."

"I thought--perhaps--you had dressed yourself to please me."

"You are quite right, John. Your pleasure is always the first motive for
anything I do or wear."

The dinner hour passed to such pleasant platitudes as John's description
of the manner in which Greenwood broke up the radical