In Consequence: A Retelling of North and South (36 page)

                  
“Probably both,” Watson quipped with a wry twist of his mouth.

                  
A consensus of nodding heads and chortled snorts answered his acid conjecture. Thornton’s standards were impeccable and his luck, so they believed, unbeatable.

                  
“Who is she?” repeated Harkness.

                  
“Miss Hale of Crampton,” Slickson announced.

                  
“Miss Hale?” Watson repeated, still confounded.

                  
“She’s none other than that girl that was at Thornton’s dinner party, Eunice tells me,” Slickson enlightened them.

                  
“Do you mean the girl with Bell?” Henderson asked with great interest, remembering the lovely creature who had dazzled them all with her elegant air and snug-fitting gown.

                  
“The spitfire beauty? Now, that’s ripe!” Watson bellowed with a punctuating guffaw at this revelation. “He’ll have a devil of a time getting that one to heel,” he added wickedly.

                  
“So it seems the blood runs hot beneath Thornton’s cool exterior, after all,” Hamper remarked with a snide grin.

                  
“Aye!” Slickson agreed as the other men snickered.

                  
“Is she an heiress — Bell’s niece?” Harkness guessed eagerly, hoping Slickson had all the pertinent information.

                  
Slickson’s brows drew together at that suggestion. “No … no. Eunice did not mention it. As far as can be discerned, she’s not by any stretch of the imagination the heiress. The family’s come from Hampshire. Her father gave up his country parish and moved wife and daughter here to become a tutor. Thornton’s been taking lessons from the old man, twice a week,” he revealed, shaking his head dubiously at the customs of the youngest member of their group.

                  
“I’ll wager it’s not the lessons he’s been after,” Watson wise-cracked, breaking the sober atmosphere into a round of sniggers once more.

                  
At this moment, the Master of Marlborough Mills entered the room.

                  
“Ah, Thornton!” Slickson greeted him. “We understand that congratulations are in order — you’re to be married!” the small, self-important man announced with a twinge of nervousness, wondering how much the imposing groom-to-be had heard of their bawdy banter.

                  
“Shackled, Thornton! There’s no escape — let me tell you! They’ll bleed you dry and still complain that the curtains need replacing, or some such thing,” Hamper endeavored to warn him, holding out his hand with a wide grin.

                  
A shy grin creased the corners of Mr. Thornton’s mouth as he gripped the hands extended to him one by one. “Thank you,” he muttered, ignoring the warnings against his future liberty.

                  
“She’s a fair young lass,” Henderson congratulated him.

                  
“Not afraid to speak her mind, eh Thornton?” Watson ribbed him with a challenging gleam in his eye.

                  
“She’ll learn soon enough to bend to your will,” Henderson added as a matter of fact.

                  
Mr. Thornton chaffed at this crude assumption, his ire rising at their ignorance. “Miss Hale and I have come to understand each other better. I believe she now understands the challenges we masters have to face,” he managed to respond with calm civility, distinctly uncomfortable to be under the scrutiny of his business fellows.

                  
“Indeed,” Watson allowed politely, raising a dubious eyebrow as he exchanged covert glances with his cohorts.

                  
“Now, then, gentlemen, shall we discuss the matter at hand?” Mr. Thornton proposed with smooth authority.

                  
When their consultation had ended, Mr. Thornton stood aloof in momentary contemplation. As the other masters talked among themselves, Watson ambled over to the loner’s side.

                  
“Thornton, if I may have a word with you ... ” the comfortably plump fellow began in earnest.

                  
The younger man gave him his full attention.

                  
“I’ve been meaning to speak to you … about your sister,” he faltered nervously. Adolphus Watson cleared his throat and began again with determination. “I wish to ask your permission to pay her my addresses,” he finished. “Ever since your dinner party, I have not been able to put her out of my mind….”

                  
Mr. Thornton half-listened to the ramblings of the middle-aged man before him as he contemplated this request. It had not been wholly unexpected, for he had seen the furtive glances Watson had given his sister that evening. Whether Fanny had taken notice was past his reckoning, but in a flash of insight he realized that he had never in his life heard Fanny speak of marriage as anything beyond a hoped-for attainment of stature and wealth. She did not seek a love match; her affections were spent upon all that pampered and impressed.

                  
“Yes, of course, Watson,” he answered the suitor, halting the older man’s speech. “I’m certain it is an honor to receive your interest,” he assured him.

                  
“Yes? Oh well, thank you, Thornton!” he muttered in his excitement as a grin of relief and triumph spread across his face.

                  
“I should like to ask you something as well,” Mr. Thornton returned, taking hold of an opportunity which suddenly emerged in his mind. “Would you stand with me at my wedding?” he candidly proposed.

                  
“Yes. Yes, of course. It will be an honor,” Watson answered, heartily shaking the hand of the man who he hoped would someday become his brother-in-law.

                  
*****

                  
The night air caressed Mr. Thornton’s face with a welcome breeze. Released from the smoky confines of the meeting room, he walked briskly, the crisp evening temperature invigorating his senses.

                  
All the talk of the strike and the riot’s effect on business had reminded him of the day when she had first thrown her arms around him. Brave, passionate girl! He had not known then that this singular act would forever alter the course of their hitherto estranged lives. Everything he had ever known of life and love had come to a blinding revelation that day. There had been no turning back, once he had felt the touch of her tenderness turned toward him.

                  
All the force of energy from those charged emotions came flowing back into his restless gait. He pushed past the corner of Marlborough Street, his feet following his unquenchable yearning to be near her.

                  
What ridicule he would meet if his colleagues knew where he intended to go at this late hour! But they could never know the feelings in his breast. He doubted they had ever known a tenth part of what he himself constantly felt. He had not known before, had never guessed what love was. He had been too consumed by his work to be aware of any other woman. Now he loved, and would love. It was the vital force of his very being.

                  
He shrank from the harrowing thought of how he should have endured if she had rejected him. He was grateful beyond measure for the forces of fate that had propelled her into his arms and opened her heart to care for him.

                  
How well he remembered the days when her pungent words, flung disdainfully for his ears, had culled from him every desire to prove himself worthy of her esteem; how her strict resolutions of justice and mercy had tormented him, constrained him to consider the paths he had chosen and the way which promised an even higher purpose and accomplishment.

                  
How unstained from the torpid and sinuous ways of men she was! Unfazed by the subtle allure of self-satisfaction that allowed men to rationalize the sufferings of others, she held firmly to the right, which blazed before her continually from that fountain of pure goodness and strong compassion that was the very essence of her.

                  
He took vigorous strides to match the throbbing emotions that swelled to feverous pitch within him. He had never known such a woman. Courageous and unflinching in her support of all that she deemed worthy of her devotion, she was a paragon of strength and virtue. Yet undergirding such fortitude lay the soft tenderness of her feminine heart, that she lavished upon those within her realm of care.

                  
His chest heaved with an overpowering sense of awe that the tenderness and passion he had so jealously watched her bestow on others was now willingly given to him. The contemplation that he should receive — foremost and forever — her most intimate affections drove him to near madness in his desire to claim them.

                  
Arriving finally at the last terraced house on the darkened, empty street, he raised his eyes reverently to the upper level where he knew she must dwell. It was well past ten o’clock. A fleeting suggestion chided him for the sentimental lunacy of this homage, but he brushed it aside, acknowledging with unrepentant zeal that he was indeed a lovesick fool with only one hope of recovery — to make her his own and abide in the constant companionship of her presence. If it was madness then let it be so, but he veritably felt the palpitating nearness of her standing in this place.

                  
He could not help imagining her gently closed eyelids and parted lips as she slept. He ached to be the one to care for her, to offer her refuge and comfort when the cruelty of this world threatened to mar her sweet confidence in life’s goodness.

                  
Picturing her in peaceful repose, he allowed his mind to wander more dangerously. He imagined the curvaceous form of her body, lying in peaceful repose on her maiden’s bed, delicately clothed in some flowing nightdress without the encumbrance of any feminine bindings. He closed his eyes to quench the rising ardor this vision roused in him. To know what would be his, and yet to know he must wait was an excruciating torment.

                  
How much he yearned for the day when she would live in his house and belong in his bed could scarcely be described. It was an agonizing ache, a torturous pleasure that he bore with every breath whenever he was parted from her.

                  
To be wedded to her was the most glorious freedom he could imagine! No longer to be imprisoned in the solitude of silence and forbearance, he would have someone to whom he might unburden the heavy weights of his mind — someone who would speak soft words of encouragement, assuaging the tension of responsibility with sweet caresses and loving arms. And he would love her in return — without reserve and with all the power his body and soul could give.

                  
He looked up to the heavens where a faint glow of silvery light shone from behind the clouds in the blackened sky.

                  
He believed that a power beyond them both must have brought them together. A future more wonderful than any he could have imagined spread before him. Joy and profound love would now fill his days.  She had awakened him to a higher purpose in everything he did, and with her compassion and clear insight, things that he had not conceived of before now lay within the grasp. To have her by his side would throw open the doors of achievement to endless possibility.

                  
He let out a sigh of wistful impatience for all that would be.

                  
He stood silently in the darkness with face upturned toward her house. At length, he turned with resignation toward his own dwelling, where the cold barrenness of every familiar corner seemed to whisper the promise of her coming.

Chapter Fourteen

Two gray-garbed men shuffled into the doorway of the Master’s office the next afternoon, one sneering doubtfully at this intrusion and the other eyeing with caution the mill owner scribbling at his desk. 

Mr. Thornton finished the tabulation he had been making and put his quill in its place. Raising his eyes at last to the figures standing just inside his office, he gave an inquiring look to his overseer.

“This ruffian claims you’ve offered him work with a message from your own hand,” Mr. Williams reported derisively, a grin of amusement poised to witness the Master’s retort.

“Nicholas Higgins, sir,” the stranger announced himself properly, a tinge of defiance in his tone. The long-time mill worker held himself erect with cap in hand, fastening the shrewd glimmer of his eyes on the Master.

Mr. Thornton studied the union leader with great interest at this revelation. He had long been curious to see the man who had earned Margaret’s friendship and was deemed worthy enough by her to be called by his Christian name. The spark of old jealousy flared for a moment until he cast it aside as illogical. Had he not won her whole affections?