From Mr. Baggs, the long fibre and the short which he had combed out of it, proceeded to the spinning mill; and now a girl came for the stricks he had just created.

Their future under the new master was still on every tongue at Bridetown Mill, and the women turned to the few men who worked among them for information on this paramount subject.

“No, I ain’t heard no more, Sarah,” answered the hackler to Miss Northover’s question.  “You may be sure that those it concerns most will be the last to hear of any changes; and you may also be sure that the changes, when made, will not favour us.”

“You can’t tell that,” answered Sarah, gathering the stricks.  “Old Mrs. Chick, our spreader minder, says the young have always got bigger hearts than the old, and she’d sooner trust them than—­”

Mr. Baggs tore a hank through the comb with such vigour that its steel teeth trembled and the dust flew.

“Tell Granny Chick not to be a bigger fool than God made her,” he said.  “The young have got harder hearts than the old, and education, though it may make the head bigger for all I know, makes the heart smaller.  He’ll be hard—­hard—­and I lay a week’s wages that he’ll get out of his responsibilities by shovelling ’em on his dead father.”

“How can he?” asked Sarah.

“By letting things be as they are.  By saying his father knew best.”

“Young men never think that,” answered she. “’Tis well known that no young man ever thought his father knew better than himself.”

“Then he’ll pretend to for his own convenience.”

“What about all that talk of changes for the better before Mister Ironsyde died then?”

“Talk of dead men won’t go far.  We’ll hear no more of that.”

Sarah frowned and went her way.  At the door, however, she turned.

“I might get to hear something about it next Sunday very like,” she said.  “I’m going into Bridport to my Aunt Nelly at ‘The Seven Stars’; and she’s a great friend of Richard Gurd at ‘The Tiger’; and ’tis there Mister Raymond spends half his time, they say.  So Mr. Gurd may have learned a bit about it.”

“No doubt he’ll hear a lot of words, and as for Raymond Ironsyde, his father knew him for a man with a bit of a heart in him and didn’t trust him accordingly.  But you can take it from me—­”

A bell rang and its note struck Mr. Baggs dumb.  He ceased both to speak and work, dropped his hank, turned down his shirt sleeves and put on his coat.  Sarah at the stroke of the bell also manifested no further interest in Levi’s forebodings but left him abruptly.  For it was noon and the dinner-hour had come.

CHAPTER IV

CHAINS FOR RAYMOND

Raymond Ironsyde had spent his life thus far in a healthy and selfish manner.  He owned no objection to hard work of a physical nature, for as a sportsman and athlete he had achieved fame and was jealous to increase it.  He preserved the perspective of a boy into manhood; while his father waited, not without exasperation, for him to reach adult estate in mind as well as body.  Henry Ironsyde was still waiting when he died and left Raymond to the mercy of Daniel.