Page:Between Two Loves.djvu/110

Rh she was under the tyranny of the weather. Monotonous rain filled the air, and saddened and weakened her. The conflict for bare existence, begun before daylight every morning, seemed on this morning almost too hard to bear. She lifted her little tin can and started for the mill. There was a long string of workers before her, and the clattering of their clogs upon the stone pavements hurt her in every nerve. Ben Holden was at the gates, but she did not speak to him, until the looms stopped for breakfast at eight o'clock. Then she said, "Ben Holden, I want to speak to t' master to-day."

"There's nobody will hinder thee. Is ta in trouble, Sarah?"

"Ay, above a bit. It's about Steve. I hev prayed, and I hev better prayed to God, to keep him in t' right road, and it seems like he is letting t' poor lad get varry far out of it."

"Don't thee reckon to know so much. God lets us go from one side of t' road to t' other and act a good deal as it pleases wersens; but we are fast tethered to His hand, after all, my lass, and when we think we are carrying out our own wills, we are carrying out His will too, and we