Page:The Star in the Window.pdf/28

18 mills wait for their men, and when he had passed, followed him, pretending he had greeted her with his big laugh; making believe she was keeping step beside him, even that his shoulder touched hers once in a while. After one of those secret meetings with the Italian, Reba would return to her room alarmed at the courage of her imagination, disturbed that she yielded to such self-indulgence, allowed her thoughts to stray so far into forbidden regions.

Eighty-nine Chestnut Street owed its existence to the mills at the foot of the hill. Somewhere behind those ribbons of stars down there Reba's father sat. His name appeared on the ground-glass panel of the door to the little room he occupied, painted in big black letters—David O. Jerome. David helped make out time-cards. His labors did not require a private office, but the Jerome Wire Company gave him one out of deference to the forty-six per cent. of the Company's shares which he owned. Also out of deference to those shares, he was invited to sit in one of the oak armchairs at the directors' meetings every month.

Reba's father was not what could be called an influential man in his business. He occupied that armchair as unobtrusively as he knew how. The truth was, David had no wish to interfere with a management that had miraculously transformed the stock, which since his father's death had gradually become as barren as a barnacled rock, into property rich and productive. There was never an off-year now. There was never a dividend passed. Ever since Joseph Horween had taken charge of affairs, the mills had yielded a harvest every season. As surely as