"She will buy herself no more watches," said Herman, with an air of
finality.
Rudolph hesitated. The organization wanted Herman; he had had great
influence with the millworkers. Through him many things would be
possible. The Spencers trusted him, too. At any time Rudolph knew they
would be glad to reinstate him, and once inside the plant, there was no
limit to the mischief he could do. But Herman was too valuable to risk.
Suppose he was told now about Graham Spencer and Anna, and beat the girl
and was jailed for it? Besides, ugly as Rudolph's suspicions were, they
were as yet only suspicions. He decided to wait until he could bring
Herman proof of Graham Spencer's relations with Anna. When that time
came he knew Herman. He would be clay for the potter. He, Rudolph,
intended to be the potter.
Katie had an afternoon off that Sunday. When she came back that night,
Herman, weary from the late hours of Saturday, was already snoring in
his bed. Anna met Katie at her door and drew her in.
"I've found a nice room," Katie whispered. "Here's the address written
down. The street cars go past it. Three dollars a week. Are you ready?"
Anna was ready, even to her hat. Over it she placed a dark veil, for
she was badly disfigured. Then, with Katie crying quietly, she left the
house. In the flare from the Spencer furnaces Katie watched until the
girl reappeared on the twisting street below which still followed the
old path--that path where Herman, years ago, had climbed through the
first spring wild flowers to the cottage on the hill.
Graham was uncomfortable the next morning on his way to the mill. Anna's
face had haunted him. But out of all his confusion one thing stood out
with distinctness. If he was to be allowed to marry Marion, he must have
no other entanglement. He would go to her clean and clear.
So he went to the office, armed toward Anna with a hardness he was far
from feeling.
"Poor little kid!" he reflected on the way down. "Rotten luck, all
round."
He did not for a moment believe that it would be a lasting grief. He
knew that sort of girl, he reflected, out of his vast experience of
twenty-two. They were sentimental, but they loved and forgot easily.
He hoped she would forget him; but even with that, there was a vague
resentment that she should do so.
"She'll marry some mill-hand," he reflected, "and wear a boudoir cap,
and have a lot of children who need their noses wiped."