he sound of them.
She wove them in with her black and dun colored threads.

The wind began at last to blow chilly up the stair-cases, and in at the
cracks; the melted drifts out under the walls to harden; the sun dipped
above the dam; the mill dimmed slowly; shadows crept down between the
frames.

"It's time for lights," said Meg Match, and swore a little at her
spools.

Sene, in the pauses of her thinking, heard snatches of the girls' talk.

"Going to ask out to-morrow, Meg?"

"Guess so, yes; me and Bob Smith we thought we'd go to Boston, and come
up in the theatre train."

"Del Ivory, I want the pattern of your zouave."

"Did I go to church? No, you don't catch me! If I slave all the week,
I'll do what I please on Sunday."

"Hush-sh! There's the boss looking over here!"

"Kathleen Donnavon, be still with your ghost-stories. There's one thing
in the world I never will hear about, and that's dead people."

"Del," said Sene, "I think to-morrow--"

She stopped. Something strange had happened to her frame; it jarred,
buzzed, snapped; the threads untwisted and flew out of place.

"Curious!" she said, and looked up.

Looked up to see her overseer turn wildly, clap his hands to his head,
and fall; to hear a shriek from Del that froze her blood; to see the
solid ceiling gape above her; to see the walls and windows stagger; to
see iron pillars reel, and vast machinery throw up its helpless, giant
arms, and a tangle of human faces blanch and writhe!

She sprang as the floor sunk. As pillar after pillar gave way, she
bounded up an inclined plane, with the gulf yawning after her. It gained
upon her, leaped at her, caught her; beyond were the stairs and an open
door; she threw out her arms, and struggled on with hands and knees,
tripped in the gearing, and saw, as she fell, a square, oaken beam above
her yield and crash; it was of a fresh red color; she dimly wondered
why,--as she felt her hands-slip, her knees slide, support, time,
place, and reason, go utterly out.

"_At ten minutes before five, on Tuesday, the tenth of January, the
Pemberton Mill, all hands being at the time on duty, fell to the
ground_."

So the record flashed over the telegraph wires, sprang into large type
in the newspapers, passed from lip to lip, a nine days' wonder, gave
place to the successful candidate, and the muttering South, and was
forgotten.

Who shall say what it was to the seven hundred and fifty souls who were
buried in the