a social sanction on the episode, to
classify it as comfortably usual and unimportant. He could see that her
friend's manner put Bessy at ease, helping her to ask her own questions,
and to reflect on his suggestions, with less bewilderment and more
self-confidence. Mrs. Ansell had the faculty of restoring to her the
belief in her reasoning powers that her father could dissolve in a
monosyllable.

The talk, on this occasion, had turned mainly on the future of the
Dillon family, on the best means of compensating for the accident, and,
incidentally, on the care of the young children of the mill-colony.
Though Amherst did not believe in the extremer forms of industrial
paternalism, he was yet of opinion that, where married women were
employed, the employer should care for their children. He had been
gradually, and somewhat reluctantly, brought to this conviction by the
many instances of unavoidable neglect and suffering among the children
of the women-workers at Westmore; and Mrs. Westmore took up the scheme
with all the ardour of her young motherliness, quivering at the thought
of hungry or ailing children while her Cicely, leaning a silken head
against her, lifted puzzled eyes to her face.

On the larger problems of the case it was less easy to fix Bessy's
attention; but Amherst was far from being one of the extreme theorists
who reject temporary remedies lest they defer the day of general
renewal, and since he looked on every gain in the material condition of
the mill-hands as a step in their moral growth, he was quite willing to
hold back his fundamental plans while he discussed the establishment of
a nursery, and of a night-school for the boys in the mills.

The third time he called, he found Mr. Langhope and Mr. Halford Gaines
of the company. The President of the Westmore mills was a trim
middle-sized man, whose high pink varnish of good living would have
turned to purple could he have known Mr. Langhope's opinion of his
jewelled shirt-front and the padded shoulders of his evening-coat.
Happily he had no inkling of these views, and was fortified in his
command of the situation by an unimpaired confidence in his own
appearance; while Mr. Langhope, discreetly withdrawn behind a veil of
cigar-smoke, let his silence play like a fine criticism over the various
phases of the discussion.

It was a surprise to Amherst to find himself in Mr. Gaines's presence.
The President, secluded in his high office, seldom visited the