Page 53 of The Armor of Light

‘Let’s just kneel down here for a few moments,’ she said to Kit.

He looked puzzled, but did not question her, and they both knelt at the grave.

Sal thought about Harry: his wiry body, his argumentative disposition, his love for her and his care for Kit. She felt sure he was in heaven now. She remembered their courtship: first the flirting, then the tentative kissing and holding hands, the secret meetings in the woods after church on Sunday, when they could not keep their hands off one another, and finally the realization that they wanted to spend their lives together. She also remembered how he had died in agony, and she wondered how such cruelty could possibly be God’s will.

Then she prayed aloud extempore, as Methodists did in their meetings. She asked Harry to watch over her and their child, and she begged God to help her look after Kit. She asked forgiveness for the sin of punching Will. She could not quite bring herself to pray for Will’s ear to get better. She asked that her trials would not go on much longer, and then she said amen, and Kit said amen too.

They stood up and walked out of the graveyard.

Kit said: ‘Where are we going now?’

‘Kingsbridge,’ said Sal.

*

Amos and Roger had spent the last few days adapting the spinning jenny.

They had worked in a back room of Amos’s warehouse, behind a locked door. They did not want the news of the new engine to get out before they were ready.

They were testing it with English wool, which was tougher than imported Spanish or Irish, the long fibres making it less liable to break. Roger had tied a loose roving to each of the eight spindles, then threaded it through the clamp that held it taut during spinning. When it was done, Amos operated the machine.

Hand spinning was an art that had to be learned, but operating the machine was simple. With his right hand Amos turned the big wheel slowly, making the spindles turn, twisting the threads. Then he stopped the wheel and carefully moved the beam forward, up the length of the machine, to feed new lengths of roving to the spindles.

‘It works!’ he said jubilantly.

Roger said: ‘At the Frankland place they turned the wheel much faster.’

Amos increased the pace, and the threads began to break.

‘As we feared,’ said Roger.

‘How can we fix that?’

‘I’ve got some ideas.’

Over several days Roger had tried out different ideas. The one that w0rked involved weighting the threads to keep them taut at every stage of the process. It had taken more trial and error to get the weight exactly right. Today, after a frustrating morning of trial and error, they succeeded; and then Amos’s mother called them to dinner.

*

Sal’s memory of Kingsbridge was vivid. Although her last visit was ten years ago, it had been an astonishing experience, and she remembered every detail. And today she could see how much the city had changed.

Approaching from the high ground to the north, she could see the familiar landmarks: the cathedral, the domed Wool Exchange, and the river with its distinctive double bridge. The place seemed bigger, especially to the south-west, where there were more houses than she remembered. But she also saw something new. On the far side of the river, upstream from the bridge, where previously there had been nothing but fields, she saw half a dozen long, high buildings with rows of large windows, all close to the water. She recalled, vaguely, hearing people talk about constructions like this: they were mills, where cloth was made. They were narrow and had tall windows so that the hands could see their work clearly. The water was needed for fulling, or felting, the cloth, and for dyeing; and where the river ran fast it could also drive machinery. Some of this must have been here ten years ago, she reasoned, for Kingsbridge had been a cloth town since before she was born. But previously the buildings had been small and scattered. They had grown and spread, and now there was a distinct manufacturing district.

‘Nearly there now, Kit,’ she said. He was exhausted, stumbling. She would have carried him but she had the spinning wheel and the cooking pot.

They entered the town. Sal asked a friendly-looking woman where Amos Barrowfield lived, and was given directions to a house near the cathedral.

The door was opened by a maid. ‘I’m one of Amos Barrowfield’s spinners,’ Sal said. ‘I would like to speak to him, if I may.’

The maid was wary. ‘What name, please?’

‘Sal Clitheroe.’

‘Oh!’ said the maid. ‘We’ve heard all about you.’ She looked down at Kit. ‘Is this the little boy who got kicked by the horse?’

‘Yes, this is Kit.’

‘I’m sure Amos will want to see you. Come in. My name is Ellen, by the way.’ She led them through the house. ‘They’re just finishing dinner. Shall I bring the two of you some tea?’