Dear Aunt Shaw,

I am sorry you had a wasted journey last week. I apologise that you should have been put to the trouble; I should never have agreed to come to London in such haste.

I am feeling better in myself, I believe; Mr Thornton and his mother have been very kind.

I have spent some time today learning about cotton production. Mr Thornton was kind enough to take time out of his busy day to show me around his Mill, as he once did for my father.

I hope Edith and Sholto are regaining their health. I think about you all and will no doubt visit London soon. Mr Thornton has kindly offered me his carriage and an escort when I feel able to travel.

Margaret

-OO-

Mrs Shaw laid down this letter. "Well, really!" she exclaimed. "Whatever is going on with the girl? I feel beyond exasperated with her."

Edith, hushing and patting a fretful invalid child, was equally vexed. "I don't know, I'm sure, Mama! It is all very strange. Learning about cotton production? Why would that be of interest to anyone? I confess I could not even bear to look at the machines on display at the Exhibition, great ugly frightening things! Maxwell and Henry spent a little time among them and tried to entice me to look, but I would not. "

"And three!" her mother tapped the paper with a finger, "THREE mentions of this Mr Thornton! I find that highly irregular, I do not mind saying. The man is a mill overlord, nothing more. He does not even own it. She should hardly give him the time of day, yet alone think of him as a... friend."

"Did you get any intimation of... that she..."

Mrs Shaw made an expression of distaste. "Not on her part, of course not! how can you think it, Edith! Though she did," she conceded, "run towards him in rather an unseemly fashion, and then beg him to be kept at his house - which could have been misinterpreted to be sure, had there been anyone there to see it. As for him, he plays his cards very close to his chest. He gave nothing away at all. A chilly cold sort of man, full of power and darkness." She shivered. "I do not like him, and I don't mind saying it."

"You should not have left Margaret with such a man, Mother!" Edith cried, appalled.

"She would not come, and as you can see from... this! she does not intend to come. She 'may visit when she feels able'. Pah! I am inclined to leave her, Edith, until she comes to her senses. It will do her no harm to realise her actions on that dreadful day when she sent me home without a kind word have had consequences."

-OO-

John Thornton went early to the mill the next morning. "Give an eye to things this morning, will you, Higgins? I'm takin' meself out for part of the day."

Higgins acquiesced with a tilt of his head. His eye engaged with the Master's, enquiringly. He said nothing, just waited.

"I know you're wonderin," the Master said with a grim little smile. "... and I'll satisfy your curiosity, since I know you care for the girl: I'm takin' Miss Hale on a walk to view the canals where the cotton-barges pass. She expressed an interest, and at present, anything which interests her..."

"I saw her watchin' over the looms with'ye yesterday," Higgins agreed. "I did think as she looked a bit more like herself, which I took as a step i'the right direction. Don't rush yerself back. I'll keep the mill runnin' right for ye, Master," and he watched Thornton, a man he (so surprisingly) thought of as a friend, go briskly on his way.

Well, well, well. Master walkin' out w'Miss Hale . His lost, beloved Bessy had been a wise young girl.

Author's notes:

I know this is short, so I'll post the final chapter very soon.