Page 286 - sons-and-lovers

sack-like. She was evidently poor, and had not much taste.
Miriam usually looked nice.
‘Where have you seen me?’ Paul asked of the woman.
She looked at him as if she would not trouble to answer.
Then:
‘Walking with Louie Travers,’ she said.
Louie was one of the ‘Spiral’ girls.
‘Why, do you know her?’ he asked.
She did not answer. He turned to Miriam.
‘Where are you going?’ he asked.
‘To the Castle.’
‘What train are you going home by?’
‘I am driving with father. I wish you could come too.
What time are you free?’
‘You know not till eight to-night, damn it!’
And directly the two women moved on.
Paul remembered that Clara Dawes was the daughter of
an old friend of Mrs. Leivers. Miriam had sought her out
because she had once been Spiral overseer at Jordan’s, and
because her husband, Baxter Dawes, was smith for the fac-
tory, making the irons for cripple instruments, and so on.
Through her Miriam felt she got into direct contact with
Jordan’s, and could estimate better Paul’s position. But Mrs.
Dawes was separated from her husband, and had taken up
Women’s Rights. She was supposed to be clever. It interest-
ed Paul.
Baxter Dawes he knew and disliked. The smith was a
man of thirty-one or thirty-two. He came occasionally
through Paul’s corner—a big, well-set man, also striking to