here in the purple stockings and the affronting
gown, and he admired. Her material achievement alone was prodigious.
He pictured her as she rose in the winter dark and in the summer dawn
to go to the works and wrestle with so much incalculable human nature
and so many complex questions of organisation, day after day, week
after week, month after month, for nearly eighteen months. She had
kept it up; that was the point. She had shown what she was made of,
and what she was made of was unquestionably marvellous.

He would have liked to know about various things to which she had made
no reference. Did she live in a frowsy lodging-house near the great
works? What kind of food did she get? What did she do with her
evenings and her Sundays? Was she bored? Was she miserable or
exultant? Had she acquaintances, external interests; or did she
immerse herself completely, inclusively, in the huge, smoking,
whirring, foul, perilous hell which she had described? The
contemplation of the horror of the hell gave him--and her, too, he
thought--a curious feeling which was not unpleasurable. It had
savour. He would not, however, inquire from her concerning details.
He preferred, on reflection, to keep the details mysterious, as
mysterious as her individuality and as the impression of her worn
eyes. The setting of mystery in his mind suited her.

He said: "But of course your relations with those girls were
artificial, after all."

"No, they weren't. I tell you the girls were perfectly open; there
wasn't the slightest artificiality."

"Yes, but were you open, to them? Did you ever tell them anything
about yourself, for instance?"

"Oh, no!"

"Did they ever ask you to?"

"No! They wouldn't have thought of doing so."

"That's what I call artificiality. By the way, how have you been
ruined? Who ruined you? Was it the hated works-manager?" There had
been no change in his tone; he spoke with the utmost detachment.

"I was coming to that," answered Concepcion, apparently with a
detachment equal to his. "Last week but one in one of the shops there
was a girl standing in front of a machine, with her back to it. About
twenty-two--you must see her in your mind--about twenty-two, nice
chestnut hair. Cap over it, of course--that's the rule. Khaki overalls
and trousers. Rather high-heeled patent-leather boots--they fancy
themselves, thank God!--and a bit of lace showing out of the khaki at
the neck. Red cheeks; she was fairly new to the works