Maggie's Girl Read Free

seventy-five, yet he was still fit and still had a fine head of hair. And he didn’t fall asleep in front of the fire.
    Adèle had finally coerced him into bringing in a younger man to run the factory – as if he was incapable! Sitting here twiddling his thumbs when there was work to be done …
    â€˜You’ll put that fire out,’ Adèle warned, seeing he was in a temper.
    Silas frowned, but put the poker down.
    â€˜You’re awake, then?’
    â€˜So it seems.’ She wasn’t going to argue; she wanted to talk to him anyway. She picked up the newspaper and looked at the picture of Chamberlain on the front, waving his precious bit of paper.
    â€˜Silas, will this peace pact hold?’ It had been preying on her mind.
    â€˜It probably won’t.’ She’d asked the question – Silas believed in a straight answer. ‘Perhaps for a while, that’s all.’
    Wasn’t the last lot bad enough?
    â€˜Don’t you go worrying about John.’ He was sure he’d winkled out the trouble, his sharp eyes narrowing. ‘I’ll see he’s all right, don’t you bother. That lad’s not going anywhere.’
    â€˜If there’s a war, how can he stay at home?’
    â€˜There will be war,’ Silas said calmly.
    It was a good job he’d hung on to the engineering works. If he’d listened to all Adèle had to say about things becoming too much for him, they’d have lost a pretty packet! The works, put to munitions, would be worth a mint. Added to the factory turning out uniforms, the coffers would be overflowing.
    â€˜We’ll get John out of university and set on in the factory. I’ll pull a few strings,’ he said. ‘There’s more important work for him here than—’
    What he was going to say next, though Adèle could well guess at it, was lost as voices came from the hall. Silas was already getting up as John came in, followed by Cliff and another boy. Young Harry Bates.
    â€˜John! What a lovely surprise!’ Adèle rose. ‘And Clifford, too! And it’s Harry, isn’t it?’
    She didn’t dare to look at Silas. The boy was the spit of Ned athis age, and she only thanked the Lord Silas didn’t have the wit to guess the truth.
    â€˜I half expected you back at Oxford already, John,’ she went on.
    â€˜I’m off on Tuesday, as a matter of fact. Just thought I’d motor down and say cheerio. We picked this young shaver up on the way, didn’t we, Cliff?’
    â€˜If you’d only come earlier, I could have taken you down the factory,’ his grandfather growled. ‘It’s about time you familiarised yourself with the place. You’ll be done at that grand university soon enough.’
    John frowned, looking helplessly towards his grandmother.
    Adèle knew he wanted to follow his stepfather into the motorcar business, and she’d tried to tell Silas, but he never had heard anything he didn’t like.
    John turned the talk to next year at university, his second, while Silas fumbled in his waistcoat pocket for a coin for Clifford. Then he gave Harry the same, ruffling the boy’s hair good-naturedly.
    Harry looked anxious, so Adèle tried to put him at his ease, asking him about school and what he might want to do once he left.
    â€˜I don’t want to go down the mines,’ was all he said, going red.
    Silas’s mine or Silas’s factory – there wasn’t any other choice in Castle Maine for a boy of Harry’s standing. Good mining stock.
    Â 
    â€˜It was kind of you to tip Harry,’ Adèle remarked after the boys had left, tumbling out of the house as quickly as they’d arrived, leaving a strange quiet in their wake.
    â€˜I don’t suppose the lad gets much, unlike young Clifford!’Silas turned the conversation on to safer ground. Adèle saw too much, he thought. It would never do if she were to have