SUPPRESSED RHEUMATISM
Joan found Cissie Averill alone in No. 35, crouching by the
fire, with her head in her hands and with traces of tears on her
colourless cheeks. She looked up as her visitor entered, and
greeted her with a smile, but a smile in which was no
brightness.
"Tell me all about it," said Joan, taking a stool and seating
herself beside Cissie.
Then the girl poured out her story into her ear. There was not
much in it more than what had already been communicated by Polly
Myatt, but the particulars were fuller.
"I've been ailing some time," said Cissie, "and I knowed it
would be on me soon. Charlie Mangin heard of it through our
bailie, and he came right into our room and straight up to me. 'Look here,' says he, 'I'm not going to have no more lead cases at Fennings', so clear out with a week's wages to play with. Hook to the seaside—anywhere you like out of this town; and after you have been there three weeks, I'll send you a postal order for a sovereign. If you mend, the Fennings know how to make it up to you—and you'll be taken back again, and promoted to something better.' ' Well,' said I, ' I'll consider it.' Then he pressed me further, and I asked him to give me a couple of days to consider it. You see, a sovereign won't go a long way, what with the trainage and lodgings; and I don't feel up to nothing, and don't fancy the sea would do much for me. If I am to die, let me die here where I've worked all my days, and where I've some friends. I don't want to be hustled away to die amongst strangers, just to accommodate Fennings and oblige Mangin."
"Why should you not go into the hospital here?"
"Because it would be reported as another case of
lead-poisoning, and be brought home to Fennings' bank. They don't
want to be blamed and get a bad name. It might get into the
papers, and then the public might take it into their heads not to
buy Fennings' ware, and think they'd done the virtuous thing, and
go to sleep again. That is why they're ready enough to give me a
sovereign to keep out of the way."
"Do you really expect to be ill, Cissie?"
"I don't see how I can chance to be other. I've enjoyed bad
health some time, but I've kept it back and tried not to let
anyone see the blue line. I've held my mouth closed—but it has
come out at last. I suppose I shall just melt away with it. The
lead plays the deuce with the nervous system, as they call it, and puts all the organs out of tune."
"But really, I suspect that the seaside would be the best
place for you."
Cissie shook her head.
"I haven't saved enough to keep me playing. When Mangin's
sovereign and my money are spent—what then? I'd rather die here. I know you'd come and see me."
"But, Cissie, you must not die. You must not think of melting
away, as you term it. Surely you can take up some healthier
branch of the work."
"Where? No potbank will have me, now that the Government are
making such a stir about us, and sending down a Commissioner to
examine into the matter of the lead-poisoning."
"But—needlework?"
"Look at my thumb—how that is affected. Besides, I have never
learned needlework and cutting-out, and suchlike. I was put to
the pots when a child, and have kept to them ever since. Then—when one is leaded, most of the life and pluck go out of one. There's no strength left, and all you care for is just to be let alone. At first you fear it is coming on, and you struggle against it. Then you know it is on you, and it's no good resisting. At last you have it, and don't care what happens. That's my case. I don't wish to hurt the bank; I've worked in it sixteen years, and the rest of the girls have been at me persuading me to leave the place, so that there mayn't be no disturbances. Some must do the work, and if they do it, sooner or later they must be leaded."
"Cissie," said Joan, "the same mischief is not wrought in all
parts of the factory."
"Bless you, no. It is harmless anywhere but in the dipping and
the ground-laying. But what's the good of all the processes that
are harmless, without the lead at the end? Some must do the work
with that."
"Why must?
"Because nobody will have ware that hasn't been treated with
it."