Read Online Pauper's Gold by Margaret Dickinson - Free Book Online Page B

swagger, his hands in his pockets. ‘Just walk slow, so we end up at the back. Then, when we get to the bottom of the hill,
there’s a little path that runs at the back of the mill just below the cliff. If no one’s watching, we nip through there.’
    Hannah nodded, her eyes shining at the thought of an hour or so of freedom.
    ‘Hey, Hannah, wait for us.’
    ‘Oh no,’ Joe muttered. ‘Not that pair.’
    Hannah turned and saw Luke with Daniel trotting close behind him.
    ‘Off for a walk, a’yer?’
    ‘How did you know?’ Joe said belligerently.
    ‘Heard you ask her the other day.’ Luke grinned.
    ‘Yeah. I asked her,’ Joe glowered. ‘Not the whole blooming lot of yer.’
    Hannah laughed and slipped her arm through theirs. ‘Oh, come on, let’s all go. It’s too nice a day to argue. Let’s just enjoy ourselves while we can.’
    ‘I’m tired, Luke,’ Daniel muttered. ‘I want to go home.’
    Luke glanced at his twin. ‘All right. See you later.’
    Daniel blinked. ‘What – what do y’mean?’
    ‘You go and have a sleep. I’m going with these.’
    Daniel glanced from his brother to Hannah. He and his brother were never apart. They went everywhere together. But now, Luke was choosing the company of others rather than him. Daniel
didn’t like it, and he was blaming Hannah. She could see it in his eyes.
    ‘All right,’ he muttered sulkily. ‘I’ll come an’ all.’
    ‘No, you go back if you want to—’
    ‘I don’t,’ he snapped back. ‘Not on me own.’
    Joe was disgruntled too now. He’d wanted to walk out with Hannah on his own, not have the twins tagging along. Joe was older than the other three. At fourteen, he fancied himself old
enough to start courting. He liked the look of this new girl whose blue eyes sparkled when she laughed. She’d left her long blonde hair flying loose this morning, cascading down her back in
golden waves and curls that glinted in the sunlight. She was lively with boundless energy and she laughed often. And sing! He’d heard singing in the room next door to where he worked in the
carding room. In the service that morning, her voice had risen, clear and pure, above all the others. She was a bit young yet, but she’d grow, he told himself, and he reckoned she’d
grow into a beauty an’ all.
    ‘Come on then. Here’s the path . . .’ He caught hold of Hannah’s hand and was elated at the look of fury on Luke’s face.
    They skirted the base of the cliff on which the row of houses containing the school and the apprentice house stood, and came to a place where a stream ran under the path to the waterwheel, whose
power turned all the machinery in the mill.
    ‘They call this the “head race”,’ Joe told them importantly. ‘They constructed this to run from the mill pool down to the wheel.’
    Hannah’s gaze followed the line of the man-made stream that surfaced beyond the path and ran towards the paddles of the great wheel, which stuck out like sharp, hungry teeth. The wheel was
silent today.
    ‘So how do they stop the water,’ Luke asked with boyish curiosity, ‘when the mill’s not working?’
    ‘There’s an iron hatch at the top of the race where it leaves the pool. When they want the wheel to work they just open the hatch. The water flows down the race to work the wheel and
then it comes out the other side and flows down the tail race back into the river.’
    ‘But where does the water go when the hatch is closed?’ Now Daniel took up the question.
    ‘There’s a weir out of the pool straight back into the river. I’ll show you.’
    A few paces further on they came to where the River Wye widened out into the huge lake that Joe called the mill pool. Then, walking to the left, they stood a moment on the narrow footbridge
watching the white foaming water cascading over the edge of the weir and rushing on down the rocky riverbed. Ahead of them was a steep climb up rocks to the hillside above.
    Joe, still holding Hannah’s hand,