They continued their walk into one of largest rooms Kizzie had ever stepped into. Wide and light, its tall ceilings reached high above to showcase two stacks of windows on either side.
Various odd-looking machines lined the space, leaving a walkway down the center.
“Gracious sakes alive,” she breathed.
He chuckled and gestured toward the room. “Here we have the largest production space. We make yarn here and the fabric here. In the back room there is a cotton bale breaker, so we can create the fabric from raw cotton all the way to the finished product.” He walked ahead, his feet and words faster. “The cotton is carded then threaded through the spinning frames.” He gestured at a machine as he spoke, his knowledge and excitement almost infectious. “Then the thread or yarn is sent to the loom to be woven into fabric. And, of course, we have a weaving shed and a dyeing room before fabric is sent to the finishing machines.”
“And it all happens here?”
“All of it.” He paused, glancing around the room. “We used to have more production when we had more employees, but we are still able to create excellent fabric, which is sold for miles around. Father's technique was admired, and his name carries the weight of the sales, I think.”
“It's fine fabric, for sure.” Kizzie stared at a machine that looked to hold rows of massive spools of thread. “Mama uses a loom, but it doesn't resemble anything like any of these machines.”“And thankfully not. These are miracle workers.” He walked over to one of the machines that looked like it had rows of fishing poles sticking out of it. “Most of the workers are monitoring the machines as they take the materials through the process.”
She stared at him, her smile brimming a little more. “So you love this work?”
He shrugged. “I enjoy working with people and seeing a job well done.” He sighed. “But even with adding a few additional vents and trying to keep up morale, I don't think it's going to change our trajectory if we keep losing workers.”
She studied him a moment and then looked around the massive space, trying to take it all in. “From what I can tell, your brother doesn't feel the way you do?”
He gestured for them to continue walking. “I believe he wants the money from a successful mill, but he's so consumed by financial success, he can't see how short-term expenses will lead to long-term gains.”
“Like higher pay and finishing the mill village?”
“Exactly.” He offered his arm again. “He carries a lot of expectation since our father's death, but with our sister gone, and now his engagement to Beatrice … well, he's just not been reasonable.”
They walked through a door into a little hallway, the quiet shifting between them. Kizzie finally decided to give in to her curiosity. “What happened to your sister?”
Noah paused in their walk, just in front of another door. A smaller one.
“Clarice. My father's pride and joy. George says she broke Father's heart and that's what led to his death.”
“How?”
The lines deepened around Noah's mouth with his frown. “She fell in love.”
Not the answer Kizzie had expected. “A mighty evil choice, for sure.”
His lips quirked at her response. “With the wrong person, or at least wrong to Father's mind.”
If Charles had married Kizzie, could that have happened to Mrs. Morgan? Death by disappointment? She seemed too mean to die over something that simple.
“A good friend of mine,” he continued. “Lucas Becker. A German.”
He said the words as if they mattered in a way Kizzie should understand. “And being German mattered to your daddy?”
He drew in a breath. “Kizzie McAdams, I think you are one of the most genuine people I've ever met, and simply wonderful.”
The compliment moved from her ears all the way down to her heart and then flooded like warm water all over her. She'd been complimented before, but it usually had to do with her looks. Noah's compliment encompassed more ofher.She tried to keep her composure. “I don't see how that makes me wonderful at all, Mr. Lewis.”
“With the war going on, some people have taken to mistreating and shunning their neighbors of German descent. Lucas is an excellent businessman and was a good friend of our family until the war broke out. Then Father's attitude toward him changed, leading to George's opinions changing as well. When Clarice announced her engagement to Lucas, Father refused the match.”
“Just because he was German?”
He dipped his chin and opened the door into a vast storage room with shelves filled with finished fabrics, spools of yarn and thread, and even a few garments.
“He gave Clarice an ultimatum.”
Kizzie's breath caught. “Her family or her fiancé?”
