After being out during the night at the fire, and consequently having had his rest broken, Fred found it rather irksome to spring out of bed at five o'clock, get his breakfast, and be ready to respond to the factory whistle on a wintry morning.

He had now got sufficient knowledge of his work, and found very little difficulty in performing it. Whenever he wanted any instruction or help, Carl seemed ready and glad to aid him, so the two boys soon became friends.

"How long have you been on these flockers, Carl?" asked Fred the morning after the fire.

"Only two months."

"Where did you work before that? I don't remember ever having seen you till yesterday morning, and I don't know what your last name is now. I heard Mr. Hanks call you Carl, so I suppose that is your given name?"

"Yes, my name is Carl Heimann; I have been in here ever since I came to Mapleton."

"Where did you come from?"

"My father and mother came from Germany when I was a small boy, and they lived in Rhode Island; but they both got sick and died, so I came here to live with my uncle."

"What is your uncle's name?" Fred went on to inquire.

"His name is Frank Baumgarten."

"Oh, I've seen him plenty of times. I used to take goods to his house from the store. It seems queer that I never saw you."

"I don't go out any nights, for I get tired out by working in here eleven hours and a half every day, I can tell you," said Carl.

"Yes, I should think you would; you don't look very strong."

"Well, I guess I can get along better now that you are here; but Tim Short used to shirk and crowd me. If Mr. Hanks would do his part of the work it wouldn't be so hard; but he won't do it, and is cross and finds fault if we don't hurry things up."

When Fred's eyes first fell upon the pale, sad face of Carl, and he noticed his dwarfed and disfigured form, he had a feeling of pity for him. There was that about his manner which at once interested him. The boy's features were good, and yet they had that sharp, shrunken appearance which may be said to be characteristic of the majority of those afflicted with spinal trouble. He was a little humpback, who, from his size, would be taken for a lad of not more than thirteen, though he was then seventeen, one year older than Fred, as the latter afterward learned.

The interest our hero felt in Carl had gradually increased as he noticed how intelligent he appeared, and when he said that he had no father nor mother, and told how he had been treated, Fred's sympathy was touched, and he said to himself, almost unconsciously, "I'm glad I'm here, for now I can do the heavy work, and will protect him from the abuse of this man Hanks!" Then he said to the boy (for he seemed but such beside his own sturdy form), "Yes, I think you will get along better now, for I am strong and well, and will do all the heavy work for you."

"Oh, I'm so glad!" replied Carl, with a sense of gratitude which showed itself in his bright eyes, "for it hurts my back every time I lift one of the heavy bags of wet flocks, and almost makes me think I will have to give up the job. Then I think my uncle can't support me, and so I keep on."

"You shall not lift any more of them while I am here. I would rather do that, any way, than stay here in the dust."

"How long will you be here?" asked the little humpback, anxious lest the brighter prospect might last but a short time."I don't know. I don't want to stay in the factory any longer than I am obliged to; but that may be forever," replied Fred, with a clouded brow, as his mind reverted to the cause that brought him down to such work.

"I don't see why you need to stay in here. You have been clerk in a store, and have a good education, I suppose. If I only had an education——"

"Haven't you ever been to school?"

"I went to school a little in the old country, and three terms in Rhode Island; then I went into the factory. My father was sick, and couldn't work. After I had been in there about a year, my coat caught one day in the shafting and wound me round it so they had to shut down the water wheel to get me off. Everybody thought I was dead. That's what hurt my back and made it grow the way it is now."

"How long ago was that?" inquired Fred sympathetically.

"It was six years ago that I got hurt, but I did not get out of bed for almost two years afterward."

"Does your back trouble you now?"

"Yes, it aches all the time; but I've got rather used to it. Only when I do a lot of lifting here, it bothers me so I can't sleep."

"That's too bad. I'm sorry for you, and, as I said, will do all the heavy work. Then you didn't go to school any after you got out again?"

"No; I went back into the mill and stayed until my mother died; then I came here."

"Did you say your father was dead?"

"Yes; he died while I was sick."

"Have you any brothers or sisters?"

"No; I have no one but my uncle."

"I suppose he is kind to you?"

"Yes, he is; but Aunt Gretchen don't seem to like me very well, she has so many children of her own."

"I should think you would board somewhere else, then."

"My uncle wants me to stay with him. If I boarded at the factory boarding house my wages wouldn't more than pay my board, and I shouldn't have anything left to buy my clothes with. If I should leave him and then get sick he wouldn't take care of me, and I should have to go to the poorhouse. I have always dreaded that since the city helped us when we were all sick."

"Well, you will soon be strong enough, I hope, to get another job, where there is more pay."

This conversation was now interrupted by the appearance of Hanks, who said to Fred:

"Come along up stairs with me, Worthington; I want yer ter help me lug some cloth down. I'll show yer where ter find it; then yer kin git it yerself erlone. Yer look stout 'nuff ter handle it 's well as me."

Each shouldered a web of cloth which made a bundle about two feet through and six feet long—rather a heavy burden for a boy; still, Fred handled it easily and quickly, deposited it by the flockers, and turned to his superior for further orders.

"Take out them pieces next; they have run long enough. Carl will help you about doing it; then you may go up and bring down two more pieces."

With these orders he vanished, and the boys went to their work.

"How long do these have to be run?" asked Fred of the little humpback.

"About three hours. If they stayed in longer than that they would get too heavy."

"This light stuff don't make them so very much heavier, does it?"

"Oh, yes; we can beat in flocks enough to double the weight of the cloth."

"Is that so?" exclaimed the new hand incredulously; and then added, after a moment's thought, "But I should think they would all tumble out."

"I suppose they would if the cloth wasn't fulled as soon as we get through with it; but that sort of sets them in.""Where do they full it?"

"Out in the fulling mills, near the extractor. Didn't you see those long wooden things with the covers turned back, and the cloth going up through them so fast?"

"Yes, I saw them, but didn't know what they were. I don't see how going through those fulls the cloth."

"It's the stuff they put in—fuller's earth and soap; they pile the soft soap in by the dishful, and it makes a great lather. I s'pose the fuller's earth is what does the most of the work. After the cloth comes out of the fulling mills it's 'bout twice as thick as when it goes in, and feels all stiff and heavy. It's no more like what it is now than nothing."

"What's the next process it goes through?"

"It goes into the washers next, and is washed as clean as can be."

"How did you learn so much about finishing cloth? You have been here but a little while."

"My father worked in a mill, and I have heard him talk about it. Then I have been in a factory enough myself to know pretty nearly everything that is done."

"Do we take the cloth direct from the weave room? It doesn't look as though anything had been done to it when it reaches us."

"It is 'burled' first; then we get it.""'Burled'? What do you mean by that?"

"Why, the knots are all cut off. You see the weavers have to tie their warp on the back side when it breaks, and that is what makes the knots."

"I don't see what harm those little things would do, as you say they are on the back of the cloth."

"They are the worst things there are, for if one of them gets in by accident it is sure to make a hole through the cloth when it runs through the shears."

Thus, with work and talk, the day flew by almost before Fred was aware of it. In fact, the hours seemed shorter to him than any he had passed for weeks. Now there was something new to occupy his attention, and work enough to keep his hands busy. The many curious machines before him, of which Carl had told him a little, interested him much—so much, indeed, that even at the end of the first day he felt no small desire to know more of them.