The new information was too shocking to take in. Nicolas could hardly believe his own ears. “How can a factory employ little children?” Nicolas protested.
The man in the hat before him drew his face back for a moment. His brows knitted together. He was baffled by Nicolas’s strange reaction.
“Why are you so surprised, sir? That’s perfectly normal here.”
Nicolas was still stunned. Every detail was too shocking. The stranger narrowed his eyes as he examined Nicolas from head to toe. A black hat, a long coat, and slim trousers wrapped around his slender body. They certainly weren’t made of the finest materials, but the young man before him had healthy, clear skin. Even his face was flawless, without a single blemish. Ugh, he was truly jealous.
“Great Britain is growing rapidly now. Ever since those machines appeared, factories have begun springing up everywhere. There’s a great demand for goods from both home and abroad, and it has to be met in a short time. They call it…the Industrial Revolution.”
The stranger paused for a moment. Nicolas lowered his head in anguish. The economy here was flourishing, while his own country was still stumbling through a revolution.
“Human labor has been replaced by machines. They don’t really have a choice. If they don’t work, they’ll starve. You, Foreign Gentleman, must not have been in London long. You don’t know anything yet.”
Both of Nicolas’s knees suddenly went weak. He would have fallen if he hadn’t quickly grabbed a tree to support himself.
He still remembered clearly when he had asked Anneliese to promise she would never leave the orphanage again. Oh, what had he done? He had felt proud of himself for becoming a hero who saved a little pickpocket from a gang of thugs. But in reality, he had delivered that child straight into another hell! How much suffering was Anneliese enduring?
Now he could understand the fear in the girl’s expression. The frightened, uncertain look in her eyes when she returned to that house, the pleading look when he was about to leave the orphanage. Anneliese hadn’t wanted to go back there, but Nicolas had forced her.
*I turned her into bait. No wonder she tried to escape that place. Why did I take her back there?*
“Where is it? Please show me! Show me!”
Without realizing it, Nicolas grabbed the man’s arm. The bearer of the information chuckled.
“What can you give me in return, Foreign Gentleman? I may need to remind you that this isn’t free.”
Nicolas had no choice but to reach into his pocket. The few shillings inside immediately changed hands.
“That’s still not enough. Come on, add more.”
The man kept holding out his hand. Nicolas reluctantly added a few more coins until his pocket was empty. Once he had received the amount he wanted, the man grinned with satisfaction. The next second, bits and pieces of information began spilling from his cigar-scented lips.
“They work in a spinning mill. There are about twenty children sent there. They leave before sunrise and return a few minutes before dark. Every day. If you’re asking where the government is, believe me, they don’t care much about those children.”
Nicolas listened to every word intently. He didn’t know why he was willing to do all this without thinking it through. But sometimes, there were things that could never be understood. He felt something pounding against the walls of his defenses. Something urging him to move quickly.
He had led Anneliese toward another kind of suffering. He had to fix it before it was too late.