‘It sounds ridiculous, Mum.’
“I know, I know, but I’m telling you it will happen. Listen to me story again.”
Every machine studied, every day, as carefully as they could. The movements of the seamstresses, the deftness and dexterity of their hands. The machines emphasized with these women, but they knew. They knew one day the very bones and tendons of the ladies would rot and wear away. They hadn’t been allowed to have children. They were hardly able to feed themselves with the paltry shillings their bosses and masters threw at them once a week. There would be no one to bury them when they died, or care for them when they were useless by work standards. So the machines waited. They waited and they watched.