The cloth under the light

An original fictional account set in an invented fabric workshop.

At the end of the inspection table, the cloth looked continuous. A pale length unrolled beneath the lamps and disappeared into a soft fold at the far side. The machine made a steady sound that seemed to promise a steady result. I asked my aunt how she could bear to watch something so repetitive.

She stopped the cloth. With her finger resting beside a thread, she asked what I could see. I could see a finger, a thread and a great deal of pale cloth. She moved the lamp. A faint bar appeared across the surface, not a different colour exactly, but a place where the light answered differently. Once I had seen it, I could not persuade it to disappear.

My aunt put a small marker at the edge and started the cloth again. I watched for the next bar so fiercely that I missed a loose loop nearer my hand. She stopped the machine before I mentioned it. I felt accused by the loop, although nobody had accused me. My aunt said that looking for one thing could make the others difficult to see.

She let me stand beside her for the next length. We did not talk much. The sound continued, but it no longer seemed to explain what was happening. There were small changes in the surface, a slight tug at one edge, a place where the weave looked crowded. My aunt did not mark every difference. Some belonged to the kind of cloth it was. I wanted a rule that would make each decision for me. She asked me to look at the whole width before deciding about the small patch.

When the final fold settled, the table was empty again. My eyes continued the movement for a moment, searching the still surface for something passing beneath the lamps. I had thought that repetition removed the need to pay attention. I left tired by how much attention it could require.

How does the writer show the narrator revising the judgement that inspecting the cloth is simply repetitive? Support your answer with references to the passage.