CONCERNING DOMESTIC ECONOMY AND DIFFICULTIES--SURPRISES AND
EXPLANATIONS.
How to "make the two ends meet," is a question that has engaged the
attention and taxed the brains of hundreds and thousands of human beings
from time immemorial, and which will doubtless afford them free scope
for exercise to the end of time.
This condition of things would appear to arise from a misconception on
the part of those who are thus exercised as to the necessities of life.
They seem to imagine, as a rule, that if their income should happen to
be, say three hundred pounds a year, it is absolutely impossible by any
effort of ingenuity for them to live on less than two hundred and
ninety-nine pounds nineteen shillings and eleven-pence three farthing.
They therefore attempt to regulate their expenditure accordingly, and
rather plume themselves than otherwise on the fact that they are firmly
resolved to save and lay bye the farthing. They fail in this attempt as
a matter of course, and hence the difficulty of making the two ends
meet. If these unfortunates had been bred to the profession of
engineering or "contracting," they would have known that it is what we
may style a law of human nature to under-estimate probable expenses. So
thoroughly is this understood by the men of the professions above
referred to, that, after they have formed an estimate,--set down every
imaginable expense, and racked their brains in order to make sure that
they have provided for every conceivable and inconceivable item, they
coolly add to the amount a pretty large sum as a "margin" to cover
unexpected and unthought-of contingencies. But anything of this sort
never seems to enter into the calculations of the people who are so much
tormented with those obstinate "two ends" that won't meet. There is one
sure and easy mode of escape for them, but they invariably hold that
mode to be ridiculous, until in dire extremity they are forced to adopt
it. This is simply to make one's calculations for living _considerably
within_ one's income!
We make no apology for going into the minutiae of this remarkable phase
of human existence, because it is necessary, in order to the correct
appreciation of the circumstances and feelings of good little Mrs
Tipps, when, several weeks after the accident described in a previous
chapter, she sat down in her little parlour to reconsider the subject of
her annual expenditure.
Netta sat beside her looking somewhat pale, for she had not quite
recovered from the effects of her recent illness.
"My darling," said Mrs Tipps, "how _can_ you charge me with having made
an error somewhere? Have I not got it all down here on black and white,
as your dear father used to say? This is the identical paper on which I
made my calculations last year, and I have gone over them all and found
them perfectly correct. Look there."
Mrs Tipps held up in triumph, as if it were an incontestable evidence
of the rectitude of her calculations, a sheet of note-paper so blotted
and bespattered with figures, that it would have depressed the heart
even of an accountant, because, besides the strong probability that it
was intrinsically wrong, it was altogether illegible.
"Dear mamma," remonstrated Netta, with a twinkle of her eye, "I do not
call in question the correctness of your calculations, but I suggest
that there may perhaps be an error of some sort somewhere. At all
events the result would seem to indicate--to imply--that--that
everything was not _quite_ right, you know."
"Quite true, darling," replied Mrs Tipps, who was a candid though
obtuse soul; "the result is unsatisfactory, eminently so; yet I cannot
charge myself with careless omissions. See--here it is; on one side are
my receipts. Your dear father always impressed it _so_ earnestly on me
that I should keep the receipts of money on one side of the accounts,
and the payments on the other. I never could remember, by the way, on
which side to put the receipts, and on which the payments, until he hit
on the idea of making me contradict myself, and then I should be sure to
keep right. He used to say (how well I remember it), `Now, darling,
this is the way: Whenever you receive a sum of money to enter in your
cash-book, always say to yourself, What side shall I put it on? If your
mind suggests on the right, at once say No--because that would be
wrong--right being _wrong_ in _this_ case,' and he did use to laugh so
over that little pleasantry."
Mrs Tipps' gravity deepened as she recalled these interesting lessons
in book-keeping.
"Yes," she continued, with a sigh, "and then he would go on to say, that
`if it was wrong to go to the right, of course it must be right to go
the other way.' At first I used to be a good deal puzzled, and said,
`But suppose my mind, when I receive a sum of money, should suggest
putting it on the _left_, am I to contradict myself _then_?' `Oh no!'
he would say, with another laugh, `in that case you will remember that
your mind is to be _left_ alone to carry out its suggestion.' I got to
understand it at last, after several years of training, but I never
_could_ quite approve of it for it causes so much waste of paper. Just
look here!" she said, holding up a little account-book, "here are all
the right pages quite filled up, while all the left pages are blank. It
takes only four lines to enter my receipts, because you know I receive
my money only once a quarter. Well, that brings me back to the point.
Here are all the receipts on one side; my whole income, deducting
income-tax--which, by the way, I cannot help regarding as a very unjust
tax--amounts to two hundred and fifty pounds seventeen shillings and
two-pence. Then here you have my paper of calculations--everything set
down--rent, taxes, water rates, food, clothing, coals, gas, candles,
sundries (sundries, my darling, including such small articles as soap,
starch, etcetera); nothing omitted, even the cat's food provided for,
the whole mounting to two hundred and forty-five pounds. You see I was
so anxious to keep within my income, that I resolved to leave five
pounds seventeen shillings and two-pence for contingencies. But how
does the case actually stand?" Here poor Mrs Tipps pointed indignantly
to her account-book, and to a pile of papers that lay before her, as if
they were the guilty cause of all her troubles. "How does it stand?
The whole two hundred and fifty pounds seventeen shillings spent--only
the two-pence left--and accounts to tradesmen, amounting to fifty
pounds, remaining unpaid!"
"And have we _nothing_ left to pay them?" asked Netta, in some anxiety.
"Nothing, my love," replied Mrs Tipps, with a perplexed look, "except,"
she added, after a moment's thought, "the tuppence!"
The poor lady whimpered as she said this, seeing which Netta burst into
tears; whereupon her mother sprang up, scattered the accounts right and
left, and blaming herself for having spoken on these disagreeable
subjects at all, threw her arms round Netta's neck and hugged her.
"Don't think me foolish, mamma," said Netta, drying her eyes in a
moment; "really it almost makes me laugh to think that _I_ should ever
come to cry so easily; but you know illness does weaken one so, that
sometimes, in spite of myself, I feel inclined to cry. But don't mind
me; there, it's past now. Let us resume our business talk."
"Indeed I will not," protested Mrs Tipps.
"Then I will call nurse, and go into the subject with her," said Netta.
"Don't be foolish, dear."
"Well, then, go on with it, mamma. Tell me, now, is there nothing that
we could sell?"
"Nothing. To be sure there is my gold watch, but that would not fetch
more than a few pounds; and my wedding-ring, which I would sooner die
than part with."
Netta glanced, as she spoke, at an unusually superb diamond ring, of
Eastern manufacture, which adorned her own delicate hand. It was her
father's last gift to her a few days before he died.
"What are you thinking of, darling?" inquired Mrs Tipps.
"Of many things," replied Netta slowly. "It is not easy to tell you
exactly what--"
Here she was saved the necessity of further explanation by the entrance
of Joseph Tipps, who, after kissing his mother and sister heartily,
threw his hat and gloves into a corner, and, rubbing his hands together
as he sat down, inquired if Edwin Gurwood had been there.
"No, we have neither seen nor heard of him," said Netta.
"Then you shall have him to luncheon in half-an-hour, or so," said
Joseph, consulting his watch. "I got leave of absence to-day, and
intend to spend part of my holiday in introducing him to Captain Lee,
who has promised to get him a situation in the head office. You've no
idea what a fine hearty fellow he is," continued Tipps enthusiastically,
"so full of humour and good sense. But what have you been discussing?
Not accounts, surely! Why, mother, what's the use of boring your brains
with such things? Let me have 'em, I'll go over them for you. What
d'you want done? The additions checked, eh?"
On learning that it was not the accounts so much as the discrepancy
between the estimate and the actual expenditure that puzzled his mother,
Tipps seized her book, and, turning over the leaves, said, "Here, let me
see, I'll soon find it out--ah, well, rent yes; taxes, h'm; wine to Mrs
Natly, you put that, in your estimate, under the head of food, I
suppose?"
"N-no, I think not."
"Under physic, then?"
"No, not under that. I have no head for that."
"What! no head for physic? If you'd said you had no stomach for it I
could have understood you; but--well--what _did_ you put it under;
sundries, eh?"
"I'm afraid, Joseph, that I have not taken note of that in my extract--
your dear father used to call the thing he did with his cash-book at the
end of the year an extract--I think I've omitted that."
"Just so," said Tipps, jotting down with a pencil on the back of a
letter. "I'll soon account to you for the discrepancy. Here are six
bottles of wine to Mrs Natly, the railway porter's wife, at
three-and-six--one pound one--not provided for in your estimate. Any
more physic, I wonder? H'm, subscription for coals to the poor.
Half-a-guinea--no head for charities in your estimate, I suppose?"
"Of course," pleaded Mrs Tipps, "in making an estimate, I was thinking
only of my own expenses, you know--not of charities and such-like
things; but when poor people come, you know, what _is_ one to do?"
"We'll not discuss that just now, mother. Hallo! `ten guineas doctor's
fee!' Of course you have not that in the estimate, seeing that you did
not know Netta was going to be ill. What's this?--`five pounds for
twenty wax dolls--naked--(to be dressed by ---)'"
"Really, Joseph, the book is too private to be read aloud," said Mrs
Tipps, snatching it out of her son's hand. "These dolls were for a
bazaar in aid of the funds of a blind asylum, and I dressed them all
myself last winter."
"Well, well, mother," said Tipps, laughing, "I don't want to pry into
such secrets; but here, you see, we have seventeen pounds odd of the
discrepancy discovered already, and I've no doubt that the remainder
could soon be fished up."
"Yes," sighed Mrs Tipps, sadly, "I see it now. As the poet truly
says,--`Evil is wrought by want of thought as well as want of heart.' I
have been assisting the poor at the expense of my trades-people."
"Mother," exclaimed Tipps, indignantly, "you have been doing nothing of
the sort. Don't imagine that I could for a moment insinuate such a
thing. You have only made a little mistake in your calculations, and
all that you have got to do is to _put down a larger sum for
contingencies_ next time. What nonsense you talk about your
trades-people! Every one of them shall be paid to the last farthing--"
Here Tipps was interrupted by the entrance of Edwin Gurwood, who at once
began with much interest to inquire into the health of Mrs Tipps, and
hoped that she had not suffered in any way from her recent accident.
Mrs Tipps replied she was thankful to say that she had not suffered in
any way, beyond being a little shaken and dreadfully alarmed.
"But railways have suffered," said Tipps, laughing, "for mother is so
strongly set against them now that she would not enter one for a
thousand pounds."
"They have suffered in worse ways than that," said Gurwood, "if all that
I hear be true, for that accident has produced a number of serious
compensation cases."
Hereupon Gurwood and his friend plunged into an animated conversation
about railway accidents and their consequences, to the intense interest
and horror of Mrs Tipps.
Meanwhile Netta left the room, and went to her old nurse's apartment.
"Nurse," she said, hurriedly, "when did you say you proposed paying your
brother in London a visit--about this time, was it not?"
"Yes, dear," said old Mrs Durby, taking off her tortoise-shell
spectacles and laying down her work, "I thought of going next week, if
it is quite convenient."
"It _is_ quite convenient, nurse," continued Netta, in a somewhat
flurried manner; "it would be still more convenient if you could go
to-morrow or next day."
"Deary me--what's wrong?" inquired Mrs Durby, in some surprise.
"Listen, I have not time to explain much," said Netta, earnestly,
sitting down beside her faithful nurse and putting her hand on her
shoulder. "We have got into difficulties, nurse--temporary
difficulties, I hope--but they must be got over somehow. Now, I want
you to take this diamond ring to London with you--pawn it for as much as
you can get, and bring me the money."
"Me pawn it, my dear! I never pawned a thing in my life, and don't know
how to go about it."
"But your brother knows how to do it," suggested Netta. "Now, you won't
refuse me this favour, dear nurse? I know it is an unpleasant business,
but what else can be done? The ring is my own; besides, I hope to be
able to redeem it soon. I know no more about pawning than yourself, but
I do know that a considerable time must elapse before the ring shall be
lost to me. And, you know, our bills _must_ be paid."
Good Mrs Durby did not require much persuasion. She consented to set
off as soon as possible, if she should obtain permission from Mrs
Tipps, who was aware that she had intended to visit her brother about
that time. She received the precious ring, which, for security, was put
into a pill-box; this was introduced into an empty match-box, which
Netta wrapped in a sheet of note-paper and put Mrs Durby's name on it.
For further security Mrs Durby enlarged the parcel by thrusting the
match-box into an old slipper, the heel of which she doubled over the
toe, and then wrapped the whole in several sheets of brown paper until
the parcel assumed somewhat the shape and size of her own head. It was
also fastened with strong cords, but Mrs Durby's powers of making a
parcel were so poor that she left several uncouth corners and ragged
ends of paper sticking out here and there. She wrote on it in pencil
the simple name--Durby.
Meanwhile Joseph and his friend, having finished luncheon, prepared to
set out on their visit to Captain Lee. As they quitted the house, Tipps
ran back to the door and called his sister out of the parlour.
"I say, Netta, what about this fifty pounds that mother was talking of?"
he said. "Do you mean to say that you are really short of that sum, and
in debt?"
"We are, but I see a way out of the difficulty. Don't distress
yourself, Joe; we shall have everything squared up, as you call it in a
few days."
"Are you _quite_ sure of that?" asked Tipps, with a doubting look. "You
know I have got an uncommonly cheap lodging, and a remarkably economical
landlady, who manages so splendidly that I feed on a mere trifle a week.
Seventy-five pounds a year, you know, is more than I know what to do
with. I can live on thirty-five or so, and the other forty is--"
"We don't require it Joe," said Netta, laughing. "There, go away, you
are giving me cold by keeping me in the passage, and your friend is
getting impatient."
She pushed him out, nodded, and shut the door. Tipps hastened after his
friend, apologised for the delay, and, stepping out smartly, they were
soon ushered into Captain Lee's drawing-room. The captain was writing.
Emma was seated near the window sewing.
"Ha! Tipps, my fine fellow, glad to see you; why, I was just thinking
of you," said the captain, extending his hand.
"I have called," began Tipps, bowing to Emma and shaking the captain's
hand, "to introduce my--my--eh!--ah, my--what's the matter?"
There was some reason for these exclamations, for Captain Lee stood
gazing in mute amazement at young Gurwood, while the latter returned the
compliment with his eyebrows raised to the roots of his hair. The
similarity of their expressions did not, however, last long, for Edwin
became gradually confused, while the captain grew red and
choleric-looking.
"So," said the latter at length, in a very stern voice, "_this_ is your
friend, Mr Tipps?"
"Sir," exclaimed Edwin, flushing crimson, "you ought not to condemn any
one unheard."
"_I_ do not condemn you, sir," retorted the captain.
"By word, no, but by look and tone and gesture you do."
"Captain Lee," exclaimed Tipps, who had stood perfectly aghast with
amazement at this scene, "what _do_ you mean?--surely."
"I mean," said the captain, "that this youth was taken up by one of our
own detectives as a thief, some weeks ago, and was found travelling in a
first-class carriage without a ticket."
Young Gurwood, who had by this time recovered his self-possession,
turned to his friend and said,--"Explain this matter, Tipps, you know
all about it. The only point that can puzzle you is, that I did not
know the name of Captain Lee when I travelled with him, and therefore
did not connect him with the gentleman to whom you said you meant to
introduce me."
Tipps drew a long breath.
"Oh," said he, "I see it all now. Why, Captain Lee, my friend is
_perfectly_ innocent. It was quite a mistake, I assure you; and the
best proof of it is that he is a personal friend of our police
superintendent, who was on the spot at the time the accident occurred,
but we were all thrown into such confusion at the time, that I don't
wonder things were not cleared up."
Tipps hereupon went into a detailed account of the matter as far as he
knew it, at first to the surprise and then to the amusement of Captain
Lee. Fortunately for Gurwood, who would have found it difficult to
explain the circumstance of his travelling without a ticket, the captain
was as prompt to acknowledge his erroneous impression as he had been to
condemn. Instead of listening to Tipps, he stopped him by suddenly
grasping Gurwood's hand, and thanking him heartily for the prompt and
able assistance he had rendered in rescuing his daughter from her
perilous position on the day of the accident.
Of course Edwin would not admit that "rescue" was the proper term to
apply to his action, and refused to admit that Miss Lee was in the
slightest degree indebted to him, at the same time assuring her and her
father that it had afforded him the highest possible pleasure to have
been of the slightest service to them. The end of it was that they all
became extremely good friends, and the captain in particular became
quite jocular in reference to mistakes in general and stealing in
particular, until Tipps, pulling out his watch, declared that
procrastination was the thief of time, and that as he happened to have
business to transact with the police superintendent in reference to the
very accident which had caused them all so much trouble, he must
unwillingly bid them adieu.
"Stay, Tipps," exclaimed the captain, rising, "I shall accompany you to
the station, and introduce our friend Gurwood to the scene of his future
labours, where," continued the captain, turning with a hearty air and
patronising smile to Edwin, "I hope you will lay the foundation of a
career which will end in a manager's or secretary's situation, or some
important post of that sort. Good-bye, Emma I'll not be back till
dinner-time."
Emma bowed to the young men, and said good-bye to her father with a
smile so ineffably captivating, that Edwin resolved then and there to
lay the foundation of a career which would end in a wife with nut-brown
hair and large lustrous eyes.
Poor Edwin! He was not the first man whose wayward spirit had been
chained, his impulses directed to good ends and aims, and his destiny
fixed, by the smile of an innocent, loving, pretty girl. Assuredly,
also, he was not the last!