LOSSES.
THE new building was finished towards the autumn,—at least two months
later than was promised; but who ever knew a building finished at the
time appointed?
The parlour was really a very pretty room, well proportioned, high and
airy. The bedroom, too, was very nice and convenient, with its shelves
and cupboards, and a light closet which Agnes dignified with the name
of a dressing-room. Letty almost envied her cousin that bedroom, and
began to look forward to the time when she should be able to have
one like it. As John had predicted, new furniture was bought for the
drawing-room, and a new carpet for the bedroom,—all good and expensive;
and Joe purchased at an auction a French clock, some vases for the
mantelpiece, and some pictures for the walls,—oil paintings, Agnes
proudly declared,—as if being oil paintings they must necessarily be
all right.
When all was complete, they had a party, which was quite the most
imposing affair of the sort ever witnessed in Myrtle Street. Letty
remonstrated a little; but, finding that Agnes was bent upon it, she
assisted her as much as she could. The supper was mostly due to her
skill; and a very good supper it was, and gained a great deal of
praise,—all of which Agnes accepted as though it had been justly her
due.
Mrs. Van Horn was there, beautifully dressed, all blushes and smiles,—a
very agreeable person to look at. She went about telling everybody how
much she had helped dear Mrs. Emerson, and how nothing could have been
done right but for her. To be sure, dear Mrs. Emerson had not much
notion of how things ought to be done at such times; and that cousin of
hers was a plague,—so conceited and stingy. She really supposed dear
Mrs. Emerson had never seen much of good society; but she certainly
appeared wonderfully well, considering.
"To be sure," said Martha Wilbur, who had lately devoted herself to the
extinguishment of Mrs. Van Horn upon all public occasions, "she has
never had the advantage of an intimate acquaintance with Mrs. Trescott
and the Miss Daltons, as you have, Mrs. Van Horn!"
Letty was there, of course, dressed in her plain black silk, with
a bit of old lace round the neck, which she had found among Aunt
Eunice's hoards. A little pearl pin, containing Sally's hair, was her
only ornament; yet, somehow (as Mrs. Van Horn confessed to herself in
vexation of spirit), she looked more like a lady than any one else in
the room. Graceful in manners, yet always lively and cheerful, she
glided here and there,—always just where she was wanted, talking to
people who seemed likely to feel neglected, making strangers acquainted
with each other, and acting generally the part of the few drops of oil
in a large machine, which cause every part to run smoothly.
After the party came something not quite so pleasant,—namely, paying
the bills. The next Sunday evening Joseph came over to Number Nine, in
great perturbation, and asked to see John.
"That fellow Carr has sent in his bill. He gave it to me yesterday. Do
you believe? He has asked me six hundred and eighty dollars!—Just twice
what he said the building would cost. I wish you would go over the bill
with me, and tell me what you think of his charges. I am sure they are
enormous."
"I will," replied John,—"but not to-night."
"Why not?" asked Joseph, surprised.
For John was sitting, without even a book in his hand, apparently doing
nothing except keeping an eye on little Alick.
"It is Sunday," replied John, quietly.
"Oh!" said Joseph, a little disconcerted. "But this is not work, John."
"I think it is,—and not very easy work either. I find looking over
bills and estimates about the hardest things I have to do. But, hard or
easy, I make it a rule never to attend to any business on Sunday. 'Thou
shalt do no manner of work,' is the commandment, you know."
"But, John, you don't always act up to it, as it seems to me. You and
Letty were down at Mrs. Jones's all Sunday afternoon; and when I passed
the house I saw you cutting wood, and Letty washing out some things in
the shed, as busy as a bee. Isn't there some inconsistency in that?"
"I think not. You know Mrs. Jones was taken suddenly ill last Sunday
morning. There was no one to take care of her, except her little
daughter, who came running up here in great distress while we were at
dinner, declaring that her mother was dying. You know she has not the
best character in the world, and none of the neighbours will have any
thing to do with her. But Letty has spoken to the little girl now and
then, and I have given her things out of the garden,—nothing of any
account to be sure, but enough, I suppose, to make her feel kindly
towards us.
"Of course we went straight down there; and we found the woman in a
deplorable state, sure enough, with no fire and no wood, and nothing
else, in short, except some whiskey. So I chopped up some boards to
make a fire; and Letty set to work to make the woman and her house
decent before the doctor came;—not a very pleasant task, as you may
guess.
"Now, that was a thing which could not be put off; and I think it came
under the head of 'works of necessity and mercy,' like our Saviour's
healing the sick. But this bill can be examined just as well to-morrow
as to-day."
"Well, I suppose you are right," said Joe, reluctantly. "I know I don't
think enough about these things. But, you see, he gave it to me last
night, and I put it in my pocket and never thought of it again till
just now. Then there is that party. I never thought it was going to
cost so much. Agnes had her mind set upon it, and I hated to refuse
her. She thinks a great deal of that sort of thing. If a thing is only
fashionable, why, she must have it, cost what it will; and her mother
is just so, exactly."
"Now, Joe, I won't hear you abuse my relations," said John, smiling;
"and, above all, I won't hear you find fault with your wife. You know
it is not right; and, besides, in this matter there is not a pin to
choose between you. You were just as fierce for the party and the new
parlour as she was; and you know you were vexed at me for advising you
against them."
"Well, but I never thought they were going to cost so much. If I had
had any idea—"
"Well, we won't talk about that now. It is time for church."
"I didn't think of going to church," said Joe.
"Oh, yes; you will go with me. Letty stays at home with the youngster
now-a-days: so I am alone in the evenings. I should like to have you
hear our new minister. I am sure you will like him."
"Well, I will; but I must go home and fix up a little."
And Joe actually went to church, instead of spending the Sunday evening
in idleness or in fretting over his bills, and came home in much better
humour.
Agnes would not go. She was tired out with the party; and, besides,
as she said, she had nothing decent to wear. She did not see what
possessed Joe all of a sudden. She hoped it would do him good; that was
all. She was sure there was abundant room for improvement.
It was an odd thing, Letty thought, but Agnes always seemed vexed when
her husband showed any inclination towards seriousness. Perhaps she
felt it a reproach.
"Bring your papers to-morrow evening, and I will go over them with
you," said John, as they parted; "but don't make up your mind
beforehand that you have been cheated. And, Joe, think over what you
have heard this evening before you go to sleep. It will do you no harm."
Monday evening brought Joseph and his papers.
John went over the bills carefully, and scrutinized every item.
"Well?" said Joseph, eagerly, as he laid down the papers.
"Well," repeated John, "really, Joe, I don't see any fault to find with
the bill. Some of the items were rather high, perhaps; but in general,
he asks no more than I should have asked for the same work."
"But he agreed to do it all for three hundred dollars."
"I understand that was the original contract."
"Yes."
"Have you it here?" Joe produced the contract, and John compared it
with the bill. "You see, Joe, there are so many extras; and every one
adds something to the cost. At first you meant to have the bedroom open
from the parlour; then you concluded to have closets between; then you
decided to have one of them with a window, and the other fitted with
shelves and drawers, and so on; then you connected the bedroom with the
kitchen by a passage—"
"Well, well, I know," interrupted Joseph, impatiently; "but surely all
that could not make such a great difference."
"Then you had the parlour finished very differently from the style you
proposed to me," pursued John. "You had a cornice,—and an expensive
one at that,—and windows down to the floor, and long blinds, and large
panes. No, Joe, I don't think Carr has cheated you; though he ought to
have told you, as he went along, how much each of these alterations
would cost."
"There it is!" said Joe. "He kept saying,—'Oh, that won't make much
difference; that will be a mere trifle;' and so on. I didn't know,—how
should I? The fact is, John, I ought not to have had Carr. I was a fool
for my pains: that's all." He was silent for a few minutes, and then
said, gloomily, "So you think I have nothing to do but to pay the bill?"
"I think so."
"And so all that money goes; and for what? Why, for things we might
just as well have done without, after all. What are we the better for
having a grand parlour?"
John did not say, "I told you so!" That was not his way. He only
remarked,—
"Why, the parlour is a very pretty parlour, and the bedroom is
certainly convenient, and will save Agnes a good many steps in the
course of the day; and, if you wished to sell the house—"
"But I don't want to sell it," said Joe, rather impatiently. "I want a
house to call my own and have my children grow up in and remember as
home. And, after all," he continued, brightening up a little, "there
is no hurry about the matter. Carr is willing to wait,—even to take a
second mortgage, if we don't want to pay him directly."
"Now, Emerson, don't you go to doing any such thing as that!" said
John, impressively. "Pay the money while it is in your hand, and then
the place will be, as you say, your own. You will never find a time
when it will come any easier."
"But, I tell you, that and the furniture and this wretched party
together will take the whole of Aunt Eunice's legacy. We sha'n't have
more than a hundred dollars left for ourselves."
"You will have the house left for yourself, won't you?" said John, a
little impatiently. "You cannot eat and have your cake, fix it as you
will. Take my advice. Pay Carr in the first place; then pay for your
furniture, if you have not done so already; and let Grayson have the
rest, as a payment on the house. That will leave you comparatively
free; and, with economy, you will easily make up the rest."
"I hate economy," said Joe, sullenly;—"always scrimping here and
pinching there; you cannot afford this, and you cannot afford that:
there is no comfort in it."
"I confess I do not love economy for its own sake," said John, smiling.
"I like to spend money as well as you,—though perhaps in a different
way; but any thing is better than being in debt."
"And even if I wanted to be economical, it would be of no use," said
Joe. "Agnes does not know how to save: I believe it is not in her.
She wastes more provisions in a week than your wife does in a year;
and, after all, we have never any thing fit to eat. Her only notion of
economy is locking up the sugar-bowl. I should think her mother might
have taught her something about housekeeping."
"Now, Emerson, I won't listen to any such talk as that," said John, in
good humour, but decidedly. "All these expenses were as much your doing
as hers; and, if I may speak plainly—"
"Go ahead."
"I think it is a downright sin for a man to talk of his wife's faults
to other people. You promised in your marriage to love and honour her;
and the Bible expressly commands a man to give honour to his wife. Now,
it is not honouring her to expose her weakness to other people. You
took her 'for better, for worse;' and you must just take the worse with
the better. It would be an excellent thing both for you and Agnes if,
instead of each fixing your thoughts on what the other ought to do,
you would learn to think more of what you ought to do yourselves. You
know we that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and
not to please ourselves. If you are wiser than Agnes,—and I don't deny
it,—you ought to let that make you more forbearing and gentle, and not
more exacting, towards her."
Joe took this lecture in good part. He really loved his wife, though he
was often unreasonable with regard to her; and he was not ill pleased
to have forbearance and gentleness urged on the ground that he was the
stronger of the two. He sat silent a while, and then went back to the
papers.
"There is another thing about paying this money, John. You know more
will be coming by-and-by from Mrs. Train."
"It is ill waiting for dead men's shoes, Joe. Mrs. Train is as likely
to live as you or I; and, besides, I am sure you would not like to feel
that you were speculating on her death."
"That is true. I should feel mean about it; for the old lady has always
been a good friend of mine. Well, John, I believe I will take your
advice;—that is, if Aggy is willing."
Joseph went home in a very good humour, and quite determined to take
John's advice.
Agnes, however, was not very well pleased. She said the money was hers,
and she didn't want it all shut up in a house. Joe could pay Carr half
his bill, if he wished to, and the rest could wait: they should want
the money for other things.
And Joe, to whom paying money for what he had had and enjoyed was
something like throwing it away, let the matter drop, saying to
himself, by way of salvo, that the money really did belong to Agnes
and she ought to have the use of it. There would be plenty of time.
His wages were rising every day, times were good, and, if they could
not make both ends meet, they might take some boarders. So that their
indebtedness was really increased, instead of lessened, by Aunt
Eunice's legacy.
About the middle of the winter, Agnes's second baby was born. It was
a fine little boy, and really did look like her: so she was quite
satisfied this time. She had been content with her mother's attendance
before; but now nothing would serve but a regular nurse, recommended by
Mrs. Van Horn as having a very genteel connection.
Mrs. Train was at first a good deal hurt, but satisfied herself with
the idea of the gentility of the thing. She was now very comfortably
off, thanks to Aunt Eunice; but the habit of complaining was too deeply
fixed to be uprooted by any change of circumstances, and she mourned
continually over the fact that the money was so tied up that she could
not touch it. It was so hard upon her not to be able to help dear
Agnes; and, after all, what did the income from three thousand amount
to? It was just an aggravation,—nothing more.
It was the first of August. John's young peach and plum trees were
coming into bearing, and the apricot tree, by the kitchen door,
was covered with fruit, just growing to perfection. The garden was
more fruitful than ever, and John had carried early cucumbers and
tomatoes to market, besides using all he wanted himself; while Letty's
flower-beds were the envy and admiration of the neighbourhood, and
threatened to eclipse Mrs. De Witt herself.
Every thing was in order at Number Nine. Not a nail was loose, not a
board hung awry, not a speck of paint was needed anywhere about it.
Every one who came through Myrtle Street said, "What a pretty place!"
One warm evening, Letty was standing at the gate, looking for her
husband, who was a little later than usual. The short baby, looking
shorter still in his abbreviated petticoats, was rolling on the grass.
Ginger, now grown a magnificent cat, was prancing around him, keeping a
sharp look-out for a fresh grasshopper. Letty turned from her watch for
a moment, and looked around her.
"How lovely every thing is!" said she to herself. "How much we have to
be thankful for! We have had nothing but mercies from the beginning
till now. May God make us grateful!"
She turned again to the gate, and saw John coming slowly up the street.
The moment he came in sight, she perceived that something was the
matter. Still, she was not alarmed. John was constitutionally subject
to fits of gloom and depression which almost amounted to hypochondria;
and while they lasted, he was totally unable to take a cheerful view of
any thing.
Letty used to be very much distressed by these fits at first; but she
learned, after a while, how to treat them, and even, to some extent, to
guard against them, by inducing her husband to take certain precautions
in regard to diet and repose, which, left to himself, he was too apt to
neglect.
"John has got one of his blue fits," said she to herself. "I thought he
was working too hard."
Not to seem as though she were watching him, she took up Alick and went
into the house to have tea all ready.
John did not enter at once; and, looking out to see what had become of
him, she saw him leaning over the well, breaking bits off a certain
choice shrub, a present from Mr. De Witt, which grew close by.
"Why, John, what are you doing?" she exclaimed. "You are spoiling that
beautiful rose-acacia."
"Am I?" said John, rousing himself, and looking around. "Well, Letty,
I beg your pardon. I did not know what I was about; and that is the
truth."
"Do come in and have some tea," said Letty, passing her arm through
his. "You look tired out."
"I am!" said John, emphatically.
He sat down to the table, but could not eat a mouthful. The prattle
of the baby, now beginning to talk, seemed to annoy him; and, for the
first time in his life, he spoke sharply to the child and bade him be
quiet.
Alick looked astonished and distressed, and put out his lip to cry.
Letty hastened to divert his attention, and set him down on the floor
to share a piece of cake with Ginger.
John soon rose from the table, and, going out, sat down on the step.
Letty hastened to get her dishes out of the way, put the baby to bed,
and then went out and sat down beside her husband.
"Is any thing the matter more than weariness, John?" she asked,
earnestly.
"Yes, Letty." He paused again, and then went on, in a firmer voice:
"Your legacy is all gone!"
"Gone!" repeated Letty. "What do you mean?"
"It is hopelessly gone," said John, "and all my year's earnings with
it!" He threw his pipe from him with such force that it was broken
into a hundred pieces, and, as if relieved by the action, added, more
calmly, "Beckman's bank has failed. Why don't you say, 'I told you
so'?" he added, bitterly.
Letty was one of those peculiarly constituted persons with whom there
is no medium between entire calmness and extreme agitation. She was
aware of this; and it had given her a habit of self-control, and of
enduring in silence any sudden blow or discomfort. This peculiarity
had its disadvantages, and more than once had she been called sullen
or cross, for going about with compressed lips when her heart was
overwhelmed with grief or with a sense of injury. At present she sat
quite still, with her eyes fixed on the western sky, for some minutes.
"Are you sure? Who told you?" she asked, presently.
"Of course I am sure. Should I bring you such a piece of news if I were
not sure?" asked John, in a tone of irritation. "It is all over town.
His office is shut; and they say he has run off."
"Well," said Letty, after another interval of silence, "if it is gone,
it is gone; that is all. It might have been worse: there is that about
it."
"I don't see how."
"You might have deposited all the money, instead of using part of it to
pay our debt. What is in the house is safe. You acted for the best, and
that is all any one can do."
"That is what cuts me to the heart, I did not act for the best. I knew
all the time that there was a risk in it; but I was so greedy after the
few additional dollars of interest that I would not consider it. Mr.
Trescott advised me against it, too. He said he did not believe Beckman
understood his business. But no:—I must have the last penny; and now
I have lost your money as well as my own. If it had been only mine, I
would not care; but to rob you—"
"Well, then, John, we will at least get a lesson out of the trouble,"
said Letty, trying to speak cheerfully. "Perhaps we have both been
growing too fond of money,—too careful for the things of this world.
'Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth,' you know," she added, in a lower
tone; "and, after all, he has left us far more than he has taken away.
We can never be very poor so long as we have each other."
John took her hand and kissed it; and Letty nestled close to his side.
They were still sitting in silence, when Mrs. De Witt came through the
garden-gate, her eyes red with crying. Mrs. De Witt was one of those
who cry easily and find great comfort in it.
"Are you talking about Beckman's failure?" said she. "Of course you
are: no one can think of any thing else. A'n't it a shame, though? And
such a man as he was thought to be! He was a member of your church:
wasn't he?"
"That's the worst of it," said Letty; "and people talk so about such
things."
"Exactly," said John, rousing himself; "and they have a right to talk.
People talk about this and that hurting the cause of religion. I do
verily believe that the thing which hurts it most and is the greatest
hindrance to the conversion of sinners is the downright dishonesty, in
such matters, of people who pass for Christians. How many do we know,
active in the church and at prayer-meetings, who have made failures
which no stretch of charity can call any thing but dishonest!"
"What do you call a dishonest failure?" asked Letty, glad of the chance
to effect a little diversion.
"I call it a dishonest failure when a man puts his property out of
his hands to save it from his honest creditors. I call it a dishonest
failure when a man goes on living in all the comfort and luxury to
which he has been accustomed, when he owes money to tradespeople and
merchants which he does not try to pay, or with whom he has compounded
for fifty cents on a dollar. I call it the meanest kind of dishonesty
when a man pleads usury to get off from paying back money which he
has borrowed and used. And I say that these things, happening as they
do among members of the church, are a shame and a disgrace, and put a
stumbling-block in the way of really sincere people; while they make
a ready excuse for hardened sinners. And I do not believe God looks
with more favour upon the prayers of such a man than if he had come to
meeting with his pockets full of counterfeit bills which he meant to
pass."
"That is just the way my husband talks," said Mrs. De Witt. "He feels
worse than you do about this matter, I can tell you. He says he led you
into it, and that you would never have gone to Beckman's but for him,
and that he has robbed you and your child. I never saw him go on so.
You would not think it was in him. I feel really concerned about him,
lest he should get a brain-fever, or something. It a'n't his own loss
he thinks of,—though that is enough,—but yours. He declares he shall be
ashamed ever to look you in the face again."
"Nonsense!" said John, rising. "He mustn't talk like that. Where is he?"
"At home, in the kitchen," replied his wife, wiping her eyes. "I tried
to make him come over here; but he wouldn't."
"Then I must go to him: that's all," said John. He looked round for his
pipe; and, not seeing it, turned inquiringly to Letty, who silently
pointed out the pieces lying on the door-stone.
John smiled, nodded, and went his way.
"There! That's just what I wanted!" said Mrs. De Witt. "I thought, 'If
I can only get them two men together, they will smoke and talk, and
kind of comfort each other.' Mr. De Witt does feel dreadful bad; but I
tell him we are young yet, and don't owe a cent, and, with the Lord's
blessing, we will make it up somehow to ourselves and you too. Has your
gladiolus blowed out yet?"
"I really don't know," replied Letty. "It had not opened early this
morning; and I have been so busy since, I have not looked at it."
"Let us go and see," said Mrs. De Witt.
Letty did not feel as though she cared much about flowers just then;
but she felt the intended kindness, and rose to follow her friend to
the spot where the valued lilies (six varieties) stood in a cluster,
lifting their stately spikes of exquisitely shaped flower-buds. Two of
them were expanded, and shone in full beauty.
"A'n't they lovely, though?" exclaimed Mrs. De Witt, with all the
enthusiasm of a florist. "Just look at the colour of those large
leaves! Mr. De Witt tries to make me say petals; but I never can
remember. Do you call it crimson, or scarlet, now?"
"I should say it was between the two," said Letty, interested in spite
of herself. "See the beautiful turn of the lip and the shape of the
half-opened bud! How perfect!"
"The things that God makes are always perfect, seems to me," said Mrs.
De Witt. "He don't slight any of his work. Think of the beautiful
things deep down in the sea and hid away in lonesome places of the
earth, where no man will ever see them! It seems as though he must take
pleasure in them himself: don't it?"
"'The Lord shall rejoice in his works,' the Bible says," observed Letty.
"That's true." She stooped once more to look at the flowers, and added,
"There's a verse about these very lilies that you and I ought to take
to heart at this present time:—'Consider the lilies of the field,' you
know. Mr. De Witt says some of our most beautiful flowers come from
Palestine."
"Every thing puts you in mind of something in the Bible: doesn't it?"
said Letty.
"To be sure. As I was telling Agnes, you know, that's what it is for.
But there was a good while, when I was young,—about Gatty's age,—that
I was very fond of reading; and the Bible was almost the only book we
had. My parents died when I was a baby, and left me to my grandmother's
care. She was old and almost blind; and I used to read the Bible to her
over and over again, till I came to know it almost by heart; and I can
repeat whole chapters. Grandmother used to point out these very things
to me,—how that nothing ever did or could happen to us that we did not
find something just to match it in the Bible. So I got into the habit
of it, you see."
"I am sure it is an excellent habit," said Letty. "Aunt Eunice was just
so. The Bible was her daily food. Didn't I hear our gate shut?"
The new-comers were Agnes and Joseph, who had heard the news down-town,
and now came to sympathize with their cousins in their trouble. Agnes,
as usual, began on the wrong tack. Priding herself on her tact and
management, she was sure to say the wrong thing, or to say the right
thing in the wrong place, simply because she had no capacity for
entering into the feelings of other people.
"How vexed you must be, Letty! If John had only taken your advice, all
this would not have happened. But I believe all men are alike about
that: they would rather be influenced by anybody else than their own
wives."
"You are much mistaken, Agnes," said Letty, with more spirit, perhaps,
than was absolutely called for. "I gave no advice on the subject,
simply because I knew nothing about the matter, one way or the other.
John said he would do as I wished; but I preferred to leave it to him.
He acted for the best, however it has turned out; and that is all any
one can do."
"Then you didn't say, 'I told you so'?" said Joe, with a tone of great
interest.
"Of course not! How should I? I did not tell him so; and, even if
I had, I should not be apt to cast it up to him, now that he is in
trouble."
Joe clapped his hands. "There, Agnes! You have lost your bet. You will
have to hand over. I made a bet with Aggy that you wouldn't say so, and
she bet you would. You have lost your new dress this time, Aggy."
"I will thank you not to make me the subject of any more bets," said
Letty, good-humouredly. "I don't believe in betting: it is entirely
against my principles."
"Well, I won't," said Joe. "But this was too good. But, Letty, I am
very sorry about this matter. Can nothing be done? Is it a dead loss?"
"I suppose it is."
"Where is John? How does he bear it?"
"Why, as well as you could expect. He blames himself for not putting
the money in the savings-bank; but I tell him there is no use in that
now. He has gone over to see Mr. De Witt, who feels much worse than we
do."
"So he ought!" exclaimed Agnes. "If I were you, I would never speak to
him again."
"Oh, Agnes!"
"Indeed I would not; nor his wife either. I always knew that no good
could come of your intimacy with such low, vulgar people. He has gained
such an influence over John that he can wind him round his finger; and
he has just drawn him into a trap,—that is all. It is just what you
might expect from a psalm-singing man like him."
"Agnes, stop!" said Letty, with emphasis. "Mr. and Mrs. De Witt are
among the kindest friends we have; and I will not hear them spoken of
in that way. Mr. De Witt made a mistake by which he has lost fully as
much as my husband, if not more. What possible object could he have in
such a course as you impute to him? What could he gain by it?"
"None so blind as those that won't see!" said Agnes, significantly.
"I don't believe his losses will hurt him much. We have all heard of
decoy-ducks."
"Let me advise you not to repeat any such remarks," said Letty. "You do
not know any harm of the De Witts; and you would look rather silly if
they should call for your proof in court, some day."
"Dear me! What did I say?" returned Agnes, rather alarmed. "You do make
such a fuss about nothing! However, scold away, if it does you any
good. I suppose you are afraid to give it to your husband, and so you
take it out on me. I am used to it: that is one thing. I have never in
my life tried to sympathize with and console any one, without meeting
ingratitude in return."
"I don't wonder at it, if that is your usual style of consolation,"
said Joe. "Come, Letty; never mind! We all know Agnes has her ways. But
I am sorry for your loss. You might better have taken the comfort of
this money as you went along, like us. Now it is all gone, and you have
had no good of it at all."
"Oh, yes, we have,—a great deal of good," replied Letty, recovering her
good humour. "What we gave for the house and our improvements is safe,
you know; then John has just paid his life and fire insurance, and we
owe no man a cent: so we are in no one's power."
Joe winced a little at this. He had been dunned that very day by Carr
the builder, who declared that he would wait on him no longer.
"There is Mr. Trescott coming in," said he, willing to change the
subject. "Shall I call John?"
"Do!" said Letty. "And Joe, don't say a word to De Witt: he feels badly
enough now."
"Not I," said Joe. "I am no hand to shy stones at a lame dog."
He went off whistling, and came back with John before Mr. Trescott had
done greeting Letty and Agnes.
"I want to tell you one thing, Caswell," said Mr. Trescott, at once.
"I don't believe Beckman has intended to act dishonestly. He is a
thick-headed man, and utterly unfit for the business he undertook; but
I do not believe he meant to wrong any one."
"I don't see what difference that makes," said Joe. "If the money is
lost, it is lost; and that is all about it."
"I beg your pardon, Emerson; it does make a great deal of difference,"
said John. "One of the hardest things to me in the whole affair was the
thought that a man who was a member of the church, and so active too,
should have laid a plan to rob others. I felt like David:—If it were
an enemy, 'I could have borne it.' You have taken a great load off my
mind, Mr. Trescott. But is it true that he has gone to Europe?"
"No: he is at home, sick in bed with jaundice. He sent for me to come
and talk with him this afternoon; and really, Caswell, if you had seen
him, I don't think you would find it hard to forgive him. The man is
completely broken down. All his old pompous way is gone. He cried like
a little child when I spoke to him; and when I came away, he grasped my
hand and sobbed,—
"'Trescott, if you see any of those poor people, beg them to try and
forgive me.'
"Think of such a speech as that coming from Beckman!"
"Poor man!" said Letty, with tears in her eyes. "I am sure we will
forgive him: won't we, John?"
"I should have tried to do so, at any rate," replied John. "If you
think it will do him any good, Mr. Trescott, please tell him so."
"I will: All his property, without exception, has been placed in the
hands of Street & Brothers, to see if any thing can be done towards
satisfying the creditors. They will clear matters up, if any one can;
and perhaps it will not be a dead loss, after all; though Mr. Street
tells me he never saw such confusion as the accounts and papers are in.
There is the trouble.
"Beckman would not be content to go on quietly in a business which he
thoroughly understood: he must make money fast. And, moreover, what
I think influenced him even more than the desire of making money,—he
wanted to be fashionable. Mr. Beckman the banker sounded much better in
his ears than Mr. Beckman the soap and candle maker."
"Any thing to be genteel," said John. "I hate the very sound of it. I
wish there wasn't any such word in the language."
"They say his wife was very extravagant," observed Agnes. "Mrs. Van
Horn says she never saw such lace as she wears; and I have noticed that
myself," she added, hastily, as a smile went round the circle.
"I do not think she has been greatly to blame," said Mr. Trescott. "Mr.
Beckman never allowed his wife or daughter to know any thing about his
affairs. I heard him say, once, it was a maxim of his that no woman
should know any thing of his business. His wife doubtless supposed him
to be immensely rich, and regulated her expenses accordingly."
"It will be hard for her to come down if they have to give up every
thing," said Agnes.
"I do not think she will mind it so much. She was sensibly brought up;
knows how to work, and is strong and active. I fancy she will lay down
all these fine things as easily as she took them up. She said to me
this afternoon,—
"'For myself I do not care. I shall be glad to go back to my little
house in Green Street. We were happier there than we have ever been
since; and if my husband's credit is saved, I shall have nothing to
regret.'
"But, Caswell, I want to talk over a little business with you. Are your
hands full of work?"
"Not at present. Indeed, I am doing very little."
Mr. Trescott entered at once upon his business. He wanted three
first-class houses built upon some lots belonging to his wife, and if
John would undertake them, he should be very glad to give him the job.
"And I shall be glad to take it," said John; "but I shall have to ask
you to advance part of the money, as all my capital is swept away."
"That I shall do, of course. Come up to my office early to-morrow
morning, and we will talk about it. Meantime, Letty, think of what you
have left, more than of what you have lost."
"Oh, I do," said Letty, smiling. "I tell John we are richer than when
we were married, by a house and a baby."
"That is the right way to look at it. Good-night; and God bless you!"