The young woman remained quietly beside the desk of Berlaps until Michael came up and handed her the shirts. She then walked quickly toward the door, but did not reach it before Michael, who had glided along behind one of the counters.
“You’re a fool! And don’t know which side your bread’s buttered,” he said, with a half leer, half scowl.
She neither paused nor replied, but, stepping quickly out, walked hurriedly away. Young Perkins, before alluded to, entered at the moment, and heard Michael’s grossly insulting language.
“Is that the way to talk to a lady, Michael?” he asked, looking at him somewhat sternly.
“But you don’t call her a lady, I hope, Mr. Perkins?” the salesman retorted, seeming, however, a little confused as he spoke.
“Do you know any thing to the contrary?” the young man asked, still looking Michael in the face.
“I can’t say that I know much about her, any way, either good or bad.”
“Then why did you use such language as I heard just now?”
“Oh, well! Never mind, Mr. Perkins,” said Michael, his whole manner changing as a new idea arose in his thoughts; “if she’s your game, I’ll lie low and shut my eyes.”
This bold assurance of the fellow at first confounded Perkins, and then made him very indignant.
“Remember, sir,” said he, in a resolute voice, and with a determined expression on his face, “that I never suffer any one to trifle with me in that style, much less a fellow like you; so govern yourself, hereafter, accordingly. As to this young lady, whom you have just insulted, I give you fair warning now, that another such an act will bring with it merited punishment.”
Perkins then turned from the somewhat crestfallen salesman, and walked back to where Berlaps was standing at his desk.
“Do you know any thing about that young woman I just now saw leave here, Mr. Berlaps?” he asked.
“I do not, Mr. Perkins,” was the respectful answer. “She is a stranger, who came in some days ago for work.”
“What is her name?”
“Lizzy Glenn, I believe.”
“Where does she live?”
“Somewhere at the north end. Michael; there, knows.”
“Get from him her street and number for me, if you please.”
Berlaps asked Michael for the street and number where she lived, which the fellow took good care to give wrong. Perkins made a memorandum of the name and residence, as furnished, in his note-book, and, bowing to the man of shears, departed.
With her half-dozen shirts at seven cents, Mrs. Gaston returned home, feeling as if she must give up the struggle. The loss of Ella, after having striven so long and so hard for the sake of her children, made her feel more discouraged than she had ever yet felt. It seemed to her as if even Heaven had ceased to regard her—or that she was one doomed to be the sport of cruel and malignant powers. She had been home for only a short time, when Dr. R—came in. After inquiring about her health, and if the children were still free from any symptoms of the terrible disease that had carried off their sister, he said—
“I’ve been thinking about you a good deal in the last day or two, Mrs. Gaston, and have now called to have some talk with you. You work for the stores, I believe?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What kind of work do you do?”
“Here are some common shirts, which I have just brought home.”
“Well, how much do you get for them?”
“Seven cents, sir.”
“
“Two are as many as I shall be able to get through with, and attend to my children; and even then I must work half the night. If I had nothing to do but sit down and sew all the while, I might make three of them.”
“Shameful! Shameful! And is that the price paid for such work?”
“It is all I get.”
“At this rate, then, you can only make fourteen cents a day?”
“That is all, sir. And, even on the best of work, I can never get beyond a quarter of a dollar a day.”
“How in the world, then, have you managed to keep yourself and three children from actual want?”
“I have not been able, doctor,” she replied, with some bitterness. “We have wanted almost every thing.”
“So I should suppose. What rent do you pay for this poor place?”
“Three dollars a month.”
“What! seventy-five cents a week! and not able to earn upon an average more than a dollar a week?”
“Yes, sir. But I had better work through the summer, and sometimes earned two dollars, and even a little more, in a week.”
The doctor paused some time and then said—
