“We haven’t any more ready, ma’am, just now.”
“What have you to give out? Any thing?”
“Yes. Here are some unbleached cotton shirts, at seven cents. You can have some of them, if you choose.”
“I will take half a dozen,” said Mrs. Gaston in a desponding tone. “Any thing is better than nothing.”
“Well, Miss Lizzy Glenn,” said Michael, with repulsive familiarity, as Mrs. Gaston turned from the counter and left the store, “what can I do for you this morning?”
The young seamstress made no reply, but laid her bundle upon the counter and unrolled it. It contained three fine shirts, with linen bosoms and collars, very neatly made.
“Very well done, Lizzy,” said Michael, approvingly, as he inspected the two rows of stitching on the bosoms and other parts of the garments that required to be sewed neatly.
“Have you any more ready?” she asked, shrinking back as she spoke, with a feeling of disgust, from the bold, familiar attendant.
“Have you any more fine shirts for Lizzy Glenn?” called Michael, back to Berlaps, in a loud voice.
“I don’t know. How has she made them?”
“First rate.”
“Then let her have some more, and pay her for those just brought in.”
“That’s your sorts!” responded Michael, as he took seventy-five cents from the drawer and threw the money upon the counter. “Good work, good pay, and prompt at that. Will you take three more?”
“I will,” was the somewhat haughty and dignified reply, intended to repulse the low-bred fellow’s offensive familiarity.
“Highty-tighty!” broke in Michael, in an undertone, meant only for the maiden’s ear. “Tip-top airs don’t pass for much in these ‘ere parts. Do you know that, Miss Lizzy Glenn, or whatever your name may be? We’re all on the same level here. Girls that make slop shirts and trowsers haven’t much cause to stand on their dignity. Ha! ha!”
The seamstress turned away quickly, and walked back to the desk where Berlaps stood writing.
“Be kind enough, sir, if you please, to hand me three more of your fine shirts,” she said, in a firm, but respectful tone.
Berlaps understood the reason of this application to him, and it caused him to call out to his salesman something after this homely fashion—
“Why, in thunder, Michael, don’t you let the girls that come to the store, alone? Give Lizzy three shirts, and be done with your confounded tom-fooleries! The store is no place for them.”
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.”
“Seven cents! How many of them can you make in a day?”
“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—
“Well, Mrs. Gaston, it’s no use for you to struggle on at this rate, even with your two remaining children. You cannot keep a home for them, and cover their nakedness from the cold. Now let me advise you.”
“I am ready to hear any thing, doctor.”
“What I would propose, in the first place—and that, in fact, is what has brought me in this morning—is that you put Henry out to a trade. He is young, it is true; but necessity, you know, knows no law. He will be just as well off, and better, too, under the care of a good master than he can be with you. And, then, such an arrangement will greatly relieve you. The care of little Emma will be light in comparison to what you have had to endure.”
“You are no doubt right, doctor,” the poor woman said, while the tears came to her eyes as she glanced toward Henry, who, for want of a pair of shoes, was compelled to stay home from school. “But I cannot bear the thought of parting with him. He is a delicate child, and only ten years old this winter. He is too young to go from home and have a master.”