Pride and Prudence CHAPTER 2.
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Ten years after her marriage, Mrs. Este found herself a widow with four young children. During that time, her sister had grown more and more selfish and reserved. After the funeral of her husband, the stricken heart of the widow turned earnestly towards her sister, but that sister was as cold as ever, and altogether uninterested in her affairs. Mr. Ashton declined administering on the estate of her husband, and this important branch of her interests was confided to a cunning and dishonest lawyer. The settlement of the estate was delayed, month after month, and even ran on to two years, during which time, only money sufficient to supply pressing demands could be obtained from the administrator. On the final settlement of the estate, all that was produced was one thousand dollars in cash; plus ten thousand dollars in bad Western and Southern debts; and ten thousand dollars in unproductive building lots, which, if forced into the market, would not have brought one thousand dollars. An honest settlement of the estate would have left her an unincumbered property of at least thirty thousand dollars, in the present, and the building lots, which in time would have been worth at least half that amount.
But Mary knew nothing of business, and had no friend to intervene for her. With a young family to raise and educate, and available means sufficient to take her through little over one year — she felt something like despair stealing upon her, while looking into the future.
"What shall I do?" was her frequent, silent ejaculation. One day she called upon Anna, for the purpose of asking her advice as to what she ought to do. Her sister received her with cold formality; so much so, that she could hardly find it in her heart to lay before her the object of her visit.
"I find myself in quite a difficulty, Anna," she said at length, "and want your advice."
"Well, what is it? You did not use to think much of my advice. But what is the matter now?"
"I suppose you know that Mr. Este's estate has yielded me but a comparative trifle, though I am sure it has not been settled fairly."
"How much? Thirty thousand dollars?"
"But one thousand available; and twenty thousand, little better than nothing."
"Then you are a beggar!" exclaimed Mrs. Ashton, rising quickly to her feet. "How can I help you?" she continued. "What have I got? I have nothing that is not my husband's, and I can't squander his property. What do you expect me to do for you?"
"I have asked you for nothing, Anna," said Mrs. Este, in a low tone, the tears coming to her eyes, "and I want nothing but your advice."
"But how can I advise you?"
"Perhaps you cannot, Anna. But you are my elder sister, and you once loved me." She could say no more, the fountain was unsealed, and she wept like a child.
For a moment, Mrs. Ashton was moved. Old feelings came back upon her, and touched her heart with something of tenderness, and in a milder tone she said —
"Come, Mary, this won't help the matter any. Let me hear what you have to propose."
There was still something so heartless in the manner of her sister, that Mrs. Este hesitated to converse further upon a subject which she knew would cause her increased pain, in witnessing her sister's lack of feeling for her; but thoughts of her children roused her to a sense of duty.
"My object in calling this morning, was to consult you on the best course for me to pursue to raise my children, and properly educate them. I have about one thousand dollars in cash, which must be made productive. If I do nothing, in a year or eighteen months, this will all be gone, and I shall have to force a sale of one of my building lots in the western part of the city, for about as much money as will keep us a year or two longer. In the end, destitution will unavoidably come, unless I do something. But the question is, what shall I do? Keep a boarding house; set up a small dry goods store; or — "
"Keep a boarding house! Set up a dry goods store! Mary! are you crazy? Do you suppose I would submit to such a disgrace? Never! You must do no such thing!"
"Then what shall I do?" asked Mrs. Este, quietly.
"That's more than I can tell. There are many ways to live, besides disgracing yourself and me, by keeping a dry goods store, or a boarding house. You say you have enough to support you for three or four years. Something may turn up by that time."
"It would be unwise to trust to so improbable an event. I have thought of many ways to get a living, and know of none which promise so well as the two I have named. How to choose between them, puzzles me."
"Mary, I tell you, you must do no such thing — you are young yet, and still fresh and good looking, and — "
She paused, for, even as heartless as she had grown, she felt that she was going too far. Mrs. Este understood the allusion, and, rising on the instant, formally withdrew.
"Mary was here this morning," said Mrs. Ashton to her husband, when he came in at dinner time.
"Well?" was the brief response.
"She is a beggar!"
"As I expected would be the case, when she entrusted her affairs to the person she did."
"She always would have her own way."
"And will have to take the consequences, I suppose. Her husband's affairs were in a pretty good condition when he died; and, with proper management, the estate would have yielded forty or fifty thousand dollars."
"Couldn't something be done with the administrator?"
"He is a lawyer, and that will make it a hard game to play. I, for one, shall not meddle with it."
"She talks about opening a dry goods store."
"Nonsense!"
"Or taking boarders."
"And losing all she's got."
"I will never hear to it."
"She can do as she pleases, Anna; I shall not meddle with her."
"But I have no idea, I assure you, of being disgraced in such a way. She has been a constant source of mortification to me for years, and — "
"You had better give yourself no further trouble about her. Everybody gets along some way — and so will she."
"But isn't she my sister, and what will people say to my sister keeping a boarding house?"
"That is one of the things which you can't help. If she does go to keeping boarders, she will come down lower than that, before she's done. What does she know about such a business? Why, even the most experienced find a great difficulty in succeeding, and the inexperienced almost invariably come out worse than nothing in a year or two."
"It does seem unnatural; but if she will persist in her course, I shall be compelled to request her to suspend her visits here. It would ruin our reputation."
"You can do as you choose, Anna; it is a matter of no interest to me."
With a burden upon her heart, weighing heavier than any that had heretofore pressed upon it, Mrs. Este slowly returned home. For more than an hour did she sit alone in her chamber, pondering deeply the course it would be right to pursue. She felt more than ever alone — more than ever thrown upon her own resources. But the active mind never despairs.
"I will take boarders," she at length said aloud, in a firm voice, and with a changed and more cheerful countenance.
She proceeded at once to rent a pleasant house without further conference with her sister; and, after increasing her stock of bedding and other necessary articles, advertised for half a dozen genteel boarders.
In the course of two weeks, she had three applications from young men; she took them at four dollars a week. At the end of a month, she had her complement, six, which brought her in twenty-four dollars a week. For some time she felt greatly encouraged, though she found little rest for her body, or quiet for her mind. Between attending the market, and overseeing the internal arrangements of her family — she had no leisure time to calculate the probable chances of succeeding, even if she had imagined such a calculation necessary.
Let us make it for her. House rent four hundred dollars a year. Wages for two servants one hundred and twenty dollars. Marketing and groceries, fifteen dollars a week, or eight hundred dollars a year; besides other expenses, clothes for herself and children, tuition bills, etc., etc., four hundred dollars more, at the lowest calculation — in all, say eighteen hundred dollars a year.
Six boarders at four dollars a week, would be twelve hundred and forty-eight dollars a year, provided the number was kept up, and no one went away without paying her.
But even this kind of plain sailing was not to be her lot, as will presently be seen. Among the boarders was a young man named Jenkins, who, three weeks after he came into her house, lost his job as a clerk in a hardware store. Like most young men, he had lived up to his income, and had, therefore, nothing laid aside for a rainy day. Three weeks passed in the vain effort to get a new job. At the end of that time, he stated to Mrs. Este that he had no means of paying her — about twenty dollars already due for board, until he could get a new job, when every cent, he said would be faithfully handed over.
Of course, if he had nothing — then nothing was to be obtained from him. This was a clear case. Nor could she tell him that he must leave her house. That would be inhumane. It was three months before he obtained a new job, at the end of which time, he owed her seventy dollars. Not being a young man of strictly honest principles, he soon began to look upon the debt to Mrs. Este, as a burden that must be shook off if possible. For about a month he paid his board, and four dollars besides each week. But this absorbed so large a part of his salary, leaving him but little for the indulgence of selfish gratification, that he began to demur in his own mind against it. He did not like to leave the house without some pretext for doing so, because that would look too bad — he, therefore, determined to produce, if possible, a cause of disagreement, between himself and Mrs. Este, and to go off in a fit of apparent anger.
For some days he studied over the means by which this might be attained, during which time his manner to Mrs. Este was not pleasant. At length, a slight cause presented itself. The servant had neglected to place water in his room. This he observed at night on retiring to bed. On the next morning he rose early, and going to the head of the stairs, called down in a loud, angry voice to the servant —
"Why in the devil is there no water in my room?"
The water was quickly brought, and the servant asked to be excused for the neglect, which would not again occur. This did not satisfy Jenkins. He grumbled and fretted until the servant left the room.
"Who was that yelling downstairs, just now?" asked Mrs. Este, as the servant passed her door.
"Mr. Jenkins, ma'am," was the reply.
"What was the matter?"
"I forgot to put water in his room."
"Well don't neglect him again," returned Mrs. Este, retiring into her chamber with disturbed feelings. She had heard the angry interrogatory uttered by Jenkins, and it had offended her. Half an hour after, she met the young man in the passage. She was about requesting him, politely, to complain to her in case the servant neglected anything in his room, but was prevented doing so by his remarking, in rather an insulting tone —
"I wish, madam, you would see that my room is better attended to!"
"What is wrong?" she asked in a calm tone.
"Why, a good deal. Here's twice that I've had no water in my room within ten days.
"When the first omission occurred, you should have complained to me, sir — not waited until there was another neglect. Or, if you had passed by the first, when the second took place — you should have come to me, instead of using improper language to one of my servants."
The young man's face became instantly inflamed with real anger.
"I'll not stay in anybody's house to be insulted!" he quickly retorted.
"After such language, and the exhibition of such a spirit, I would not keep you a day longer. You can seek a new home at once," Mrs. Este said, with something of indignation in her voice.
Jenkins turned upon his heel and left her. In half an hour, he was out of the house. He never came back to pay his sixty dollars that were due to Mrs. Este. She went for it several times, but he always returned for answer that he had no money. She did not care to compel him by law to pay, and therefore, she lost the whole of it.
A few days after he went away, a man and his wife applied for boarding. They had one child. The only room vacant was that which had been occupied by Jenkins. It was small; but they were willing to take it. The price agreed upon was eight dollars per week.
For a week or two Mr. Slocum, that was the man's name, paid the eight dollars punctually. After that, he would hand Mrs. Este, four or five dollars on Saturday evening, saying that he would give her the balance on the next Monday or Tuesday. But Monday or Tuesday never saw the "balance due." Mr. Slocum and his wife did not live very happily together; they jarred frequently, and were not at all particular, even at the table, and in the presence of the other boarders, as to their manner of addressing each other. This, at length, became so annoying, that two of Mrs. Este's best boarders left the house. They did not tell her the reason. By paying only three or four dollars a week, Mr. Slocum managed to get in debt to Mrs. Este pretty heavily in the course of a few months.
Winter set in, adding considerably to the expenses of house keeping. The places of the two boarders who had gone away, had not yet been filled. Only three remained besides Mr. Slocum and his wife. From the whole, she only received fifteen dollars a week, in cash. This was not half the amount of her expenses. Of course Mrs. Este found herself going behindhand, and this troubled her very much. To add to her other sources of despondency, Mr. Slocum, who already owed her fifty dollars, had a quarrel with his wife and went off and left her. It was, as has been said, mid-winter, the friends of the deserted wife lived more than a hundred miles away.
She could not get to them until spring opened. Mrs. Este was too humane to send the poor woman and her child to the almshouse. Consequently, she was burdened with their support for two months longer, when spring opened. The boarders in the house, commiserating her situation, raised among themselves money enough to send her home to her friends.
Nine months had now elapsed since Mrs. Este had opened a boarding house. During that time, Mrs. Ashton had not come near her. Twice Mrs. Este called upon her, but the reception she met with was so cold, that she cared not to go again. During this nine months, she had been compelled to check out from bank, four hundred dollars of her little fund, thus showing an actual loss of four hundred dollars, instead of having been able to sustain herself. At the end of the year, she gave up this experiment, but not until she had, what ought to have been the first step taken, entered into a close calculation in regard to income and expenses. This showed her the radical error which vitiated her whole scheme, and caused her to lose six hundred dollars; for only four hundred remained out of her thousand dollars.
No increase of boarders that she could make, would be sufficient to induce her to continue, and she at once gave them up, sold off a great part of her furniture, all of which she had kept since the death of her husband, and removed with her children into a small house, in the western extremity of the city. The proceeds of the sale of her most valuable articles of furniture, brought her, in cash, about sixteen hundred dollars. Thus she had two thousand dollars to draw upon for future expenses.
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