Newspaper Page Text
2
HAL ELLSWORTH’S SAVINGS SANK
AY ELLSWORTH opened the door of
the cozy kitchen where her mother was
preparing supper; her cheeks were glow
ing from the biting wind outside.
“Cakes!” she sniffed happily. “How
good they smell! But, oh, mother,”
drawing off her coat and gloves excited
ly, “I have the most wonderful news
to tell you! What do you think! Miss
[fl
Hill is going to leave the store, and Mr. Bascom is
having to find another bookkeeper, and today when
he was telling us about it, he said to me, ‘May, don’t
you know bookkeeping?’ Mother, you can’t think
how I felt —I couldn’t say a word —I just shook my
head, and I suppose he thought there was something
the matter; for as he turned aw T ay he said, ‘Come
into my office.’ And when I went, he asked me
didn’t I take the bookkeeping course at school, and
I told him only the first half —that after father’s
death 1 couldn’t go back any more. I don’t know
how I came to do it, but before I knew it I was
telling him how dreadfully I wanted to go to
school to finish that course more than anything else,
so that I could help you to take care of the children,
and —■ ’ ’
The mother’s hand shook as she examined the
browning cakes, and a tear glistened on her cheek
in the ruddy gleam of the firelight. •
“My little girl!” she murmured.
“But, oh, little mother, there’s no need to cry
now, for listen to the wonderful news —you haven’t
heard yet! —and say, if Mr. Bascom isn’t the best
man in the world! He spoke of father and of you,
and called me a good girl, and then he said Will
had done very well in the store these two weeks
that he has been trying him, and though he is so
young he would take him regularly from this on
at my salary so that I could go to school, ‘ And
when you have finished,’ he said, ‘you shall be our
bookkeeper’ —mother, do you know that means we
shall have sixty dollars a month —that instead of
seven and a half a week I shall earn fifteen! Why,
w’e shall be rich! ’ ’
Mrs. Ellsworth looked at her daughter with shin
ing eyes. “Heaven bless that good man!” she said.
‘‘ My dear child —my good little girl! ’ ’
It was a happy little family that gathered about
that simple board, and when the meal was over and
the table clear, mother and daughter sat down to
talk over the good fortune.
“Let me put on plenty of coal, mother,” said
May; “I feel as if we will never have to stint
so any more. ’' And she piled it up until the room
was as warm and cheerful as prosperity itself.
“There is the twenty dollars you have saved,”
remarked Mrs. Ellsworth. “That will pay for your
books and incidental expenses. How good it is you
have it!”
May laughed happily. “You remember how sleepy
I would get over those ruches and collars, and how
little it was each one brought; it didn’t seem worth
sitting up for when I was so tired after being at
the store all day. And you know, mother, I never
would have saved a cent of it but for you. If
you hadn’t started me at putting the nickels and
dimes into that dear little bank, I wouldn’t have
a penny now for books.” She got up and reaching
to a hid-away corner in the closet brought it forth.
How heavy it was, and so full the coins would
scarcely jingle the least bit! It was pleasant to hold
it, and she sat down with it in her lap.
“Hist!” the mother held up her hand, an anxious
look on her face. “Whose voices are those? I
do wish Will would come in when night falls; here
it is nine o’clock, and he has had no supper. I miss
the father’s hand to help—”
“It’s no use, Will,” some one was saying out
side the window, “it’s a clear case. The money
was there in the drawer, and there was no one else
could have gotten it.” May looked at her mother’s
face growing white and set as she scarcely seemed to
breathe while she listened. “Now, it’s either to
put it back tonight and have the matter hushed
up,” the gruff, friendly voice went on, “or I must
arrest you like any other thief.”
The Golden Age for April 25, 1907.
By Florence L. Tucker,
“I tell you I didn’t get the money”—they
recognized the boyish treble, subdued and sullen.
May sprang to the door and threw it open. “What
is this?” she cried; “Will, what is the matter?”
The stalwart form of the policeman advanced in
to the patch of light that streamed out; he had the
slinking boy by the arm.
“Come in!” commanded the girl as the wind
nearly took her off her feet, and they entered the
room where the trembling mother sat too weak to
rise. “Will!” —she tried to say, but it was only
a faint, dry sob.
“I’m sorry to trouble you, Mrs. Ellsworth,”
said the officer. “We wanted the boy to give up
the money and have the whole affair hushed up
without you and Miss May knowin’ nothin’ about
it. It was six o’clock before the theft was discov
ered, and I’ve been these three hours fiindin’ him,
and tryin’ to get him to come across with the
amount, but I reckon it’s as he says, he hain’t got
it, for he had been with them pals of his two solid
hours when I found him. Mr. Bascom will hate
this; he didn’t want you —”
‘ ‘ Mr. Bascom! ’ ’ May stood erect in the middle
of the floor, her slender figure tense, her eyes burn
ing. Then the red crept to her lips; suffused her
face. “How much was it?” she asked in a tone
so dead the man regarded her curiously.
“Twenty-six dollars, even,” he said, reluctantly.
“Mother,” she turned mechanically, “the six
dollars you had put away for the rent —and here
is the twenty,” picking the little bank up from the
chair where she had laid it on going to the door.
“Mr. Scruggs,” she said, putting it into his hands,
“I had not expected to go to the store tomorrow.
Mr. Bascom told me this morning he would give
Will a place at my salary. I was to tell Will to
night. But now’, will you do me the kindness to
tell Mr. Bascom that I will be there tomorrow as
usual ? ’ ’
The strain was too much, she reeled and would
have fallen had not the kind-hearted man caugld
her in his arms and laid her on the couch. It was
no longer any place for him. He looked at the
half swooning girl, the sorrow-stricken mother
leaning over her, and the youth, shame-faced and
defiant, sulking in the shadow; and at eleven o’clock
the merchant, seated in his private office, was hav
ing a detailed account of the whole pitiable affair.
“Scruggs,” said the rich man, “you remember
when you and Ellsworth and I went to our first
school together. That was a long time ago, and
since then the most of us fellows that were in that
grade have come to the present time by different
and divergent paths, or dropped out. Poor Ells
worth’s career was not to be long, nor, as the world
counts it, successful. But he was a good fellow’, we
all remember that, and married one of the finest
girls in town. That boy of his is not bad; he is
only weak, and since his father is gone has gotten
in with a crowd that will be his ruin if he is not
rescued. We must keep an eye on him, Scruggs—•
you can, maybe, save him from going too far; a
friendly officer is sometimes the best friend a fool
boy can have. As for the girl, I will stand by her! ’ ’
You look after the boy and I’ll take care of the
girl. ’ ’
When the man had gone he sat looking at the
childish bank and the little pile of silver. “Their
rent,” he muttered, “and not half enough, either.
Poor child! Her savings to go for that young scamp,
to shield him from disgrace, and the family name
from dishonor! Gad, but things are not fair, and
what’s the use to try to even ’em up?”
But May was not back in the store on the morrow’,
though the merchant did not know it, being sud
denly called away for several days. There was
little sleep in the Ellsworth home that night; wide
eyed and stricken to the heart the mother lay gaz
ing into darkness hardly darker to her than seem
ed the future of her and her children, and May, the
child who was her comfort and her hope, May lay
tossing in a fever which rose higher and higher
as the night wore on. The morning found her de
lirious, talking wildly of school and the store, and
once throwing her hands over her face, as she cried:
“Oh, no, not a thief! Take my money, but don’t
let my brother be called a thief! Oh. I did want
so to go to school! Sixty dollars —it was too
much! ’ ’
The mother hung over her, ministering and weep
ing, and the little children sat around silent and
awed; for three days the doctor came and went,
and consciousness returned not to the sick girl;
the brother, unable to endure longer the misery he
had wrought, had slunk away, no one knew whither.
On the evening of that day, Mr. Bascom had just
returned from his trip and sat m conference with
his head clerk.
“It looks, sir,” said the clerk, “as though there
will have to be another sales-girl. May Ellsworth
has not reported since Monday. Some of the girls
are saying that she was taken suddenly and vio
lently ill on Monday night, and has been delirious
ever since. Nor has her brother been to the store.
No word has come, and I see no use in holding
places for people who are too indifferent even to
report. ’ ’
“That will do,” said Mr. Bascom, sternly, get
ting into his top-coat as he spoke, “w T e will talk
over matters further tomorrow.”
Making all the time that he could, and reproach
ing himself as he went, it was nine o’clock before
he was seated with Mrs. Ellsworth in her tiny sit
ting-room. The widow’, with patiently folded hands
and grief-laden eyes, answered his questions. He
knew her poverty and the shame her son had
brought on her; and with the agonizing anxiety for
her sick child, words would not come —he had to
ask to learn what he would know.
“So,” he said, holding the little bank in his
hand, “this she made working nights, after being
on her feet in the store from eight till six o’clock?
Months she w’as saving it, and now it becomes mine,
not for value received, but mine to pay a debt she
had nothing to do with incurring. Mrs. Ellsworth,
if I were not a man I could shed tears over this
little toy. Yes, it is mine, to do with as I will,
and I want to ask you to give it to May to have
just as she had it before this unfortunate occur
rence, and to spend as she would have spent it.
I would like to give her the books, but she will
prefer to buy them with her own money. And I
have a proposition to make to you for her. It
is only business, and I, as w’ell as she, will be the
gainer in the end. I have offered your daughter
the position of bookkeeper with a salary of sixty
dollars per month when she shall have equipped
herself to fill the place. Suppose, now, instead of
beginning six months hence to draw sixty dollars,
we let her have her usual thirty per month while
she is at school, and for the first six months after
her return to us in the capacity of bookkeeper, give
her only thirty instead of the sixty she W’ould have
drawn? It is merely an advance, and at the end
of the year, we are repaid.
“I don’t mind saying that if May proves as com
petent as I believe she will, and our business con
tinues to grow, at the beginning of next year she
will be entitled to an advance.
“I will take it for granted the proposition w’ill
meet with acceptance, and have a check for the
current month mailed her tomorrow.” And with
expressions of sympathy and interest the merchant
took his leave.
“Mother,” called a faint voice from the sick
chamber, whose door stood ajar; “Mother,” whis
pered May as Mrs. Ellsworth softly approached the
bed, “what does all this mean? Have I been sick?
I heard what Mr. Bascom was saying.”
“I thought you were asleep,” replied the mother
gently. “Yes, my little girl has been sick, but will
soon be well again. Go to sleep, now.”
“Yes, I can go to school, now,” she murmured,
and closing her eyes like a tired child, sank into
beautiful slumber.
“Dear God,” breathed the mother, as she slipped
silently to her knees, “I thank thee for all thy
goodness, and, oh, I bless thee for mv good, good
child!”