"Of course, you wouldn't want Perry to tell a downright lie about it," said Mrs. Morse; and little Charlie wondered if downright lies were any different from other lies.
"Why, no—certainly not. But he never drove the horse—what can he know? I'll trust him to get around it. Of course if he should have to come upon the stand and testify, he would have to tell the truth about it. But if he don't know anything about it, he will not be likely to be called upon."
Perry wondered if a lie in the court-room was really so much worse than a lie in somebody's parlour or breakfast-room; but then Perry's conscience was tender just then.
Perry's resolution had not gained strength by this little conversation, and his father's hint at his own possible imperfections disturbed him somewhat. What would he say when he knew all? Oh, if Perry's father had lived nearer to Christ, and if Perry had gone first to him with his confession! He was walking straight on toward the private office where he expected to meet Mr. Wynn, when he was stopped by that gentlemen.
"Morse, see here—some goods belonging to your department have just come in. I want to show them to you. There—aren't those beauties?" displaying some laces. "Now see if you can tell the difference. Is there any?"
"I should be a dull scholar not to have profited by the lesson you gave me on laces," returned Perry, smiling; "but the imitation is so like the real that I am almost afraid to call it so."
"Just so! Just so!" said Mr. Wynn. "Now, Morse, I am going to take a set of these up to Mrs. Wynn, and when you show the others you can say that Mrs. Wynn has a set like them—they are very like, you see. And you understand, you are not to show them both to the same customers. Mrs. Golden or Mrs. Amesbury would detect a difference very quick, but Mrs. Longseam would never know whether she paid ten dollars for a collar exactly like Mrs. Wynn's or not. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir, I understand," said the clerk to his employer; then as that individual turned away, he continued to himself, "I quite understand that it is no worse for me to take twenty-five dollars of your money than for you to take ten dollars from a poor woman for an article that isn't worth five, because she never will know any better. Yes, I understand. You and father call yourselves Christians, and I don't know as it will pay for me to humble myself for the sake of being like you, and I sha'n't do it. My secret is safe now, and I'll keep it. I'd like to know how Lester, and Clarke, and all the rest of them, are going to get along here. I can tell them that religion hasn't any chance for a foothold in this store. They'll have to give in at last; then they won't be any better off than I am."
A customer interrupted this one-sided talk, and he had no farther opportunity for meditation during the day. Indeed he would have avoided anything of the sort. He said he had "stopped thinking; he guessed it would do as well to let things slide along;" and by way of doing his part, he did not go near the church that evening, but went back to Murphy's, and reeled home toward midnight with just sense enough left to remember his broken resolutions.
As he kicked off his boots and groped about for a match, he muttered, "Well, this is different from last evening! And to think that all my hard work to bring myself up to the confessing point has just ended in smoke! Everything knocked over by the wonderful consistency of two church members! Well, if it hadn't been for father and Mr. Wynn, I should have spent this evening differently, I presume. Humph! I guess so! For all I know I might have spent it in jail. Mr. Wynn would have been as likely to take that course as any other. My! What a mountain I made of it last night! It wasn't such a great affair, after all. I have done extra work enough to earn that money a dozen times over; and as for religion, I don't want the kind that some folks have, and in my position, I couldn't very well manage any other. Heigh ho! I'm sick of Westville. I wish I had Herbert's chance in New York. He is a lucky dog. It was dull at Murphy's without Nick. I must try to coax him back."