After he had been with us a week he was quite a changed man. He was the life and soul of the place, always merry, and always in high spirits. The customers liked him very much, and he really brought a lot of custom to the room, some of the young gentlemen from the houses round about coming to see him, and liking to talk to him, and hear his stories of what he had seen and done.
After he had been with us a fortnight he told us he was doing very well, as most of the gentlemen gave him something for himself. He said it made him feel queer at first to take a tip, like a servant, but after all he would be able to pay his landlady what he owed her, and so that helped him to swallow his pride.
We all got to like him very much indeed. He said Harry and I were as good as a brother and sister to him—better than his own brothers and sisters had been—and he was so grateful to us, there was nothing he would not have done to show it.
Of course, that Graves, the farrier, had something to say about it, in his nasty vulgar way. One day we were talking about Charley, and Graves said to Harry, “Yes, he’s a handsome young fellow. If he’d a lame leg and a squint eye and red hair, I don’t suppose the missus would have taken him up so kindly.” Harry gave Graves a look and curled his lip. “Graves,” he said, “I know you don’t mean to be objectionable, but shoeing horses is more in your line than people’s feelings. Talk about what you understand!”
Mr. Wilkins had something to say too, only he wasn’t as coarse as Graves. There is a little more refinement about a parish clerk than there is about a farrier. Mr. Wilkins only said that, of course, we knew our own business best; but he didn’t think a broken down betting-man was the nicest kind of person to keep on a well-conducted establishment.
I said, “Mr. Wilkins, when you have an hotel, you can manage it yourself and choose your own people; while the ‘Stretford Arms’ is ours, we’ll do the same thing.”
Charley—Mr. Bright I suppose I ought to call him now—stayed with us for two months, and then one day he came to me, and he said, “Mrs. Beckett, I hope you won’t think me ungrateful, but I’m going to leave you.”
Of course I said I was very sorry, and I asked him why.
Then he told me that a young fellow who had known him in his good days had gone into business for himself, and had offered him a situation as clerk in his office if he would come.
Of course I saw that was a more suitable situation for a young man of his position, and I said so. A few days afterwards he left us, and there wasn’t a soul but was sorry when he left; our housemaid, silly girl!—who, I do believe, had fallen in love with him—crying her eyes out.