“I did not say he was in love with her, Mrs. Daly, I only said he wanted our consent to marry her—so, wife, if you have no objection, I may as well let them marry at once; business is a little slack just at present, and he can be spared better now than in the spring.”
“Why, to be sure, husband, Martin Barton is worth his weight in gold in such a shop as ours, and no one could supply his place if he were to leave us; so I’ll just step back and tell Letty—oh, here she comes—Letty, my dear, Martin Barton’s time is up, he is twenty-one this morning, and he told your father, and your father told me, that he wants to have you for a wife.”
“Yes, so Martin Barton told me himself,” said Miss Letty, a fine tempered girl of eighteen, and as brisk as a bee.
“Oh, then he has spoken to you himself, has he? When did you see him? Not this morning after church, I guess, for I saw him turn the corner with Ira Elkado, and I saw him come back with old Hosea Bringle around the very same corner.”
“We talked the matter over after church about a month ago; indeed we have done all our courting in that way while coming home after church, for Martin Barton has no time to court on week days, you know.”
“No more he has not,” said the satisfied mother, “so, husband, all we have to do now is to get them married and pass the shop over to Martin Barton. You and I are tired of all this hard work, so we will go to our little farm in the country and live at our ease.” Live at their ease!!
Martin Barton expected as much, and so did Miss Letty; they were married the following week, and before another week had expired Mr. and Mrs. Daly bade adieu to the thread and needle store, and went into the country to live at their ease!
Hosea Bringle, with whom Martin Barton had gone round the corner, was the book keeper as long as goods were sold on credit, but as soon as it was determined to sell for cash alone, the old man’s occupation was gone. He was transferred to the lower end of the counter—but, alas! Hosea Bringle was found to be a poor vender of tape and bobbin. It did well enough when it came to a dozen of stockings or socks, but he never could tell which thread of yarn was thick or which thin, and above all he could not tell linen tape from cotton tape. It was plain, therefore, that Hosea Bringle had to go.
Sigismund Sloper had entered the shop at the same time with Martin Barton, but although he was a decent lad enough, and had been a year out of his time, for he was fifteen when he began his service, yet Mr. Daly had no great partiality for him. He continued on, therefore, at good wages, till the present time, when little Jenny Hart spoke up and said that Sigismund Sloper was not wanted any longer, as she had heard of an excellent lad of the right age who would work better and cheaper.
Now Jenny Hart was the oracle of the shop; she likewise had been in Mr. Daly’s employ for a term of years—three, I believe—but it was a far different thing to see her move about and direct every thing that was done, than when the clerks or Martin Barton did it. Clean and neat, too, was little Jenny Hart, quick at meals and quick at work, an early riser and a late sitter up; and such a tongue as she had, such a spirit as she showed, such a goer and comer! In short, little Jenny Hart was the life and soul of the establishment, and money came in so fast that the money drawers had to be emptied every night—no credit—happy thread and needle people were Mr. and Mrs. Martin Barton.