Every body that went to the shop took a good look at Jenny Hart, but no one took the least liberty with her; there she stood helping the customers, watching Hosea Bringle, curbing Ira Elkado, keeping Martin Barton from prosing, and relieving Mrs. Martin Barton from the most of her labours. The worthy couple had now been married eight years, and had but two children, twin girls, now in their seventh year, and it was odd enough to see how they were brought up; in fact, if it had not been for Jenny Hart they would not have been brought up at all. The shop was opened at daylight winter and summer; Jenny Hart was the first in it, and the last to leave it; every thing, as they said, went through her mouth and through her hands; neither Martin Barton nor his wife had the least concern in the world, for Jenny Hart ordered the marketing too; and as the girl brought the market basket through the long shop, the little body would whisk from behind the counter, lift up the cover, and satisfy herself that all was as she ordered. Then she hired the cook, and nurse, and maid of all work, and little Betty the waiter was of her choosing.
“Mrs. Martin Barton, what a noise those children make,”—said Mr. Martin Barton; “you must tell Jenny Hart that we shall have to build a room back of the parlour, and let them range about there, for their play is as noisy as their cries.”
Jenny Hart had just returned from quieting them, and a lady who was buying some German worsted asked Mrs. Martin Barton how old the little girls were.
“Let me see—how old are the two twins?”—for she always called them the two twins, just as if they were speaking of two candles, or two pinches of snuff—“how old are the two twins, Jenny Hart?”
“Just seven years old, Mrs. Martin Barton,” and Jenny Hart had answered this question of the age of the two twins ever since they were a year old. Mr. Martin Barton never knew, and Mrs. Martin Barton always forgot.
“As to building another room, Mr. Martin Barton, that will never do,” (oh, how Ira Elkado stared to see what a sway she had!) said Jenny Hart,—“for the back parlour is dark enough already, and we shall have less draft through the shop, too, if we clutter up the yard; but the twins are soon going to school; I spoke to Mrs. Playfair yesterday,—she was buying canvass of me,—and she has promised to take good care of the children, and for one year let them off easy—after that,” said she, whispering in Mrs. Martin Barton’s ear—“after that, we’ll get poor old Hojer to teach them at home, and Mrs. Armstrong will be a sort of governess to them; for old Hojer Bringle is a dead weight in the shop.”
“Good,” said Mrs. Martin Barton, and she went the other side of Jenny Hart and whispered it to Martin Barton. “Good,” said he.
“Oh, if I had only the ruling of that girl,” thought Ira Elkado, “how I would quell her.” Just as he said this, mentally, however, Jenny Hart, who had sold a gross of pearl buttons while the Martin Bartons were saying “good, good,” thrust a bad shilling in his hand. “You took that bad shilling from a boy, yesterday,” said she, “and gave it to Amy Russel this morning; it has come back, and it must be charged to you.” Ira Elkado put it in his pocket and gave her a good shilling; but the moment her quick eye was directed to something else, he slipped the bad piece of money in old Hosea Bringle’s drawer and helped himself to another, for he did not see why he should lose it. Hosea Bringle stood up, holding by the counter, fast asleep, and did not see it.
“That bad shilling,” said Jenny Hart, “will be known again, I’ll warrant, for I run the file across the edge. You had better put it in Hosea Bringle’s bad money drawer, that last slit in the corner; all the counterfeit money goes there.” “Powers on earth!” thought Ira Elkado, “did the little black-eyed devil see me slip the shilling in?”
No, Jenny Hart did not see him do it, but she suspected he would. She knew that he was a capital hand to buy goods at auction, and it was for this purpose she hired him—we may as well say she hired him, for it was all her doings. Martin Barton had nothing to do but approve; Jenny Hart, therefore, put up with many things from him.