But Gordon did not stop to bandy words with one of the men who had helped to ruin him.
"It's all over with us, Mary. Evenly's got a man in my place," said Gordon, as he entered his house and threw himself despairingly into a chair. "But won't he give you work, too?" asked Mrs. Gordon, in a husky voice.
"No! He insulted me, and said I should never come ten feet inside of his shop."
"Did you tell him that you had signed the pledge?"
"Yes. But it was no use. He did not seem to care for me any more than he did for a dog."
The poor man's distress was so great that he covered his face with his hands, and sat swinging his body to and fro, and uttering half-suppressed moans.
"What are we to do, Mary? There is no other shop in town," he said, looking up, after growing a little calm. "Doesn't it seem hard, just as I am trying to do right?"
"Don't despair, Henry. Let us trust in Providence. It is only a dark moment; yet, dark as it is, it is brighter to me than any period has been for years. A clear head and ready hands will not go long unemployed. I do not despond, dear husband, neither should you. Keep fast anchored to your pledge, and we will outride the storm."
"But we shall starve, Mary. We cannot live upon air."
"No," replied Mrs. Gordon; "but we can live upon half what you have been earning at your trade, and quite as comfortably as we have been living. And it will be an extreme case, I think, if you can't get employment at five dollars a week, doing something or other. Don't you?"