‘There will be no need to ask you to come to my lecture on the art of dressing ordinary wounds,’ said the little doctor gallantly; ‘but I hope you will come, for I shall then feel that there will be at least two people in the room who have some idea of the subject—you and the lecturer. Meanwhile, you are not to go away without seeing Mrs Joy. She has one of her patients with her—a poor woman who has got into a dreadful muddle with her domestic economies. What a pity that we cannot get the simple rule driven into their heads, that a penny saved is a penny gained.—That’s her going now. Come this way; and you’ll excuse me—I have a couple of patients to see immediately.—My dear, here is Miss Heathcote with Pansy Culver.’
The doctor hurried away as Mrs Joy advanced with both hands extended to Madge.
‘I am so delighted to see you, dear; I have’—— She interrupted herself, and without releasing Madge’s hands, said in parenthesis: ‘How do you do, Pansy; and how is your father? Please sit down.’ Without waiting for a reply, she proceeded with what she had been about to say to Madge. ‘I have such an interesting case to report to you. Of course you remember Edwin’s lecture last year called “Penny wise and Pound saved”—that is his playful way of dealing with that wicked saying of “penny wise and pound foolish,” which has done incalculable harm to poor people—and rich people too, I am sure. You remember it?’
‘I am sorry to have to own that I missed the lecture.’
‘What a pity! However, there was a poor labourer present—Wolden is his name—and he was so deeply impressed by what he heard, that he determined to lay by one penny regularly every week. That is a most gratifying proof of the benefit of real practical counsel: but what is most gratifying is that the man actually carried out his good resolution. Think of that! He has fourteen shillings a week, and out of each payment he regularly put by one penny in a hole above the fireplace, which was only known to himself and his wife. Well, he kept to his good resolution in spite of many temptations, and he only wanted three weeks to make out a complete year of that noble self-denial. Think!—what a glorious proof of the value of the lessons which Edwin and I have been teaching. This man, who never before had a shilling he could call his own, had actually stored away in the course of forty-nine weeks four shillings and one penny!... It is so delightfully marvellous to observe how atoms grow and multiply into mountains!’
Mrs Joy was so much pleased with the idea which the last words conveyed to herself, that she paused to repeat and admire them with a view to their future use when she should offer herself as a candidate for the local School-board.
‘The doctor and you must be greatly pleased,’ said Madge, cordially appreciating the effect of Dr Joy’s wise admonitions.
‘We are—we were; but’—here Mrs Joy shook her head with a smiling regretfulness at being obliged to own the existence of human weakness—‘but to-day there came to him a friend who required him to take a parcel into London—a parcel for a friend of yours, Mr Philip Hadleigh. His fare there and back was to be paid, and half-a-crown for the service. Wolden had often thought, if he were in London, he would buy something useful with his savings. Here was the opportunity. He ran home for his savings; and what did he find? The hole in the wall was empty; and his wife was obliged to own that she had used the money for a pair of boots for one of the children. Think!’
Madge did think; but it was not about the doctor’s lecture or the misfortune of his convert—it was about the person who had been suddenly employed to carry a parcel to Philip. Pansy’s thoughts jumped in the same direction.
‘How unfortunate,’ said Madge; ‘the poor man’s disappointment must have been awful. But who gave him the parcel for—Mr Hadleigh?’