CHAPTER XVI.
FURTHER RETRENCHMENT.
The loss of ten thousand dollars—sweeping from his hands, at a single stroke, all he was worth, and all his means of doing any thing like a profitable business—left Mr. Townsend really in a very helpless state, and filled him with discouragement the moment he turned his thoughts upon the straitened condition of his affairs. But, after such a lesson as he had received from Eunice—after such an opening of his eyes to the true light—he could not utterly despond. He had lifted himself from the earth, stood up erect, and taken the first step. It would not do to pause now, sink again, and abandon all. He must do to the utmost of his ability, let what would come.
The greatest difficulty that presented itself to Mr. Townsend, was the universally-prevailing spirit of cupidity existing among men of business, which led almost every one to seek his own good in a heartless disregard of others. Were he to make a full exposition of his affairs, and ask for consideration and aid from those for whom he did business, instantly their confidence would cease, consignments be withheld, and the destruction of business he was seeking to avoid become inevitable. There would be no generous consideration, no sympathy for his losses, extended toward him, but censure for his want of sagacity in not perceiving the signs of weakness in the house that had failed. No longer able to advance upon consignments, or guaranty sales, those who wished advances would not send him their goods, and those who were willing to waive the guaranty, would be afraid to trust their sales to a man who had committed the mistake of selling to a house just on the eve of its failure.
That this would be the result of an exposure of his affairs, Mr. Townsend felt well assured. It was just as he had acted in his days of prosperity. He never regarded the interests of any man, and never extended the slightest sympathy toward the unfortunate. His system had been, to get out of every one who owed him and became embarrassed, all he would yield by the severest pressure, and then throw his bloodless carcass out of sight—to the dogs, for all he cared. And little more consideration than he had given, did he expect. Judging all men by his own standard, he did not believe in the existence of a particle of unselfishness in business circles; and he, therefore, expected to receive no generous consideration in his misfortunes. That this selfish disregard of others was wrong, he could now see, because it affected himself. If no other good result came from his reverses, the clear conviction and acknowledgment of this was something, and worth all he had lost and suffered to acquire.
A long and anxious debate on the question of what it was best for him to do, was at length terminated by his coming to the conclusion, that his best course was to conceal from every one the desperate condition of his affairs, and make a vigorous effort to sustain himself. In this, he believed, lay his only hope. To trust any man with the fact that his losses had seriously crippled him, would be, he felt well convinced, to ruin all.
In a few days, two or three letters were received from eastern manufacturers, containing invoices and bills of lading of goods consigned to him on sale, upon which the usual advances they had been in the habit of receiving were asked. Immediate replies were made, that he was already so much in advance to various parties, that he could not extend such accommodations, but that he would endeavor to make immediate sales, and transmit the proceeds. Before the goods arrived, Mr. Townsend received advices that their destination had been changed, and that they were to go into another commission house, from which the desired advances could be had.
“Well, let them go!” he said, in the effort to feel indifferent about the matter, at the same time that a feeling of discouragement oppressed him, and brought a cloud over his mind.
By the next mail came notice of a valuable consignment upon which neither an advance nor guaranty was asked, and it came from new parties, who promised still heavier shipments of goods.
“There is hope yet,” was the silent, thankful expression of Mr. Townsend’s heart, as he read this letter. “If I can only manage to meet, at maturity, the five or six thousand dollars for which I am liable under guaranty of sales, I may yet be able to hold up my head in business, though how I shall manage to support my family on the diminished proceeds, is beyond my power to tell.”
One day, about a week after the occurrence of the interview between himself and daughter, Eunice drew her father aside, and said to him,
“I saw a neat, pretty house this morning, in a very pleasant neighborhood, the rent of which is only a hundred and eighty-five dollars. There is a snug little parlor below, beautifully papered, and having in it a pure white marble mantle; and quite a large chamber over that, and another of the same size in the third story. Back of these is a kitchen, dining-room, and good-sized chamber, with bath-house and dressing-room. Take it all in all, it is exactly what we want—perfectly new, neat, genteel, and comfortable; and very cheap. Won’t you go with me and look at it after dinner?”
“I’m afraid it’s too small, Eunice,” remarked her father. “We shall not be able to breathe in it.”
“Oh, no! it is not too small. The chambers are large and airy. And as to breathing, it will be done as freely again there, for the pressure upon our bosoms will be removed.”
“Are there no garrets to the house?”
“None.”
“Then where will a servant sleep?”
“There’ll be no difficulty about that—none in the world.”
“But where, Eunice?”
“There’s the room over the dining-room.”
“Which will shut us off from the bath. It won’t do, my child.”
“Will you go with me to look at it?”
“Oh, yes. But I am sure it will not answer.”
“And I am sure it will; and you will agree with me after you have seen it.”
Mr. Townsend went to look at the house, and thought it really quite neat, genteel, and comfortable. But his main objection lay in full force against it. There was no place for the servant to sleep, and he urged it as an insuperable objection, to which Eunice at length replied—
“We don’t intend to have any servants; Eveline and I have settled all that.”
At this, Mr. Townsend shook his head in a most emphatic way, and said,
“That’s out of the question, child; utterly so. I will not hear to it a moment.”
“Why not? Don’t you have to attend to business all day, and are we better than you?”
“I don’t have to go into the kitchen and cook. I don’t have to go through menial household drudgery.”
“Don’t call any useful employment menial, father. Would it at all degrade me to bake you a sweet loaf of bread, or prepare you a comfortable meal when you are hungry? I think not.”
“But the hard drudgery of the thing, Eunice. You don’t know what you propose to yourselves to do.”
“Love will make the labor light,” replied Eunice, with a tone and smile that found a quick passage to the heart of her father. “Let it be as we desire.”
But Mr. Townsend would not yield the point. At least, he would not consent that a house should be taken without a room in it where a servant could sleep. So Eunice had to make another search. In a few days one was procured with the room, additional, required, at a rent of two hundred dollars per annum; and Mr. Townsend gave his consent that it should be taken, provided the mother, who had been kept ignorant of the desperate state of her husband’s business, could be brought to give a free consent to the change. The procurement of this consent was left to Eveline and Eunice. The latter, after the first doubt and fear she had experienced at her sister’s suggestion of another change in their father’s circumstances, was ready to support Eunice in every thing.
“Mother,” said Eunice, on the day after the taking of a house at a lower rent had been determined upon, “I think we might manage to live at a smaller cost than we do. Indeed, I am sure we could. Father’s business cannot be very profitable, and even the meeting of our present family expenses must be a serious matter to him.”
“To live any plainer than we do, is impossible,” replied Mrs. Townsend; “we keep but a single servant, and I am sure that no family could practice more economy.”
“But we might live in a much smaller house.”
“Smaller house!”
“Yes, mother. We don’t occupy much over half of this, and what is the use of paying one or two hundred dollars for what we don’t want, especially when father has need in his business of every cent he can procure. I saw, when I was out yesterday, a beautiful little house, with rooms very nearly as large as they are in this one, only there were not so many. It was finished as well as this one is, throughout, and had quite as respectable an appearance; and the rent was only two hundred dollars.”
“Indeed!” said Mrs. Townsend, struck with the difference.
“That is all. I think we had better take it. Two hundred dollars is a good deal of money to save off of rent.”
“I don’t believe your father will hear to such a thing.”
“If he consents to move, will you make no objection?”
“I don’t know. But I am sure he will not listen a moment to such a proposition. The way in which we now live is very different to what it was. I never could have believed it possible to become reconciled to it.”
“You say yes, then, if father is willing?”
“I think I may safely say yes.”
“Very well,” replied both the girls, smiling; “we will hold you to this promise.”
In the evening, after tea, when all were together, Eunice said, in a very pleasant way,
“Father, mother says if you are willing to move into the house I told you about, that she will make no objection. What do you say?”
“Of course, your father wouldn’t think of such a thing,” spoke up Mrs. Townsend.
“That isn’t fair, mother,” said Eveline, good-humoredly. “We object to any attempt on your part to use influence. Father must decide this matter for himself in freedom. We’ve got your promise, and now we must get his.”
“I’m sure that is using influence, and with a double power. First, you get me to make a conditional promise, and then set to work to influence the conditions. No, no; I object also. Let father, as you say, decide this matter in freedom.”
“Very well; father shall speak for himself,” said Eunice. “Let me put the question. Are you willing to give up this house, and take the one alluded to, which only rents for two hundred dollars?”
“If all of you agree to it; if all are willing, I promise not to object.”
“There, do you hear that, mother?” exclaimed Eveline.
Mrs Townsend looked surprised and serious.
“But, is there any necessity for this?” she asked, turning her eyes upon her husband’s face.
“Perhaps it would be a prudent step for us to take, provided we could be comfortable and happy under the change,” he replied.
“I hardly think we can be,” said Mrs. Townsend, looking troubled.
“Then we will not move,” was promptly answered.
“But what is to hinder us?” urged Eunice. “The house is large enough, and the rooms of a good size. The situation is pleasant, and the appearance of the house very nearly equal to the one we now live in. With all this in its favor, and added thereto, the fact that the change made a saving of two hundred dollars in our expenses, perhaps more, and I hardly think we would be less comfortable or happy. Father has said that this reduction of our expenses would be a prudent step to take. Should we hesitate a moment after this?”
“He should know what is best, certainly,” said Mrs. Townsend, struck with the force of application that Eunice gave to her father’s words. “And if he thinks it prudent, we ought by all means to move. But, before it is done, the necessity for it should be understood by all of us, and then we can all enter into and promote it with a more cheerful spirit.”
“Very true, indeed,” answered Mr. Townsend; “and I will therefore state, that my business does not promise so well as it did a short time ago; that I have met with a serious loss by the failure of a house to which I sold a large amount of goods, and that, therefore, it will be a measure of prudence to do as the girls propose. For their willingness to make sacrifices, and to prompt to further reductions of expense, we certainly ought to feel deeply grateful. To find them as they are, is to find light in a dark place—to meet streams in a desert. With such loving hearts to sustain us, we ought never to despond.”