Timothy Arthur - Home Scenes and Home Influence; a series of tales and sketches

"The greatest you could do me just at this time!"

"Very well; here is the money."

And Anna drew a purse of gold from her pocket, and held it before his eyes.

"Anna! What does this mean?"

And Brainard reached his hand to grasp the welcome treasure. But she drew it away quickly, saying, as she did so,—

"Certain conditions must go with the loan."

"Name them," was promptly answered by the husband, into whose face the sunshine had already come back.

"One is, that you are not to be angry with me for any thing that I have done to-day."

"What have you done?"

And Brainard glanced around the room with an awakened suspicion.

"I want your promise first."

"You have it."

"But mind you, I am in earnest," said Anna.

"So am I. Now make your confession."

"I sold the piano."

"What?"

There was an instant change in the expression of Brainard's face.

"Your promise. Remember," said Anna, in a warning voice.

"Sold the piano!"

And he walked into the next room, Anna moving by his side.

"Yes, I sold it to Mrs. Aiken for four hundred dollars. I had my old instrument brought over from father's. This is as good a piano as I want, or you either, I should think, seeing that you perceived no difference in its tones from the one I parted with. Now, take this purse, and if you don't call me the right sort of a wife you are a very strange man—that is all I have to say."

Surprise kept Brainard silent for some moments. He looked at the piano, then at his wife, and then at the purse of gold, half doubting whether all were real, or only a pleasant dream.

"You are the right sort of a wife, Anna, and no mistake," said he, at length, drawing his arm around her neck and kissing her. "You have done what I had not the courage to do, and, in the act, saved me from a world of trouble. The truth is, I never should have bought that piano. A clerk, with a salary of only a thousand dollars, is not justified in expending four hundred dollars for a piano."

"Nor in having so much costly furniture," said Anna, glancing round the room.

Brainard sighed, for the thought of two hundred dollars yet to pay flitted through his mind.

"Nor in paying three hundred dollars for rent," added Anna.

"Why do you say that?" asked Brainard.

"Because it's the truth. The fact is, George, I'm afraid we're in the wrong road for comfort."

"Perhaps we are," was the young man's constrained admission.

"Then the quicker we get into the right way the better. Don't you think so?"

"If we, are wrong, we should try to get right," said Brainard.

"It was wrong to buy that piano. This is your own admission."

"Well?"

"We are right again in that respect."

"Yes, thanks to my dear wife's good resolution and prompt action."

"It was wrong to take so costly a house," said Anna.

"I couldn't find a cheaper one that was genteel and comfortable."

"I'm sure I wouldn't ask any thing more genteel and comfortable than Mrs. Tyler's house."

"That pigeon-box!"

Brainard spoke in, a tone of contempt.

"Why, George, how you talk! It's a perfect gem of a house, well built and well finished in every part, and big enough for a family twice as large as ours. I think it far more comfortable than this great barn of a place, and would a thousand times rather live in it. And then it is cheaper by a hundred and twenty dollars a year."

A hundred and twenty dollars! What a large sum of money. Ah, if he had a hundred and twenty dollars in addition to the four hundred received from Anna, how happy he would be! These were the thoughts that were flitting through the mind of Brainard at the mention of the amount that could be saved by taking a smaller house.

"Well, Anna, perhaps you are right. Oh, dear!"

"Why do you sigh so heavily, George?" asked Mrs. Brainard, looking at her husband with some surprise.

"Because I can't help it," was frankly answered.

"You've got the money you needed?"

"Not all."

"Why, George! Didn't you say that you had only four hundred dollars to pay?"

"I didn't say only."

"How much more?"

"The fact is, Anna, I have two hundred dollars yet to meet."

"To-day?"

Anna's face became troubled.

"No, not until the day after to-morrow."

The young wife's countenance lighted up again.

"Is that all?"

"Yes, thank Heaven, that is all. But how the payment is to be made, is more than I can tell."

Dinner was now announced.

"I shall have to turn financier again," said Anna, smiling, as she drew her arm within that of her husband, and led him away to the dining-room.

"I'm a little afraid of your financiering," returned her husband, shaking his head. "You might sell me next as a useless piece of furniture."

"Now, George, that is too bad," replied Anna, looking hurt.

"I only jested, dear," said Brainard, repairing the little wrong done to her feelings with a kiss. "Your past efforts at financiering were admirable, and I only hope your next attempt may be as successful."

Two days more passed, during which time neither Brainard nor his wife said any thing to each other about money, although the thoughts of both were busy for most of the time on that interesting subject. Silently sat Brainard at the breakfast-table on the morning of the day when his last note fell due. How was he to meet the payment? Two hundred dollars! He had not so much as fifty dollars in his possession, and as to borrowing, that was a vain hope. Must he go to the holder of the note, and ask a renewal? He shrunk from the thought, murmuring to himself—"Any thing but that."

As for getting the required sum through Anna, he did not permit himself to hope very strongly. She had looked thoughtful since their last interview on the subject, and at times, it seemed to him, troubled. It was plain that she had been disappointed in any efforts to get money that she might have made.

"That she, too, should be subject to mortification and painful humiliation!" said he, as his mind dwelt on the subject. "It is too bad—too bad!—Oh, to think that my folly should have had this reaction!"

Anna looked sober as Brainard parted with her after breakfast, and he thought he saw tears in her eyes. As soon as he was gone she dressed herself, and taking from a handsome jewel-box the present of her husband, a gold watch and chain, a bracelet, diamond pin, and some other articles of the same kind, left the house.

Two hours afterward, as Brainard sat at his desk trying to fix his mind upon the accounts before him, a note was handed in bearing his address. He broke the seal, and found that it enclosed one hundred and seventy dollars, with these few words from Anna:

"This is the best I can do for you, dear husband. Will it be enough?"

"God bless her!" came half audibly from the lips of Brainard, as he drew forth his pocket-book, in which were thirty dollars. "Yes, it will be enough."

"There is no comfort in owing, or in paying after this fashion," said the young man to himself, as he walked homeward at dinner-time, with his last note in his pocket. "There will have to be a change."

And there was a change. When next I visited my young friend, I found him in a smaller house, looking as comfortable and happy as I could have wished to see him. We talked pleasantly about the errors of the past, and the trouble which had followed as a natural result.

"There is one thing," said Brainard, during the conversation, glancing at his wife as he spoke, "that I have not been able to make out."

"What is that?" asked Mrs. Brainard, smiling.

"Where the last one hundred and seventy dollars you gave me came from."

"Have you missed nothing?" said she, archly.

"Nothing," was his reply.

"Been deprived of no comfort?"