“Well, perhaps you are right, dear,” said his mother.  “It seems to me that you may be a trifle too punctilious; still, it is best to err on the safe side, and, after all, these are new people; we know very little about them, after all.”  Nothing was further from Mrs. Anderson than the surmise that, even had she called, no invitation would have come from these unknown new people to the village grocer and his mother.  Mrs. Anderson, even with her secret and persistent dissent to her son’s giving up his profession and adopting trade, never dreamed of any possible loss of social prestige.  She considered herself and her son established in their family traditions beyond possibility of shaking by such minor matters.  Anderson did not enlighten her.

“Mrs. Monroe said that she had heard that the Carrolls were owing a good deal,” said she, presently.  “She said she heard that Blumenfeldt said he must have cash for the flowers for the decorations.  They have ordered a great many palms and things.  She said she heard that Captain Carroll told him that the money would be forthcoming, and scared him out of his wits, he was so high and mighty, and the florist just gave right in and said he should have all he wanted.  She said Mr. Monroe was in there and heard it.  I hope Mrs. Griggs will get her pay.  They don’t owe you, I hope, dear?”

“Don’t worry about me, mother?” Randolph replied, smiling.  However, she had placed a finger upon a daily perplexity of his.  The Carrolls indeed owed him, and every day the debt was increasing.  He felt that his old clerk regarded him with wonder at every fresh entry on the books.  That very day he had come into the office to inform him, in a hushed voice, that the Carrolls had sent for a pail of lard and a box of butter, besides a bag of flour, and to inquire what he should do about supplying them.

“The girl hasn’t brought any money,” said he, further, in an ominous whisper.

Anderson, glancing out, saw the small, sturdy, and smiling face of the Hungarian girl employed by the Carrolls.  She was gazing straight through at him in the office with a shrewd expression in her untutored black eyes.  “Send the order,” Anderson replied, in a low voice.

“But,” began the clerk.

“It’s all right,” said Anderson.  He dipped his pen in the ink and went on with the letter he was writing.  The clerk retreated with a long, anxious, wondering look, which the other man felt.

The Hungarian girl plodded smiling forth with the promise to have the groceries sent at once.  Stepping flat-footedly and heavily through the door, she caught her cotton skirt on a nail, and, lo! a rent.  The boy, who was a gallant soul for all femininity in need, hurried to her aid with some pins gathered from the lapel of his gingham coat.  Little Marie, with a coquettish shake of her head and a blush and smile began repairing the damage.

“It is the cloth that is easy broke,” explained she, when she lifted her suffused but still smiling face, “and I a new one will have when I haf my money, my vage.”  With that Marie was gone, her poor gown scalloping around her heavy, backward heels, her smiling glance of artless coquetry over her shoulder to the last, and the boy and the old clerk looked at each other.  The boy whistled.