“I hope they don’t owe you any thing,” remarked one of the boarders.

“Indeed, they do.”

“Not much, ma’am; I hope.”

“Over five hundred dollars.”

“O, that is too bad!  How could you trust a man like Mr. Cameron to such an amount?”

“Why, surely,” said Mrs. Turner, “he is a respectable and a responsible merchant; and I was in no want of the money.”

“Indeed, Mrs. Turner, he is no such thing.”

“Then what is he?”

“He is one of your gentlemen about town, and lives, I suppose, by gambling.  At least such is the reputation he bears.  I thought you perfectly understood this.”

“How cruelly I have been deceived!” said Mrs. Turner, unable to command her feelings; and rising, she left the table in charge of Mary.

On examining Mr. and Mrs. Cameron’s room, their trunk was found, but it was empty.  The owners of it, of course, came not back to claim their property.

The result of this year’s experience in keeping boarders, was an income of just $886 in money, and a loss of $600, set off against an expense of $2380.  Thus was Mrs. Turner worse off by $1494 at the end of the year, than she was when she commenced keeping boarders.  But she made no estimates, and had not the most remote idea of how the matter stood.  Whenever she wanted money, she drew upon the amount placed to her credit in bank by the administrator on her husband’s estate, vainly imagining that it would all come back through the boarders.  All that she supposed to be lost of the first year’s business were the $600, out of which she had been cheated.  Resolving to be more circumspect in future, another year was entered upon.  But she could not help seeing that Mary was suffering from hard labor and close confinement, and it pained her exceedingly.  One day she said to her, a few weeks after they had entered upon the second year—­

“I am afraid, Mary, this is too hard for you.  You begin to look pale and thin.  You must spare yourself more.”

“I believe I do need a little rest, mother,” said Mary; “but if I don’t look after things, nobody will, and then we should soon have our boarders dissatisfied.”

“That is too true, Mary.”

“But I wouldn’t mind it so much, mother, if I thought we were getting ahead.  But I am afraid we are not.”

“What makes you think so, child?”

“You know we have lost six hundred dollars already, and that is a great deal of money.”

“True, Mary; but we must be more careful in future.  We will soon make that up, I am sure.”

“I hope so,” Mary responded, with a sigh.  She did not herself feel so sanguine of making it up.  Still, she had not entered into any calculation of income and expense, leaving that to her mother, and supposing that all was right as a matter of course.

As they continued to set an excellent table, they kept up pretty regularly their complement of boarders.  The end of the second year would have shown this result, if a calculation had been made:  cash income, $1306—­loss by boarders, $150—­whole expenses, $2000.  Consequently, they were worse off at the end of the year by $694; or in the two years, $2188, by keeping boarders.