allow that. "You've got enough to do to study your lessons," she
said. Andrew watched his wife crochet with ill-concealed impatience.

"I ain't goin' to have you do that long," he said--"workin' at that
rate for no more money. That Mrs. William Pendergrass that lets out
these hoods is as bad as any factory boss in the country."

"Well, she got the chance," said Fanny, "and they won't let out the
work except that way; they can get it done so much cheaper."

"Well, you sha'n't have it, anyhow," said Andrew, smiling
mysteriously.

"Why, you ain't goin' to work again, be you, Andrew?"

"You wait."

"Well, don't you talk the way poor Jim did. Eva wasn't going to
crochet any more hoods, and now Jim's out of work again. Eva told me
yesterday that she didn't know where the money was comin' from.
Jim's mother owns the place, and it ain't worth much, anyhow, and
they can't take it from her in her lifetime, even if she was willing
to let it go. Eva said she was goin' to try again for work herself
in the shop. She thought maybe there might be some kind of a job she
could get. Don't you talk like Jim did about his good-for-nothin'
mining stock. I've been glad enough that you had sense enough to
keep what little we had where 'twas safe."

"Ain't it most time for Ellen to be comin' home?" asked Andrew, to
turn the conversation, as he felt somewhat guilty and uncomfortable,
though his eyes were jubilant. He had very little doubt about the
success of his venture. As it is with a man who yields to love for
the first time in his life, it was with Andrew in his tardy
subjection to the hazards of fortune. He was a much more devoted
slave than those who had long wooed her. He had always taken nothing
but the principal newspaper published in Rowe, but now he subscribed
to a Boston paper, the one which had the fullest financial column,
though Fanny exclaimed at his extravagance.

Along in midsummer, in the midst of Ellen's vacation, the mining
stock dropped fast a point or more a day. Andrew's heart began to
sink, though he was far from losing hope. He used to talk it over
with the men who advised him to buy, and come home fortified.

All he had to do was to be patient; the fall meant nothing wrong
with the mine, only the wrangle of speculators. "It's like a
football, first on one side, and then on the other," said the man,
"but the football's there all the same, and if it's that you want,
you're all right."

One night when Nahum