The Argosy — page 267: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Edina. . 251 and home, and care? Whether caused by Charles’s tone or Charles’s words, the shadowy thought, that it might be so, entered for the first time into the mind of Peter. ; And Charles never had “things made pleasant for him,” at the Office, in pursuance of the friendly wish just expressed : the opportunity was not afforded. Exactly twenty days from that evening, he was invited to attend the funeral of Frederick Tanting. CHAPTER XXIX. JEALOUSY. Tne shabby room was smartened up for the occasion. . At least, as much as a poor room that holds cane-seated chairs, and a threadbare carpet not half covering the boards, can be smartened. It was Mrs. Raynor’s birthday. Frank Raynor and his wife had gone to wish her many happy returns of it and to take tea; Alice was invited to come ; Charles had said he would be home early. But the tea was over, and neither Charles nor Alice had put in an appearance: and the little féte, wanting them, had seemed like a failure to their mother. Mrs. Raynor was altered: aged, spiritless, always ailing. Disap- pointment and poof circumstances told on her health as well as her mind. It was not for herself she grieved and suffered, but for her children. For Charles especially. His prospects had been blighted , his standing in the world utterly changed. Edina had her hands full, for Mrs. Raynor could help but very little now. What Mrs. Raynor chiefly did was to gather the young ones around her, and talk to them in her gentle voice of resignation to God’s will, of patience, of that better world that they were travelling on to; where there shall be neither sickness nor sorrow, neither mortification nor suffering. The children needed such lessons: it seemed very hard to them that they should sometimes have to eat dry bread for dinner, or baked potatoes without butter. Even with all Edina’s economy and with Charles’s earnings, meat could not always be had: the joint must be carved sparingly, and made to last the best part of the week. They generally had a joint on a Sunday: that was as much as could be said. Clothes cost so much; and Charles, at least, had to be well-dressed. As the experienced house-wife knows, there are many items in a family’s expenditure besides eating and drinking ; and this applies especially to fallen gentlepeople, whose habits have been formed, and who must still in adegree keep up appearances. If the Raynors had needed discipline, as some of the standers-by at Eagles’ Nest had opined, they were certainly enjoying it in a very marked degree. Twelve months had slipped by since they took up their abode at Laurel Cottage, and there had been no change. The days and the weeks had drifted on,\one day, one comicbooks.coun