“Are these made to please you?” Mrs. Walton ventured to ask.

“They’ll do,” was the brief answer; and then came the same dead silence, and the same interest on the part of the lady in something passing in the street.

Mrs. Walton wanted the money she had earned for making the shirts, and Mrs. Lander knew it.

But Mrs. Lander never liked to pay out money, if she could help it; and as doing so always went against the grain, it was her custom to put off such unpleasant work as long as possible.  She liked to encourage the very poor, because she knew they generally worked cheaper than people who were in easier circumstances; but the drawback in their case was, that they always wanted money the moment their work was done.

Badly as she stood in need of the money she had earned, poor Mrs. Walton felt reluctant to ask for it until the whole number of shirts she had engaged to make were done; and so, after sitting for a little while longer, she got up and went away.  It happened that she had expended her last sixpence on that very morning, and nothing was due to her from any one but Mrs. Lander.  Two days at least would elapse before she would have any other work ready to take home, and what to do in the mean time she did not know.  With her the reward of every day’s labour was needed when the labour was done; but now she was unpaid for full four days’ work, and her debtor was a lady much interested in the welfare of the poor, who always gave out her plain sewing to those who were in need of encouragement.

By placing in pawn some few articles of dress, and paying a heavy interest upon the little sum of money advanced thereon, the poor widow was able to keep hunger from her door until she could finish some work she had in hand for a lady more considerate than Mrs. Lander.  Then she applied herself with renewed industry to the three shirts yet to make, which she finished at the time she promised to have them done.  With the money to be received for these, she was to pay one dollar and a half to get her clothes from the pawnbroker’s shop, buy her little boy a pair of shoes,—­he had been from school a week for want of them,—­and get a supply of food for the many mouths she had to feed.

Mrs. Lander received her with that becoming dignity of manner and gravity which certain persons always assume when money has to be paid out.  She, as it behooved her to do, thoroughly examined every seam, line of stitching, and hem upon each of the three shirts, and then, after slowly laying the garments upon a table sighed, and looked still graver.  Poor Mrs. Walton felt oppressed; she hardly knew why.

“Does the work please you?” she ventured to ask.

“I don’t think these are as well made as the others,” said Mrs. Lander.

“I thought they were better made,” returned the woman.

“Oh, no.  The stitching on the bosoms, collars, and wristbands isn’t nearly so well done.”