He struck a balance, and found to
his consternation that, unless business took a turn for the better, he
would not be able to hold out beyond the end of the year. Afterwards, he
was blessed if he knew what was going to happen. The ingenious Hempel
was full of ideas for tempting back fortune--opening a branch store on
a new lead was one of them, or removing bodily to Main Street--but
ready money was the SINE QUA NON of such schemes, and ready money he had
not got. Since his marriage he had put by as good as nothing; and the
enlarging and improving of his house, at that time, had made a big hole
in his bachelor savings. He did not feel justified at the present pass
in drawing on them anew. For one thing, before summer was out there
would be, if all went well, another mouth to feed. And that meant a
variety of seen and unforeseen expenses.
Such were the material anxieties he had to encounter in the course of
that winter. Below the surface a subtler embarrassment worked to destroy
his peace. In face of the shortage of money, he was obliged to thank his
stars that he had not lost the miserable lawsuit of a few months back.
Had that happened, he wouldn't at present have known where to turn. But
this amounted to confessing his satisfaction at having pulled off his
case, pulled it off anyhow, by no matter what crooked means. And as if
this were not enough, the last words he had heard Purdy say came back to
sting him anew. The boy had accused him of judging a fight for freedom
from a tradesman's standpoint.
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