Hope Mills by Amanda Minnie Douglas (lightweight ebook reader txt) 📕

mean that we are to plan it all out for her," said Sylvie, and she looked across at Miss Morgan.

"It will not do to buy a pound of sugar and a pound of coffee at a time," said Jane concisely.

"Then I will be the capitalist," promised Sylvie.

"Exactly. Kit had better do this on some money that she must give an account of, and it will make her more careful. She owns a cow, so there is the milk. I should like this started quietly, not with a great blare of opposition to the dram-shops."

"Well, what must we do first?" asked Sylvie.

"I wish you and Jane would go down and call on her, and suggest the business. See how she takes it, and look around at the capabilities of the place. I will see to the fitting-up."

They went, as desired. Mrs. Connelly--a round, rosy, buxom Irishwoman, with a mellow voice, laughing eye, and artist-red hair--was very much taken with their plan. "To turn an honest penny in these hard times, and not be wronging any one, would just suit the likes of her. And there was the store standing empty,--but it might stand till the crack o' doom afore she'd have a drop of rum sold in it. There never was a better man than Den when he was sober, and sure she'd had sorrow enough along wid drinking. And there was Barney growin' up, and the two smaller ones, and she'd never, never put a bit of temptation in their way."

The store had been used for a meat-shop and green-grocery. Kit had sold the fixtures when she had been in sore need of money, so now it was a great bare room, with one large window and two small ones.

"Sure I can scrub an' whitewash it myself, an' put clean curtains to the windows. And you're very good to think of such a thing, Miss Barry,--may the saints bless you! An' if Mr. Darcy will see to getting what is wanted, I'll do my very best to please you all."

Sylvie blushed a little at taking the credit, but it was Jack's wish. Jack had a small portico built over the door-way, to keep out the cold in winter, and a neat sign put up, with but two words,--"Coffee-House." Sylvie and Miss Morgan ordered some cheap, small tables, some plain wooden chairs, and found two comfortable, old-fashioned, wooden settles. Then she collected old magazines and illustrated papers, and a rack was put up at one side for them. All the tables were covered with light marbled rubber-cloth, so that they would be kept fresh and sweet. The sugar and coffee were forthcoming. Kit could roast coffee to a turn. One Thursday evening the place was lighted up, and a few guests asked in; and the next day the fame of Kit Connelly's coffee-house began. Half the folks in Yerbury knew her and Dennis.

Rose Connelly, who was just seventeen, a nice fresh-looking girl, was to keep the books, and take the money as she was quite a scholar. Several of the mill-hands went over immediately for their lunches. Such splendid wheat, rye, and Graham bread, spread already, and brought on a clean plate! A nice bite for three cents, and a solid meal for six. Sylvie was to go down now and then, of a morning, to keep matters straight.

"There is one entering-wedge in the cause of temperance," she remarked, in her piquant way. "Only, Jack, it does not seem quite right for us women to take the credit of it. I confess, among all my plans, there has been nothing like this."

"I would rather not be openly connected with it," and Jack made a queer little grimace. "By and by I may have to do some real fighting on my own account, and I don't want too many vulnerable points. Human nature is rather queer and cranky, as you have, no doubt, observed by this time."

"But I do not see why any one should want to fight against your good work, Jack," said Sylvie, with an indignant flush. "I am sure it is no light undertaking to provide all these people with work; and everybody ought to strengthen your hands, instead of putting obstacles in the way."

"I must be prepared for all things."

Maverick was very enthusiastic over the coffee-house. It was a new institution in Yerbury. There had been in good times several so-called cheap lunch-rooms, but the fare was invariably poor.

"Keppler will be your first enemy, and your worst one," said the doctor with a shrewd smile.

"Very well. He must fight Miss Barry and Miss Morgan. I did send a man to do some work, but Miss Barry paid the bills. I keep my hands out of it altogether."

"Good for you, Jack. And how does business progress?"

"I am dubious," and Jack shook his head in a mock-serious way. "There is too much rose-color. Every thing works to a charm. Whether people really have learned something by the hard times, remains to be seen; but it looks so now. And we couldn't have a better working firm. Owen Cameron is the same kind of a man that Miss Morgan is for a woman, not stingy here and wasteful there, but a thorough-going economist. Every week he makes a little saving somewhere. It is what we needed to learn, badly enough. He manages to make the men understand that every penny saved is for the benefit of all, that a yard of cloth or a pound of wool spoiled is to the loss of all. And that is the only way to settle this business, this everlasting wrangle between labor and capital."

Amos Hurd and Peter Yardley used to talk over the other scheme of a co-operative store. It would not do to have too many irons in the fire in such times as these, when no one had any great deal of money. But it did seem as if poor people were paying at the dearest rate for every thing, partly because they asked for trust, and the only man willing to trust them to any extent kept a very full line of second or third rate articles, but the prices did not always correspond.

"Now, there's coal," said Yardley one evening. "At the trade-sale it went up ten cents a ton on the average. Our dealers here, who had their yards full, put up their prices from twenty to thirty cents. I know, on the other hand, if coal takes a sudden tumble, they may lose; but, after watching this thing for years, I find the prices go up five times with full yards, where they fall once. Now, I was thinking, when coal was bought for the mill, some extra car-loads might be ordered for the men."

"Yes," and Hurd opened his eyes widely. "Let us talk to Darcy about it."

Jack listened to their proposal with a sudden interest.

"It will be some trouble to you," he answered. "It is not as thoroughly screened, and there is the delivering. The men cannot carry it home in market-baskets."

"I don't know about the screening," said Yardley rather grimly. "When you clean up your bin, and find several bushels of sand and refuse out of five or six tons, you think half of it, at least, ought to have been good burning-coal. And in wholesale buying you get long tons."

"I can do it as well as not," replied Jack. "In fact,"--laughingly,--"it will rather redound to my credit to order largely, and we have a somewhat extensive coal-shed. But you must look up one or two men who will cart it, and a man to screen; and, when you have counted up your labor, decide upon what price you can offer your coal. Perhaps it would be as well to canvass, and learn how many tons you can dispose of."

The workmen had their own board of managers, of which Yardley had been elected president. They generally met every week, and now Yardley laid this matter before them. There would be an average saving, he thought, of two dollars on every ton, but the coal must be paid for in thirty days. If the men chose to leave one or two dollars every Monday night (for Darcy had wisely made Monday instead of Saturday pay-day) they might give in an order for one or two or even three tons.

Meanwhile Peter Yardley found some thorns even in his path. A good, stout Irish lad was willing to do the screening at a dollar per day; but when he spoke to several carters, who were not busy half the time, to a man they stuck to their regular price, fifty cents per ton. Not one of them would work by the day.

"I can fix that just right," declared one of the men. "My wife's brother has a heavy wagon and two mules. He used to do carting for the iron-mills, and since then he has had mostly catch-jobs. He owns a little place over on the creek-road; and I know he will be glad enough to do it, and maybe take part of his pay in coal."

Seth Williams was hunted up. He would come, and bring his son who would help about loading, for two dollars and a half a day. There were seventy-odd tons subscribed for, but they decided to make their order one hundred tons. Coal was selling at six dollars and a half per ton at Yerbury. After due calculation, they offered theirs to the men at four.

It came duly to hand. After the first day, Williams hired another team on his own account, and his son drove one to its destination, making thereby extra time. Before the seventy tons had been delivered, the remainder was bespoken. They found when it had all been disposed of, and their workmen paid, that they had counted very closely, but there was a small balance on hand. This was deposited in the bank as a nucleus for a co-operative store as soon as there might be sufficient capital to warrant it. This, at least, had been a success. So many of the poorer class of Yerbury were not able to pay for the last ton of coal until they ordered again, being always that much behind.

Yardley was quite jubilant over his scheme.

"You forget that in this you and Hurd have received nothing for your trouble," said Darcy. "Then," smilingly, "you have no bad debts to count out. Still only a philanthropist can do business this way. If you were the proprietor of a coal-yard, you could not afford it."

"I think I have something for my trouble, Mr. Darcy," the man answered proudly. "I have saved ten dollars on my four tons of coal, and that surely pays me."

They were doing moderately well at the mill. Several orders had come in from old buyers; and now Winston started out on a travelling tour, being admirably fitted for that part of the business. At the West he managed to talk two large wool-dealers into a trade; they taking cloth of various grades in exchange, and disposing of it to the best of their ability.

"A regular old-fashioned barter," he wrote to Maverick. "It took a good deal of talking, to be sure, but I'm never the worse for that. They were pleased to get a fair price for their wool, and I lost nothing on my cloth. It clears out the stock, and keeps the men busy."

Indeed, Hope Mills was doing a great thing for Yerbury. There was a brisker air on the streets, a kind of inspiring music