'If I don't know it, I shan't use the money,' he answered, shortly.--'Why, surely, father, you can trust me!' she rejoined. 'That is not it, Mary,' said John Baxendale. 'I don't like to use borrowed money, unless I know who it has been borrowed from.' 'It was not borrowed, in your sense of the word, father. I have only done what you and Mrs. Baxendale have been doing lately. I pledged that set of coral ornaments of my mother's. Had you forgotten them?' 'Why, yes, I had forgot 'em,' cried he. 'Coral ornaments! I declare they had as much slipped my memory, as if she had never possessed them.' 'Cox would only lend me two pounds upon them. Father, I hope I shall some time get them redeemed.' John Baxendale made no reply. He turned to pace the small room, evidently in deep thought. Mary, her poor short breath gathered again, took off her wet cloak and bonnet. Presently, Mrs. Baxendale put the loaf upon the table, and some cold potatoes. 'Couldn't you have brought in a sausage or two for yourself, Mary, or a red herring?' she said. 'You had got a shilling in your pocket.' 'I can eat a potato,' said Mary; 'it don't much matter about me.' 'It matters about us all, I think,' cried Mrs. Baxendale. 'What a delicious smell of onions!' she added in a parenthesis. 'Them Shucks have got the luck of it just now. Us, and the children, and you, are three parts starved--I know that, Mary. _We_ may weather it--it's to be hoped we shall; but it will just kill you.' 'No, it shan't,' said John Baxendale, turning to them with a strangely stern decision marked upon his countenance. 'This night has decided me, and I'll go and do it.' 'Go and do what?' exclaimed his wife, a sort of fear in her tone. 'I'll go to WORK, please God, Monday morning comes,' he said, with emphasis. 'The thought has been hovering in my mind this week past.' 'It's just the thing you ought to have done weeks ago,' observed Mrs. Baxendale. 'You never said it.'--'Not I. It's best to let men come to their senses of their own accord. You mostly act by the rules of contrary, you men; if I had advised your going to work next Monday morning, you'd just have stopped away.' Passing over this conjugal compliment in silence, John Baxendale descended the stairs. He possessed a large share of the open honesty of the genuine English workman. He disdained to do things in a corner. It would not suit him to return to work the coming Monday morning on what might be called 'the sly;' he preferred to act openly, and to declare it to the Trades' Union previously, in the person of their paid agent, Sam Shuck. This he would do at once, and for that purpose entered the kitchen. The first instalment of the supper was just served: which was accomplished by means of a tin dish placed on the table, and the contents of the frying-pan being turned unceremoniously into it. Sam and the company deemed the liver and bacon were best served hot and hot, so they set themselves to eat, while Mrs. Shuck continued to fry.