It was just here that a new mistake of Richling's emerged. He had come into contact with two or three men of that wretched sort that indulge the strange vanity of keeping others waiting upon them by promises of employment. He believed them, liked them heartily because they said nothing about references, and gratefully distended himself with their husks, until Ristofalo opened his eyes by saying, when one of these men had disappointed Richling the third time:-- "Business man don't promise but once." "You lookin' for book-keeper's place?" asked the Italian at another time. "Why don't dress like a book-keeper?" "On borrowed money?" asked Richling, evidently looking upon that question as a poser. "Yes." "Oh, no," said Richling, with a smile of superiority; but the other one smiled too, and shook his head. "Borrow mo', if you don't." Richling's heart flinched at the word. He had thought he was giving his true reason; but he was not. A foolish notion had floated, like a grain of dust, into the over-delicate wheels of his thought,--that men would employ him the more readily if he looked needy. His hat was unbrushed, his shoes unpolished; he had let his beard come out, thin and untrimmed; his necktie was faded. He looked battered. When the Italian's gentle warning showed him this additional mistake on top of all his others he was dismayed at himself; and when he sat down in his room and counted the cost of an accountant's uniform, so to speak, the remains of Dr. Sevier's last loan to him was too small for it. Thereupon he committed one error more,--but it was the last. He sunk his standard, and began again to look for service among industries that could offer employment only to manual labor. He crossed the river and stirred about among the dry-docks and ship-carpenters' yards of the suburb Algiers. But he could neither hew spars, nor paint, nor splice ropes. He watched a man half a day calking a boat; then he offered himself for the same work, did it fairly, and earned half a day's wages. But then the boat was done, and there was no other calking at the moment along the whole harbor front, except some that was being done on a ship by her own sailors. "John," said Mary, dropping into her lap the sewing that hardly paid for her candle, "isn't it hard to realize that it isn't twelve months since your hardships commenced? They _can't_ last much longer, darling." "I know that," said John. "And I know I'll find a place presently, and then we'll wake up to the fact that this was actually less than a year of trouble in a lifetime of love." "Yes," rejoined Mary, "I know your patience will be rewarded." "But what I want is work now, Mary. The bread of idleness is getting _too_ bitter. But never mind; I'm going to work to-morrow;--never mind where. It's all right. You'll see."