The second day resembled the first, and the third resembled the second. Jones felt quite satisfied "that it was all right," until he cast up his accounts at the end of the week. To his surprise, he found that his expenditure was barely covered, and that, somehow or other, his gains had considerably lessened. He reckoned over and over, and still he came to the same result. "Well, 'taint of much consequence for one week," he thought, a little impatiently, and he put the books by. "What's the matter, father?" asked Mary, looking up into his overcast face. "What's the matter!" he echoed cheerfully; "why, the matter is, that you are a saucy puss--that's what's the matter," and he chucked her chin, and Mary laughed. But the next week's examination revealed a still deeper gap. Jones scratched his head, and pulled a long face. It was not that he minded the loss, for it was a trifling one after all; but be had a secret dread, and it stood in the background of his thoughts, like a ghost in a dark room, haunting him. Could it be--was it possible--that his customers were playing him false--that they were deserting him--and he began to think and think, and to remember, how many pennyworths of this, and of that, he had sold to the children, and how few shillings worth he had sold to the mothers. "Well, father, and how's this week?" asked Mary. Jones rubbed his chin, and looked at her fairly perplexed--his wit was none of the brightest--as to how he might best elude the question. "How's this week," he echoed; "well, this week is like last week to be sure. I wonder how that fellow Saunders is a getting on." "Law! father, don't mind him," said Mary. "He's low, that's what he is-- he's low." Impossible for us to translate the scorn with which Miss Mary Jones spoke. It impressed her father. "Spirited little thing," he thought, and he drew her fondly towards him, and kissed her, and Mary fortunately forgot her question. Week after week passed, and what had been a speck on the horizon, became a dark and threatening cloud. Richard Jones could not shut his eyes to the truth that his customers were deserting him. Even Mary perceived it, and spoke uneasily on the subject, of which her father at once made light.