Lessons in Life, for All Who Will Read Them Part 13

"To myself, if the truth must be spoken."

"Is it possible?"

"Yes--to myself."

"That places the matter in rather a serious light, Mr. Grant."

"It does. And I think I have reason to complain."

"You ought to be certain about this matter."

"I'm certain enough. When a man treads on your toe, you are likely to know it."

"It is barely possible that Mr. C-- did not intend to designate you, or any one, in what he said."

"He _must_ have meant me," replied Mr. Grant, with emphasis. "He couldn't have said what he did, unless he had been informed of certain things that have happened in this town. Had he not visited the Harrisons, I might have doubted. But that fact places the thing beyond a question."

"In what did the personality consist?"

"Did you not observe it?"

"No."

"Indeed!"

"I perceived no allusion to any one."

"There are plenty of others, no doubt, who did. I don't care to speak of it just now. But you'll hear about it. I noticed three or four turn and look at me while he was speaking. It will be a pleasant piece of gossip; but if Mr. C-- doesn't take care, I'll make this place too hot to hold him. I'm not the one to be set up as a target for any whipper-snapper to fire at."

"Don't get excited, friend Grant. Wait awhile. I still think there is some mistake."

"I beg your pardon; there is no mistake about it. He meant me. Don't I know? Can't I tell when a man points his finger at me in a public a.s.sembly?"

In his opinion, Mr. Grant was still further confirmed, ere he reached his home, by the peculiar way in which sundry members of the congregation looked at him. Of course, he was considerably disturbed on the subject; and felt a reasonable share of indignation. In the evening, he declined attending worship as an indication of his feelings on the subject; and he doubted not that the new preacher would note his absence and understand the cause.

About a year prior to this time, Mr. Grant, who was a manufacturing jeweller, was called upon by a gentleman, who desired him to make a solid gold wedding-ring. It was to be of the finest quality that could be worked, and to be unusually heavy. When the price was mentioned, the gentleman objected to it as high.

"Your neighbour, over the way," said the gentleman, "will make it for a dollar less than you ask."

"Not of solid gold," replied Mr. Grant.

"Oh, yes. I would have no other."

Mr. Grant knew that the ring could not be made of fine, solid gold, for the price his neighbour had agreed to take. And he knew, also, that in manufacturing it, his neighbour, if he took the order, would fill up the centre of the ring with solder--a common practice. On the spur of the moment, he determined to do the same thing, and therefore replied--

"Well, I suppose I must work as low as he does."

"The ring must be of solid gold, remember. I will have no other."

"That's understood, of course," replied the jeweller; adding to himself, "as solid as any one makes them."

The ring was manufactured at a reasonable profit, and the man got the full worth of his money; but not of solid gold. Silver solder composed the centre. But as the baser metal could not be detected by simple inspection or weighing, Mr. Grant felt secure in the cheat he had practised; and, quieted his conscience by a.s.suming that he had given a full equivalent for the money received.

"He's just as well off as he would have been if he had gone to my neighbour over the way, as he called him," said he to himself, in the effort to quiet certain unpleasant sensations. "To suppose that he was going to get a solid ring at such a price! Does he think we jewellers steal our gold? Men will be humbugged, and there is no help for it."

Yet, for all this, Mr. Grant could not cast out the unpleasant feeling.

He had done a thing so clearly wrong, that no attempt at self-justification gave his mind its former calmness.

"The ring is solid gold?" said the man, when he came for it.

"That was the contract," replied Mr. Grant, with a half-offended air, at the intimation conveyed in the tone of voice, that all might not be as agreed upon.

"Excuse me," remarked the man, apologetically; "but I am very particular about this matter, and would throw the ring into the street rather than use it, if not of solid gold."

"Gold rings are not given away," muttered Grant to himself, as the man left the shop.

Some days after this transaction, a man named Harrison, who belonged to the church of which Grant was a member, met him, when this little conversation took place.

"I sent you a customer last week," said Mr. Harrison.

"Ah! I'm very much obliged to you."

"A gentleman who wanted a gold ring. He asked me to give him the name of a jeweller upon whom he could depend. The ring, he said, must be solid, for a particular reason; and, as he was a stranger, he did not know who was to be trusted. I told him I would guaranty you for an honest man. That if you undertook to manufacture any article for him, he might rely upon its being done according to agreement."

While Harrison was uttering this undeserved compliment, it was with the utmost difficulty that Mr. Grant could keep the tell-tale blood from rushing to his face.

"He showed me the ring," continued Mr. Harrison. "It is a very handsome one."

"Was he satisfied with it?" asked Mr. Grant.

"Not fully."

"Why so?"

"He was afraid it might not be solid. In fact, so anxious was he on this point, that he took the ring to your neighbour, over the way, to get his opinion about it."

As Mr. Harrison said this, Grant was conscious that a betrayal of the truth was on his countenance.

"And, of course, Martin said the ring was not solid."

"No, he did not exactly say that. I went with the gentleman, at his request. Martin weighed the ring, and, after doing so, simply stated that gold of the quality of which the ring was made was worth a certain price per pennyweight. By multiplying the number of pennyweights contained in the ring with the price mentioned, he showed that you either lost one dollar on the ring, or filled the centre with some baser metal."

"Well?" The blood had, by this time, risen to the very brow of the jeweller.

"'Cut the ring,' said my friend. It was done, and, to my mortification and astonishment, it proved to be even as he had said. The ring was not solid!"

For some moments, Mr. Grant hung his head in painful confusion. Then, looking up, he said--

"It was his own fault."