Page:Middle Aged Love Stories (IA middleagedlove00bacorich).djvu/79

 the cottages of the mill-hands, while her lodger pitched pennies with the delighted children outside. It was on one of these occasions that Miss Gould took the opportunity to address Mr. Thomas Waters, late of the paper and cardboard manufacturing force, on the wickedness and folly of his present course of action. Mr. Waters had left his position on the strength of his wife’s financial success. Mrs. Waters was a laundress, and the summer boarders, together with Mr. Welles, who alone went far toward establishing the fortunes of the family, had combined to place the head of the house in his present condition of elegant leisure.

“I wonder at you, Tom Waters, after all the interest we’ve taken in you! Are you not horribly ashamed to depend on your wife in this lazy way?” Miss Gould demanded of the once member of the Reformed Drunkards’ League. “How many times have I explained to you that nothing—absolutely nothing—is so disgraceful