"Yes, Mr. Crimsworth, you will find I have a good memory."
I said no more. I did not think the time was come for much
parley. I had an instinctive feeling that it would be folly to
let one's temper effervesce often with such a man as Edward. I
said to myself, "I will place my cup under this continual
dropping; it shall stand there still and steady; when full, it
will run over of itself--meantime patience. Two things are
certain. I am capable of performing the work Mr. Crimsworth has
set me; I can earn my wages conscientiously, and those wages are
sufficient to enable me to live. As to the fact of my brother
assuming towards me the bearing of a proud, harsh master, the
fault is his, not mine; and shall his injustice, his bad feeling,
turn me at once aside from the path I have chosen? No; at least,
ere I deviate, I will advance far enough to see whither my career
tends. As yet I am only pressing in at the entrance--a strait
gate enough; it ought to have a good terminus." While I thus
reasoned, Mr. Crimsworth rang a bell; his first clerk, the
individual dismissed previously to our conference,
re-entered.
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