It began in a small way, of course.

Carrie, going to get her hat one morning, was stopped by him.
"Where are you going, Carrie ?" he asked.
"Over to the baker's," she answered.
"I'd just as leave go for you," he said.
She acquiesced, and he went.

Each afternoon he would go to the corner for the papers.
"Is there anything you want ?" he would say.
By degrees she began to use him.

Doing this, however, she lost the weekly payment of twelve dollars.
"You want to pay me to-day," she said one Tuesday, about this time.
"How much ?" he asked.
She understood well enough what it meant.
"Well, about five dollars," she answered.

"I owe the coal man." The same day he said: "I think this Italian up here on the corner sells coal at twenty-five cents a bushel.