The Lights and Shadows of Real Life Part 51

"How, sick?" was Sandy's persevering inquiry.

"Sick at heart! O, dear! I wish I'd been dead before I opened a grog-shop!"--And the countenance of Mr. Graves changed its quiet, sad expression, to one of intense agony.

Sandy looked at the tavern-keeper with an air of stupid astonishment for some moments, unable to comprehend his meaning. It was evident to his mind that Mr. Graves had suddenly become crazed about something. This idea produced a feeling of alarm, and he was about retiring for counsel and a.s.sistance, when the tavern-keeper roused himself and said:

"When did you see Bill Riley, Sandy?"

"I saw him yesterday."

"Are you certain?" in a quick, eager tone.

"O yes. I saw him going along on the other side of the street with two or three fellows that didn't look no how at all like rum-bruisers."

"I was afraid he was dead," Mr. Graves responded to this, breathing more freely.

"Dead! Why should you think that?" inquired Sandy, still more (sic) mistified.

"I had reason for thinking so," was the evasive reply. A pause of some, moments ensued, when the bar-keeper said--

"I shall have to be stirring bright and early to-morrow morning."

"Why so?"

"We're out of sugar and lemons both. That Sub-Treasury runs on them 'ere articles strong."

"Confound the Sub-Treasury!" Mr. Graves e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, with a strong and bitter emphasis. Sandy stood again mute with astonishment, staring into the tavern-keeper's face.

"Sandy," Mr. Graves at length said in a calm, resolute tone, "my mind is made up to quit selling liquor."

"Quit selling liquor, sir!" exclaimed Sandy, more astonished than ever. "Quit selling liquor just at this time, when you have made such a hit?"

"Yes, Sandy, I'm going to quit it. I'm afraid that we rum-sellers are on the side of h.e.l.l."

"I never once supposed that we were on the side of heaven," the bar-keeper replied, half smiling.

"Then what side did you suppose we were on?"

"O, as to that, I never gave the matter a thought. Only, it never once entered my head that we could claim much relationship with heaven. Heaven feeds the hungry and clothes the naked. But we take away both food and clothing, and give only drink. There is some little difference in this, now one comes to think about it."

"Then I am right in my notion."

"I'm rather afraid you are, sir. But that's a strange way of thinking."

"Aint it the true way?"

"Perhaps so."

"I am sure so, Sandy! And that's what makes me say that I'm done selling rum."

The tavern-keeper did not tell all that was in his mind. He said nothing of his dream, nor of that horrible idea of going to the rum-seller's h.e.l.l, and becoming a devil, filled with the delight of rendering mankind wretched by deluging the land with drunkenness.

"What are you going to do then?" asked Sandy.

"Why, the first thing is to quit rum-selling."

"But what then?"

"I'm not decided yet;--but shall enter into some kind of business that I can follow with a clear conscience."

"You'll sell out this stands I suppose. The goodwill is worth three or four hundred dollars."

"No, Sandy, I will not!" was the tavern-keeper's positive, half indignant reply. "I'll have nothing more to do with the gain of rum-selling. I have too much of that sin on my conscience already."

"Somebody will come right in, as soon as you move out. And I don't see why you should give any one such an advantage for nothing."

"I'm not going to move out, Sandy."

"Then what are you going to do?"

"Why, one thing--I'm going to shut up this devil's man-trap. And while I can keep possession of the property, it shall never be opened as a dram-shop again."

"What are you going to do with your liquors, Mr. Graves? Sell 'em?"

"No."

"What then?"

"Burn 'em. Or let 'em run in the gutter."

"That I should call a piece of folly."

"You may call it what you please. But I'll do it notwithstanding.

I've received my last dollar for rum. Not another would I touch for all the world!"

A slight shudder pa.s.sed through the tavern-keeper's body, as he said this, occasioned by the vivid recollection of some fearful pa.s.sage in his late dream.

"You'd better give the liquors to me, Mr. Graves. It would be a downright sin to throw 'em in the gutter, when a fellow might make a good living out of 'em."

"No, Sandy. Neither you nor anybody else shall ever make a man drunk with the liquor now in this house. It shall run in the gutter.

That's settled!"

When the sun arose next morning, Harmony House was shorn of its attractions as a drinking establishment. All the signs, with their deceptive and alluring devices, were taken down--the shutters closed, and everything indicating its late use removed, excepting a strong smell of liquor, great quant.i.ties of which had been poured into the gutters.

In the course of a few weeks, the house was again re-opened as a hatter-shop, Mr. Graves having resumed his former honest business, which he still follows, well patronized by the temperance men, among whom are Joseph Randolph, and William Riley, the former reclaimed through his active instrumentality.