"I am afraid I do not understand you even yet," he said, when she paused. "Do you refer to the tariff or seal fisheries or female suffrage or war or what?"
"I refer to the rum power in America. That is the god I mean. The most heartless, depraved monopoly on earth, yet men and governments grovel in the dust at its feet and cringe like dogs before its power."
Mr. Allison was silent, and she continued, presently, turning her face to him.
"It has always seemed to me that the firm of Allison, Russell & Joy was an important part of this great iniquity; partly, I presume, because I happen to be acquainted with a family that has been utterly destroyed by that firm. Tell me truly—have they, have YOU never heard wails and cries and bitter prayers in the stillness of the night? Have you never felt the burden of your awful sin?"
Mr. Allison smiled.
"I am sure," he said, "I have never heard any weeping or wailing that I have been aware of, and really I hope to be pardoned, but the burden that you speak of has failed to make itself felt."
"Well, you will hear it some day. Even legal, licensed murder will have its reckoning time. You will see a face some day; you will hear a voice that will haunt you like the wail of a lost soul."
Mr. Allison shrugged his shoulders as if in apprehension.
"I hope not," he said; "but Miss Thorn, I am afraid you do not enjoy the society of a liquor dealer."