“You don’t mean it?” cried the manager, eagerly. Then he regarded the other suspiciously: “Your proposal is not inspired through sympathy?”
“Why not through the golden prospects you have so eloquently depicted?” replied Saint-Prosper, coldly.
“Why not indeed!” exclaimed the reassured manager. “Success will come; it must come. You have seen Constance but once. She lives in every character to her heart’s core. How does she do it? Who can tell? It’s inborn. A heritage to her!”
His voice sank low with emotion. “Yes,” he murmured, shaking his head thoughtfully, as though another image arose in his mind; “a heritage! a divine heritage!” But soon he looked up. “She’s a brave girl!” he said. “When times were dark, she would always smile encouragingly, and, in the light of her clear eyes, I felt anew the Lord would temper the wind to the shorn lamb.”
“One––two––three––four,” rang the great clock through the silent hall, and, at its harsh clangor, Barnes started.
“Bless my soul, the maids’ll be up and doing and find us here!” he exclaimed. “One last cup! To the success of the temperance drama!”
In a few moments they had parted for their respective chambers and only the landlord was left down-stairs. Now as he came from behind the bar, where he had been apparently dozing and secretly listening through the half-opened door leading into the kitchen, he had much difficulty to restrain his laughter.
“That’s a good one to tell Ezekiel,” he muttered, turning out the lights and sweeping the ashes on the hearth to the back of the grate. “To the temperance drama!”