“Cash I can not pay,” he said; “but here is my I O U, and a check of my Uncle Lawrence’s in the morning; for I have no account, you know.”
His voice was rough. It was two o’clock in the morning; and the lonely woman he had left sat waiting and wondering: stealing to the front door and straining her eyes into the night: stealing softly back again to press her forehead against the window: and the quiet hopelessness of her face began to be pricked with terror.
“Good-night, gentlemen,” said Abel, huskily and savagely.
There was a laugh around the table at which he had been playing.
“Takes it hardly, now that he’s got money,” said one of his old cronies. “He’s made up with Uncle Lawrence, I hear. Hope he’ll come often, hey?” he said to the bank.
The bank smiled vaguely, but did not reply.
It was after two, and Abel burst into the street. He had been drinking brandy, and the fires were lighted within him. Pulling his hat heavily upon his head, he moved unsteadily along the street toward the ferry. The night was starry and still. There were few passers in the street; and no light but that which shone at some of the corners,-the bad, red eye that lures to death. The night air struck cool upon his face and into his lungs. His head was light.—He reeled.
“Mus ha’ some drink,” he said, thickly.
He stumbled, and staggered into the nearest shop. There was a counter, with large yellow barrels behind it; and a high blind, behind which two or three rough-looking men were drinking. In the window there was a sign, “Liquors, pure as imported.”
The place was dingy and cold. The floor was sanded. The two or three guests were huddled about a stove—one asleep upon a bench, the others smoking short pipes; and their hard, cadaverous faces and sullen eyes turned no welcome upon Abel when he entered, but they looked at him quickly, as if they suspected him to be a policeman or magistrate, and as if they had reason not to wish to see either. But in a moment they saw it was not a sober man, whoever he was. Abel tried to stand erect, to look dignified, to smooth himself into apparent sobriety. He vaguely hoped to give the impression that he was a gentleman belated upon his way home, and taking a simple glass for comfort.