“Aha! thees eies not fair blay, you vant to shvindle your son!” cried the Alsacien. “Do you kow vot you do ven you trink ein pottle of vine? You gif goot trink to ein bad scountrel.”
“Oh, father!” cried David.
“I came to see if you wanted anything,” said old Séchard, half sobered by this time.
“Und it was for de inderest vot you take in us dot you brought der liddle ladder!” commented Kolb, as he pushed the casks aside and flung open the door; and there, in fact, on a short step-ladder, the old man stood in his shirt.
“Risking your health!” said David.
“I think I must be walking in my sleep,” said old Séchard, coming down in confusion. “Your want of confidence in your father set me dreaming; I dreamed you were making a pact with the Devil to do impossible things.”
“Der teufel,” said Kolb; “dot is your own bassion for de liddle goldfinches.”
“Go back to bed again, father,” said David; “lock us in if you will, but you may save yourself the trouble of coming down again. Kolb will mount guard.”
At four o’clock in the morning David came out of the distillery; he had been careful to leave no sign of his occupation behind him; but he brought out some thirty sheets of paper that left nothing to be desired in fineness, whiteness, toughness, and strength, all of them bearing by way of water-mark the impress of the uneven hairs of the sieve. The old man took up the samples and put his tongue to them, the lifelong habit of the pressman, who tests papers in this way. He felt it between his thumb and finger, crumpled and creased it, put it through all the trials by which a printer assays the quality of a sample submitted to him, and when it was found wanting in no respect, he still would not allow that he was beaten.
“We have yet to know how it takes an impression,” he said, to avoid praising his son.