THE PLOT
A village bar-room is a village hell.
Jud Carpenter and Joe Hopper were soon there, and the silver their children had earned at the mill began to go for drinks.
The drinks made them feel good. They resolved to feel better, so they drank again. As they drank the talk grew louder. They were joined by others from the town—ne'er-do-wells, who hung around the bar—and others from the mill.
And so they drank and sang and danced and played cards and drank again, and threw dice for more drinks.
It was nearly nine o'clock before the Bacchanal laugh began to ring out at intervals—so easily distinguished from the sober laugh, in that it carries in its closing tones the queer ring of the maniac's.
Only the mill men had any cash. The village loafers drank at their expense, and on credit.
“And why should we not drink if we wish,” said one of them. “Our children earned the money and do we not own the children?”
Twice only were they interrupted. Once by the wife of a weaver who came in and pleaded with her husband for part of their children's money. Her tears touched the big-hearted Billy Buch, and as her husband was too drunk to know what he was doing, Billy took what money he had left and gave it to the wife. She had a sick child, she told Billy Buch, and what money she had would not even buy the medicine.