"So you see—when I got up this morning, I felt half-determined to sign the pledge, at all hazards. Still I didn't want to give up my liberty, and was arguing the points over again, when Sally took me right aback so strongly that I gave up, wrote a pledge, signed it, and nailed it up over the mantelpiece, where it has got to stay."
"I am most heartily glad to hear of your good resolution," Mr. Jones said, grasping warmly the hand of Braddock—"and heartily ashamed of myself for having tempted you, yesterday. Hereafter, I am resolved not to offer liquor to any man who works for me. If my money is not enough for him, he must go somewhere else. Well," he continued—"you have signed away your liberty, as you called it. Do you feel any more a slave than you did yesterday?"
"A slave? No, indeed! I'm a free man now! Yesterday I was such a slave to a debased appetite, that all my good resolutions were like cobwebs. Now I can act like an honest, rational man. I am in a state of freedom. You ask me to drink. I say 'no'—yesterday I could not say no, because I was not a free man. But now I am free to choose what is right, and to reject what is wrong. I don't care for all the grog-shops and whiskey-bottles from here to sun-down! I'm not afraid to go past Harry Arnold's—nor even to go in there and make a temperance speech, if necessary. Hurrah for freedom!"
It cannot be supposed that Jim's wife, after her many sad disappointments, could feel altogether assured that he would stand by his pledge, although she had more confidence in its power over him than in anything else, and believed that it was the only thing that would save him, if he could be saved at all. She was far more cheerful, however, for her hope was stronger than it had ever been; and went about her house with a far lighter step than usual.
Towards evening, as the time began to approach for his return, she proceeded, as she had done on the day before, to make arrangements for his comfortable reception. The little scene of preparation for supper, and dressing up the children, was all acted over again, and with a feeling of stronger confidence. Still, her heart would beat at times oppressively, as a doubt would steal over her mind.
At last, the sun was just sinking behind a distant hill. It was the hour to expect him. The children were gathered around her in the door, and her eyes were afar off, eagerly watching to descry his well-known form in the distance. As minute after minute passed away, and the sun at length went down below the horizon, her heart began to tremble. Still, though she strained her eyes, she could see nothing of him,—and now the twilight began to fall, dimly around, throwing upon her oppressed heart a deeper shadow than that which mantled, like a thin veil, the distant hills and valleys. With a heavy sigh, she was about returning into the house, when a slight noise within caused her to turn quickly, and with a start.
"Back again, safe and sound, old girl!" greeted her glad ear, as the form of her husband caught her eye, coming in at the back door.
"O, Jim!" she exclaimed, her heart bounding with a wild, happy pulsation. "How glad I am to see you!"
And she flung herself into his arms, giving way, as she did so, to a gush of joyful tears.
"And I'm glad enough to see you, too, Sally! I've thought about you and the children all day, and of how much I have wronged you. But it's all over now. That pledge has done it!" pointing up as he spoke to his pledge nailed over the mantelpiece. "Since I signed that, I've not had the first wish to touch the accursed thing that has ruined me. I'm free, now, Sally! Free to do as I please. And that's what I havn't been for a long time. As I told Mr. Jones, I don't care now for all the grog-shops, whiskey-bottles, and Harry Arnolds, from here to sun-down."