There was something in his manner which forced her to obey. She dropped into a chair by the fire, and burst into a hurricane of tears. He let her spend herself, and then, himself sitting down, he said,—
“Alice, you’ve known me long enough to be sure that I’m not the sort of man to be turned from my purpose. You and I have lived together many years now, and all on ’em’s been spent in the service of the devil. I’m not laying the blame more on you nor on myself. I’ve been the worse, it may be, of the two. But I can’t go on as I have done. The Lord has been very merciful to me, or I shouldn’t be here now. I’ve served the old lad too long by the half, and I mean now to serve a better Mayster, and to serve him gradely too, if he’ll only help me—and our Betty says she’s sure he will, for the Book says so. Now, if I’m to be a gradely servant of the Lord Jesus Christ, I must be an honest man—I must pay my way if I can; but I can’t pay at all if my brass is to go for the drink—and you know, Alice, you can’t deny it, that you’d spend the brass in drink if I gave it yourself. But, more nor that, if I’d as much brass as’d fill the coal-pit, shaft and all, I’d not give my consent to any on it’s going for the drink. I know that you can do without the drink if you’ve a mind. I know you’ll be all the better by being without it. I know, and you know yourself, that it’s swallowed up the clothes from your own back, and starved and beggared us all. If you’ll give it up, and live without it like a Christian woman should, you’ll never have an afterthought; and as soon as I see that you can be trusted with the brass, I’ll give it you again with all my heart. Come, Alice, there’s a good wench; you mustn’t think me hard. I’ve been a hard husband, and fayther too, for years, but I must be different now; and I’ll try and do my duty by you all, and folks may just say what they please.”
Alice did not reply a word; her passion had cooled, and she sat rocking herself backwards and forwards, with her apron to her eyes, sobbing bitterly. She knew her husband too well to think of deliberately attempting to make him change his purpose, yet she was equally resolved that the drink she would and must have. At last she said, with many tears,—
“Well, Thomas, you must please yourself. I know well, to my cost, that I might as well try and turn the hills wrong side out as turn you from what you’ve set your heart on. But you know all the while that I can’t do without my little drop of drink. Well, it makes no odds whether I starve to death or die for want of the drink—there’ll be short work with me one road or the other; and then you and Betty can fill up my place with some of them teetottal chaps you’re both so fond on, when I’m in the ground.”
Johnson made no reply, but shortly after left for his work, as he was in the night-shift that week.
Alice sat for a long time turning over in her mind what steps to take in order to get the means for satisfying her miserable appetite. She had no money; she knew that none of the publicans would trust her any longer; and as for pawning any articles, she had pawned already everything that she dared lay her hands on. Her only hope now was in Betty; she would speak her fair, and see if she could not so work upon her feelings as to induce her to give her part of her own wages.
“Betty,” she said, softly and sadly, “you’re all the wenches I have; ay, and all the childer too, for our Sammul’s as good as dead and gone, we shall never see him no more—ah, he was a good lad to his poor mother; he’d never have grudged her the brass to buy a drop of drink. You’ll not do as your father’s doing—break your old mother’s heart, and let her waste and die out for want of a drop of drink.”
“Mother,” replied Betty very quietly, but with a great deal of her father’s decision in her manner, “I can’t go against what fayther’s made me promise. I’ve worked for you ever since I were a little wench scarce higher nor the table; and I’ll work for you and fayther still, and you shall neither on you want meat nor drink while I’ve an arm to work with; but I can’t give you the brass yourself ’cos it’ll only go into the publican’s pocket, and we’ve nothing to spare for him.”
“You might have plenty to spare if you’d a mind,” said her mother, gloomily.
“No, mother; all fayther’s brass, and all my brass too, ’ll have to go to pay old debts for many a long week to come.”