"Good gracious!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. "It's true, sir," said the last speaker, turning to me, "I never saw anything like it. And this wasn't all bar-room talk, which, as you may know, isn't the most refined and virtuous in the world. I wouldn't like my son to hear much of it. Frank was always an eager listener to everything that was said, and in a very short time became an adept in slang and profanity. I'm no saint myself; but it's often made my blood run cold to hear him swear." "I pity his mother," said I; for my thought turned naturally to Mrs. Slade. "You may well do that," was answered. "I doubt if Cedarville holds a sadder heart. It was a dark day for her, let me tell you, when Simon Slade sold his mill and built this tavern. She was opposed to it at the beginning." "I have inferred as much." "I know it," said the man. "My wife has been intimate with her for years. Indeed, they have always been like sisters. I remember very well her coming to our house, about the time the mill was sold, and crying about it as if her heart would break. She saw nothing but sorrow and trouble ahead. Tavern-keeping she had always regarded as a low business, and the change from a respectable miller to a lazy tavern-keeper, as she expressed it, was presented to her mind as something disgraceful. I remember, very well, trying to argue the point with her--assuming that it was quite as respectable to keep tavern as to do anything else; but I might as well have talked to the wind. She was always a pleasant, hopeful, cheerful woman before that time, but, really, I don't think I've seen a true smile on her face since." "That was a great deal for a man to lose," said I. "What?" he inquired, not clearly understanding me. "The cheerfull face of his wife." "The face was but an index of her heart," said he. "So much the worse." "True enough for that. Yes, it was a great deal to lose. "What has he gained that will make up for this?" The man shrugged his shoulders. "What has he gained?" I repeated. "Can you figure it up?" "He's a richer man, for one thing." "Happier?" There was another shrug of the shoulders. "I wouldn't like to say that." "How much richer?" "Oh, a great deal. Somebody was saying, only yesterday, that he couldn't be worth less than thirty thousand dollars." "Indeed? So much." "Yes." "How has he managed to accumulate so rapidly?" "His bar has a large run of custom. And, you know, that pays wonderfully." "He must have sold a great deal of liquor in six years." "And he has. I don't think I'm wrong in saying that in the six years which have gone by since the 'Sickle and Sheaf' was opened, more liquor has been drank than in the previous twenty years." "Say forty," remarked a man who had been a listener to what we said. "Let it be forty then," was the according answer. "How comes this?" I inquired. "You had a tavern here before the 'Sickle and Sheaf' was opened."