Ten Nights in a Bar RoomArthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)
General
Ten Nights in a Bar Room
Arthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)
Christian fiction; Temperance -- Fiction
How the name, uttered so sadly, and yet with such moving tenderness by
the mother's lips, caused me to start--almost to tremble.
"If he is in the house, ma'am," said I, firmly, "I will see him for
you." And I left her and went into the bar.
"In what room do you think I will find young Hammond?" I asked of the
bar-keeper. He looked at me curiously, but did not answer. The question
had come upon him unanticipated.
"In Harvey Green's room?" I pursued.
"I don't know, I am sure. He isn't in the house to my knowledge. I saw
him go out about half an hour since."
"Green's room is No.----?"
"Eleven," he answered.
"In the front part of the house?"
"Yes."
I asked no further question, but went to No. 11, and tapped on the
door. But no one answered the summons. I listened, but could not
distinguish the slightest sound within. Again I knocked; but louder. If
my ears did not deceive me, the chink of coin was heard. Still there
was neither voice nor movement.
I was disappointed. That the room had inmates, I felt sure.
Remembering, now, what I had heard about light being seen in this room
through a rent in the curtain, I went down-stairs, and out into the
street. A short distance beyond the house, I saw, dimly, the woman's
form. She had only just passed in her movement to and fro. Glancing up
at the window, which I now knew to be the one in Green's room, light
through the torn curtain was plainly visible. Back into the house I
went, and up to No. 11. This time I knocked imperatively; and this time
made myself heard.
"What's wanted?" came from within. I knew the voice to be that of
Harvey Green.
I only knocked louder. A hurried movement and the low murmur of voices
was heard for some moments; then the door was unlocked and held partly
open by Green, whose body so filled the narrow aperture that I could
not look into the room. Seeing me, a dark scowl fell upon his
countenance.
"What d'ye want?" he inquired, sharply.
"Is Mr. Hammond here? If so, he is wanted downstairs."
"No, he's not," was the quick answer. "What sent you here for him, hey?"
"The fact that I expected to find him in your room," was my firm answer.
Green was about shutting the door in my face, when some one placed a
hand on his shoulder, and said something to him that I could not hear.
"Who wants to see him?" he inquired of me.
Satisfied, now, that Hammond was in the room, I said, slightly
elevating my voice:
"His mother."
The words were an "open sesame" to the room. The door was suddenly
jerked open, and with a blanching face, the young man confronted me.
"Who says my mother is down-stairs?" he demanded.
"I come from her in search of you," I said. "You will find her in the
road, walking up and down in front of the tavern."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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