In the stable, the hostler, a one-eyed servitor, with the piping voice, wobbly gait, and shrunken features of the "white drunkard," was in his usual sociable state of intoxication, and declared that he would stick by them. He testified slobberingly as to his devotion to Mr. Parrott, declared that when the women descended Mr. Parrott confided to him the delicate task of "hiding the stuff," and that he had managed to conceal quite a lot of it. "Well, dig it up and throw it away," directed Hiram. "Oh, only a fool in the business buries rum," confided the hostler. "I've been in the rum business, and I know. They allus hunts haymows and sullers. But I know how to hide it. I'm shrewd about them things." "We don't want no rum around here," declared the showman with positiveness. The hostler winked his one eye at him, and, having had a rogue's long experience in roguery, plainly showed that he believed a command of this sort to be merely for the purpose of publication and not an evidence of good faith. "And there won't be much rum left round here if we only let him alone," muttered Hiram as he and the Cap'n walked back to the house. "I only wisht them hired girls had as good an attraction for stayin' as he's got." "Look here, Hiram," said the Cap'n, stopping him on the porch, "it's all right to make loud talk to them Double-yer T. Double-yers, but there ain't any sense in makin' it to each other. You and me can't run this tavern no more'n hen-hawks can run a revival. Them wimmen--" "You goin' to let them wimmen cackle for the next two years, and pass it down to their grandchildren how they done us out of all the money we put in here--two able-bodied business men like we be? A watch ain't no good only so long's it's runnin', and a tavern ain't, either. We've got to run this till we can sell it, wimmen or no wimmen--and you hadn't ought to be a quitter with thutty-five hunderd in it." But there was very little enthusiasm or determination in the Cap'n's face. The sullenness deepened there when he saw a vehicle turn in at the tavern yard. It was a red van on runners, and on its side was inscribed: T. BRACKETT, TINWARE AND YANKEE NOTIONS. He was that round-faced, jovial little man who was known far and wide among the housewives of the section as "Balm o' Joy Brackett," on account of a certain liniment that he compounded and dispensed as a side-line. With the possible exception of one Marengo Todd, horse-jockey and also far-removed cousin of Mrs. Sproul, there was no one in her circle of cousins that the Cap'n hated any more cordially than Todd Ward Brackett. Mr. Brackett, by cheerfully hailing the Cap'n as "Cousin Aaron" at every opportunity, had regularly added to the latter's vehemence of dislike. The little man nodded cheery greeting to the showman, cried his usual "Hullo, Cousin Aaron!" to the surly skipper, bobbed off his van, and proceeded to unharness.