ath of Paul Benedict, and an instrument drawn up in legal form,
making over to me all his right, title and interest in every patented
invention of his which I am now using in my manufactures. Do you hear
that?"

"I do."

"What have you to say to it? Are you going to live up to your pledge, or
are you going to break with me?"

"If I could furnish such an instrument honorably, I would do it."

"Hm! I tell you, Sam Yates, this sort of thing won't do."

Then Mr. Belcher left the room, and soon returned with a glass and a
bottle of brandy. Setting them upon the table, he took the key from the
outside of the door, inserted it upon the inside, turned it, and then
withdrew it, and put it in his pocket. Yates rose and watched him, his
face pale, and his heart thumping at his side like a tilt-hammer.

"Sam Yates," said Mr. Belcher, "you are getting altogether too virtuous.
Nothing will cure you but a good, old-fashioned drunk. Dip in, now, and
take your fill. You can lie here all night if you wish to."

Mr. Belcher drew the cork, and poured out a tumblerful of the choice
old liquid. Its fragrance filled the little room. It reached the
nostrils of the poor slave, who shivered as if an ague had smitten him.
He hesitated, advanced toward the table, retreated, looked at Mr.
Belcher, then at the brandy, then walked the room, then paused before
Mr. Belcher, who had coolly watched the struggle from his chair. The
victim of this passion was in the supreme of torment. His old thirst was
roused to fury. The good resolutions of the preceding weeks, the moral
strength he had won, the motives that had come to life within him, the
promise of a better future, sank away into blank nothingness. A patch of
fire burned on either cheek. His eyes were bloodshot.

"Oh God! Oh God!" he exclaimed, and buried his face in his hands.

"Fudge!" said Mr. Belcher. "What do you make an ass of yourself for?"

"If you'll take these things out of the room, and see that I drink
nothing to-night, I'll do anything. They are hell and damnation to me.
Don't you see? Have you no pity on me? Take them away!"

Mr. Belcher was surprised, but he had secured the promise he was after,
and so he coolly rose and removed the offensive temptation.

Yates sat down as limp as if he had had a sunstroke. After sitting a
long time in silence, he looked up, and begged for the privilege of
sleeping in the house. He did not dare to trust himself in the street
until sleep ha