After a walk of ten minutes, they reached Boylston Market, where they were at once beset by venders of evergreen and holly wreaths, crosses and stars of every description. Mr. Brownlow bought half a dozen of the cheaper sort of wreaths, which the owner kindly threaded upon his arm, as if they were a sort of huge, fragrant beads. Then he selected a tree, and, after a short consultation with Mrs. Brownlow, decided to carry it home himself, to save a quarter. A horse-car opportunely passing, they boarded it, Mrs. Brownlow and her bag being with some difficulty squeezed in through the rear door, and Mr. Brownlow taking his stand upon the front platform, from which the tree, which had been tightly tied up, projected like a bowsprit, until they reached home.
Great was the bustle at 17 Elm Street that night. Parcels were unwrapped; the whole house was pleasantly redolent of boiling molasses; and from the kitchen there came at the same time a scratchy and poppy sound, denoting the preparation of mounds of feathery corn. Bob and his father took upon themselves the uprearing of the tree. On being carried to the parlor it was found to be at least three feet too long, and Mr. Brownlow, in his shirt-sleeves, accomplished wonders with a saw, smearing himself in the process with pitch, from head to foot.
The tree seemed at first inclined to be sulky, perhaps at having been decapitated and curtailed; for it obstinately leaned backward, kicked over the soapbox in which it was set, bumped against Mr. Brownlow, tumbled forward, and in short, behaved itself like a tree which was determined to lie on its precious back all the next day, or perish in the attempt. At length, just as they were beginning to despair of ever getting it firm and straight, it gave a little quiver of its limbs, yielded gracefully to a final push by Bob, and stood upright, as fair and comely a Christmas tree as one would wish to see. Mr. Brownlow crept out backward from under the lower branches, (thereby throwing his hair into the wildest confusion and adding more pitch to himself), and regarded it with a sigh of content. Such presents as were to be disposed of in this way were now hung upon the branches; then strings of pop-corn, bits of wool, and glistening paper, a few red apples, and lastly the candles. When all was finished, which was not before midnight, the family withdrew to their beds, with weary limbs and brains, but with light-hearted anticipation of to-morrow.
“Do you s’pose Mrs. Bright will come with her children, John?” asked Mrs. Brownlow, as she turned out the gas.
“Shouldn’t—wonder”—sleepily from the four-poster.
“Did Mr. Bright say anything about the invitation we sent, when he paid you off?”
Silence. More silence. Good Mr. Brownlow was asleep, and Clarissa soon followed him.
Meanwhile the snow, which had been falling fast during the early part of the evening, had ceased, leaving the earth as fair to look upon as the fleece-drifted sky above it. Slowly the heavy banks of cloud rolled away, disclosing star after star, until the moon itself looked down, and sent a soft “Merry Christmas” to mankind. At last came the dawn, with a glorious burst of sunlight and church-bells and glad voices, ushering in the gladdest and dearest day of all the year.
The Brownlows were early astir, full of the joyous spirit of the day. There was a clamor of Christmas greetings, and a delighted medley of shouts from the children over the few simple gifts that had been secretly laid aside for them. But the ruling thought in every heart was the party. It was to come off at five o’clock in the afternoon, when it would be just dark enough to light the candles on the tree.
In spite of all the hard work of the preceding days, there was not a moment to spare that forenoon. The house, as the head of the family facetiously remarked, was a perfect hive of B’s.
As the appointed hour drew near, their nervousness increased. The children had been scrubbed from top to toe, and dressed in their very best clothes; Mrs. Brownlow wore a cap with lavender ribbons, which she had a misgiving were too gaudy for a person of her sedate years. Nor was the excitement confined to the interior of the house. Thetree was placed in the front parlor, close to the window, and by half-past four a dozen ragged children were gathered about the iron fence of the little front yard, gazing open-mouthed and open-eyed at the spectacular wonders within. At a quarter before five Mrs. Brownlow’s heart beat hard every time she heard a strange footstep in their quiet street. It was a little odd that none of the guests had arrived; but then, it was fashionable to be late!
Ten minutes more passed. Still no arrivals. It was evident that each was planning not to be the first to get there, and that they would all descend on the house and assault the door-bell at once. Mrs. Brownlow repeatedly smoothed the wrinkles out of her tidy apron, and Mr. Brownlow began to perspire with responsibility.
Meanwhile the crowd outside, recognizing no rigid bonds of etiquette, rapidly increased in numbers. Mr. Brownlow, to pass the time and please the poor little homeless creatures, lighted two of the candles.
The response from the front-yard fence was immediate. A low murmur of delight ran along the line, and several dull-eyed babies were hoisted, in the arms of babies scarcely older than themselves, to behold the rare vision of candles in a tree, just illumining the further splendors glistening here and there among the branches.
The kind man’s heart warmed towards them, and he lighted two more candles. The delight of the audience could now hardly be restrained, and thebabies, having been temporarily lowered by the aching little arms of their respective nurses, were shot up once more to view the redoubled grandeur.
The whole family had become so much interested in these small outcasts that they had not noticed the flight of time. Now some one glanced suddenly at the clock, and exclaimed, “It’s nearly half-past five!”
The Brownlows looked at one another blankly. Poor Mrs. Brownlow’s smart ribbons drooped in conscious abasement, while mortification and pride struggled in their wearer’s kindly face, over which, after a moment’s silence, one large tear slowly rolled, and dropped off.
Mr. Brownlow gave himself a little shake and sat down, as was his wont upon critical occasions. As his absent gaze wandered about the room, so prettily decked for the guests who didn’t come, it fell upon a little worn, gilt-edged volume on the table. At that sight, a new thought occurred to him. “Clarissy,” he said softly, going over to his wife and putting his arm around her, “Clarissy, seein’s the well-off folks haven’t accepted, don’t you think we’d better invite some of the others in?” And he pointed significantly toward the window.
Mrs. Brownlow, despatching another tear after the first, nodded. She was not quite equal to words yet. Being a woman, the neglect of her little party cut her even more deeply than it did her husband.
Mr. Brownlow stepped to the front door. Nay more, he walked down the short flight of steps, tookone little girl by the hand, and said in his pleasant, fatherly way,
“Wouldn’t you like to go in and look at the tree? Come, Puss” (to the waif at his side), “we’ll start first.”
With these words he led the way back through the open door, and into the warm, lighted room. The children hung back a little, but seeing that no harm came to the first guest, soon flocked in, each trying to keep behind all the rest, but at the same time shouldering the babies up into view as before.
In the delightful confusion that followed, the good hosts forgot all about the miscarriage of their plans. They completely outdid themselves, in efforts to please their hastily acquired company. Bob spoke a piece, the girls sang duets. Mrs. Brownlow had held every individual baby in her motherly arms before half an hour was over. And as for Mr. Brownlow, it was simply marvelous to see him go among those children, giving them the presents, and initiating their owners into the mysterious impelling forces of monkeys with yellow legs and gymnastic tendencies; filling the boys’ pockets with pop-corn, blowing horns and tin whistles; now assaulting the tree (it had been lighted throughout, and—bless it—how firm it stood now!) for fresh novelties, now diving into the kitchen and returning in an unspeakably cohesive state of breathlessness and molasses candy,—all the while laughing, talking, patting heads, joking, until the kindly Spirit of Christmas Presentwould have wept and smiled at once, for the pleasure of the sight.
“And now, my young friends,” said Mr. Brownlow, raising his voice, “we’ll have a little ice-cream in the back room. Ladies first, gentlemen afterward!” So saying, he gallantly stood on one side, with a sweep of his hand, to allow Mrs. Brownlow to precede him. But just as the words left his mouth there came a sharp ring at the door-bell.
“It’s a carriage!” gasped Mrs. Brownlow, flying to the front window, and backing precipitately. “Susie, go to that door an’ see who ’tis. Land sakes,whata mess this parlor’s in!” And she gazed with a true housekeeper’s dismay at the littered carpet and dripping candles.
“Deacon Holsum and Mrs. Hartwell, Pa!” announced Susie, throwing open the parlor door.
The lady thus mentioned came forward with outstretched hand. Catching a glimpse of Mrs. Brownlow’s embarrassed face she exclaimed quickly—
“Isn’t this splendid! Father and I were just driving past, and we saw your tree through the window, and couldn’t resist dropping in upon you. You won’t mind us, will you?”
“Mind—you!” repeated Mrs. Brownlow, in astonishment. “Why of course not—only you are so late—we didn’t expect”—
Mrs. Hartwell looked puzzled.
“Pardon me,—I don’t think I quite understand”—
“The invitation was for five, you know, ma’am.”
“But we received no invitation!”
Mr. Brownlow, who had greeted the deacon heartily and then listened with amazement to this conversation, now turned upon Bob, with a signally futile attempt at a withering glance.
Bob looked as puzzled as the rest, for a moment. Then his face fell, and he flushed to the roots of his hair.
“I—I—must have—forgot”—he stammered.
“Forgotten what?”
“The invitations—they’re in my desk now!”
Thus Bob, with utterly despairing tone and self-abasement.
Mrs. Hartwell’s silvery little laugh rang out—it was as near moonlight playing on the upper keys of an organ as anything you can imagine—and grasped Mrs. Brownlow’s hand.
“You poor dear!” she cried, kissing her hostess, who stood speechless, not knowing whether to laugh or cry, “so that’s why nobody came! But who has cluttered—who has been having such a good time here, then?”
Mr. Brownlow silently led the last two arrivals to the door of the next room, and pointed in. It was now the kind deacon’s turn to be touched.
“‘Into the highways’!” he murmured, as he looked upon the unwashed, hungry little circle about the table.
“I s’pose,” said Mr. Brownlow doubtfully, “they’d like to have you sit down with ’em, just ’s if they were folks—if you didn’t mind?”
Mind! I wish you could have seen the rich furs and overcoat come off and go down on the floor in a heap, before Polly could catch them!
When they were all seated, Mr. Brownlow looked over to the deacon, and he asked a blessing on the little ones gathered there. “Thy servants, the masters of this house, have suffered them to come unto thee,” he said in his prayer. “Wilt thou take them into thine arms, O Father of lights, and bless them!”
A momentary hush followed, and then the fun began again. Sweetly and swiftly kind words flew back and forth across the table, each one carrying its own golden thread and weaving the hearts of poor and rich into the one fine fabric of brotherhood and humanity they were meant to form.
Outside, the snow began to fall once more, each crystaled flake whispering softly as it touched the earth that Christmas night, “Peace—peace!”
A railroad station in a large city is hardly an inviting spot, at its best; but at the close of a cold, cheerless, blustering December day, when biting draughts of wind come scurrying in at every open door, filling the air with a gray compound of dust and fine snow; when passengers tramp up and down the long platform, waiting impatiently for their trains; when newsboys wander about with disconsolate, red faces, hands in pockets and bundles of unsold papers under their ragged and shivering arms; when, in general, humankind presents itself as altogether a frozen, forlorn, discouraged and hopeless race, condemned to be swept about on the nipping, dusty wind, like Francesca and her lover, at the rate of thirty miles an hour—then the station becomes positively unendurable.
So thought Bob Estabrook, as he paced to andfro in the Boston and Albany depot, traveling-bag in hand, on just such a night as I have described. Beside him locomotives puffed and plunged and backed on the shining rails, as if they, too, felt compelled to trot up and down to keep themselves warm, and in even tolerably good humor.
“Just my luck!” growled Bob, with a misanthropic glare at a loud-voiced family who were passing; “Christmas coming, two jolly Brighton parties and an oratorio thrown up, and here am I, fired off to San Francisco. So much for being junior member of a law firm. Wonder what”—
Here the ruffled current of his meditations ran plump against a rock, and as suddenly diverged from their former course. The rock was no less than a young person who at that moment approached, with a gray-haired man, and inquired the way to the ticket-office.
Bob politely gave them the desired information, and watched them with growing interest as they followed his directions, and stood before the lighted window. The two silhouettes were decidedly out of the common. The voice, whose delicate tones still lingered pleasantly about Mr. Robert Estabrook’s fastidious ears, was an individual voice, as distinguishable from any other he remembered as was the owner’s bright face, the little fur collar beneath it, the daintily-gloved hands, and the pretty brown traveling suit.
“Dignified old fellow!” mused Bob, irrelevantly as the couple moved toward the train-gates. “Probablyher father. Perhaps—hallo, by George, they’re going on my car!”
With which breath of summer in his winter of discontent the young man proceeded to finish his cigar, consult his watch, and, as the last warning bell rang, step upon the platform of the already moving Pullman. It must be admitted that as he entered he gave an expectant glance down the aisle of the car; but the somber curtains hanging from ceiling to floor told no tales. Too sleepy to speculate, and too learned in the marvelous acoustic properties of a sleeping-car to engage the porter in conversation on the subject, he found his berth, arranged himself for the night with the nonchalance of an old traveler, and, laying his head upon his vibrating atom of a pillow, was soon plunged into a dream at least fifty miles long.
It was snowing, and snowing hard. Moreover, it had been snowing all night, and all the afternoon before. The wind rioted furiously over the broad Missouri plains, alternately building up huge castles of snow and throwing them down again like a fretful child; overtaking the belated teamster on his homeward journey, clutching him with its icy hand, and leaving him buried in a tomb more spotless than the fairest marble; howling, shrieking, racing madly to and fro, never out of breath, always the same tireless, pitiless, awful power. Rocks, fields, sometimes even forests were blotted out of the landscape. A mere hyphen upon the broad, white page, lay the Western-bound train. The fires in the locomotives (there were two of them), had been suffered to go out, and the great creatures waited silently together, left alone in the storm, while the snow drifted higher and higher upon their patient backs.
When Bob had waked that morning to find the tempest more furious than ever and the train stuck fast in a huge snow-bank, his first thought was of dismay at the possible detention in the narrow limits of the Pullman, which seemed much colder than it had before; his next was to wonder how the change of fortune would affect Gertrude Raymond. Of course he had long ago become acquainted with the brown traveling suit and fur collar. Of course there had been numberless little services for him to perform for her and the old gentleman, who had indeed proved to be her father. Bob had already begun to dread the end of the journey. He had gone to his berth the night before, wishing that San Francisco were ten days from Boston, instead of six. Providence having taken him at his word, and indicated that the journey would be of at least that duration, if not more, he was disposed, like no few of his fellow-mortals, to grumble.
Once more he became misanthropic. “There’s Miss Raymond, now,” he growled to himself, knocking his head savagely against the upper berth in his attempt to look out through the frosty pane,“sitting over across the aisle day after day with her kid gloves, and all that. Nice enough, of course,” recalling one or two spirited conversations where hours had slipped by like minutes, “but confoundedly useless, like the rest of ’em. If she were like mother, now, there’d be no trouble. She’d take care of herself. But as it is, the whole car will be turned upside down for her to-day, for fear she’ll freeze, or starve, or spoil her complexion, or something.”
Here Bob turned an extremely cold shoulder on the window, and having performed a sort of horizontal toilet, emerged from his berth, his hair on end, and his face expressive of utter defiance to the world in general, and contempt of fashionable young ladies in particular.
At that moment Miss Raymond appeared in the aisle, sweet and rosy as a June morning, her cheeks glowing, and her eyes sparkling with fun.
“Good-morning, Mr. Estabrook,” she said demurely, settling the fur collar about her neck.
Bob endeavored to look dignified, and was conscious of failure.
“Good-mo-morning,” he replied with some stiffness, and a shiver which took him by surprise. Itwascold, jumping out of that warm berth.
“I understand we must stay—but don’t let me detain you,” she added with a sly glance at his hair.
Bob turned and marched off solemnly to the masculine end of the car, washed in ice-water, completed his toilet, and came back refreshed. Breakfast wasformally served as usual, and then a council of war was held. Conductor, engineers and brakemen being consulted, and inventories taken, it was found that while food was abundant, the stock of wood in the bins would not last till noon. There were twelve railroad men and thirty-five passengers on board, some twenty of the latter being immigrants in a second-class behind the two Pullmans.
The little company gathered in the snow-bound car looked blankly at each other, some of them instinctively drawing their wraps more tightly about their shoulders, as if they already felt the approaching chill.
It was miles to the nearest station in either direction. Above, below, on all sides, was the white blur of tumultuous, wind-lashed snow.
The silence was broken pleasantly. Once more Bob felt the power of those clear, sweet tones.
“The men must make up a party to hunt for wood,” she said. “While you’re gone, we women will do what we can for those who are left.”
The necessity for immediate action was evident, and without further words the council broke up, to obey her suggestion.
A dozen men, looking like amateur Esquimaux, and floundering up to their armpits at the first step, started off through the drifts. One of the train-men, who knew the line of the road thoroughly, was sure they must be near a certain clump of trees where plenty of wood could be obtained. Taking the precaution to move in single line, one of the engineers,a broad-shouldered six-footer, leading the way, and steering by compass, they were soon out of sight. As they struck off at right angles to the track, Bob thought he recognized a face pressed close to the pane and watching them anxiously; but he could not be sure.
Two hours later the men appeared once more, some staggering under huge logs, some with axes, some with bundles of lighter boughs for kindling. In another five minutes smoke was going up cheerily from the whole line of cars; for the trees had proved to be less than a quarter of a mile distant, and the supply would be plentiful before night.
When Bob Estabrook stamped into his own car, hugging up a big armful of wood, he was a different looking fellow from the trim young lawyer who was wont to stand before the jury seats in the Boston Court House. He had on a pair of immense blue yarn mittens, loaned by a kindly brakeman, his face was scratched with refractory twigs, his eyebrows were frosted, his mustache an icy caret, two fingertips frozen, and with all this, he looked and felt more manly than ever before in his life.
His eye roved through the length of the car as it had that first night in the depot. She was not there. He was as anxious as a boy for her praise.
“Guess I’ll take it into the next car,” he said apologetically to the nearest passenger; “there’s more coming, just behind.”
She was not in the second Pullman. Of course she wasn’t in the baggage-car. Was it possible—?He entered the third and last car, recoiling just a bit at the odor of crowded and unclean poverty which met him at the door.
Sure enough, there she sat—his idle, fashionable type of inutility—with one frowsy child upon the seat beside her, two very rumpled-looking boys in front, and in her arms a baby with terra-cotta hair. Somehow, the baby’s hair against the fur collar didn’t look so badly as you would expect, either. She seemed to be singing it to sleep, and kept on with her soft crooning as she glanced up over its tangled red locks at snowy Bob and his armful of wood, with a look in her eyes that would have sent him cheerfully to Alaska for more, had there been need.
With the comfortable heat of the fires, the kind offices of nearly all the well-dressed people to the poorer ones—for they were not slow, these kid-gloved Pullman passengers, to follow Miss Raymond’s example—the day wore on quietly and not unpleasantly toward its close. Then some one suddenly remembered that it was Christmas Eve.
“Dear me!” cried Miss Raymond, delightedly, reaching round the baby to clap her hands; “let’s have a Christmas party!”
A few sighed and shook their heads, as they thought of their own home firesides; one or twosmiled indulgently on the small enthusiast; several chimed in at once. Conductor and baggage-master were consulted, and the spacious baggage-car “specially engaged for the occasion,” the originator of the scheme triumphantly announced. Preparations commenced without delay. All the young people put their heads together in one corner, and many were the explosions of laughter as the programme grew. Trunks were visited by their owners and small articles abstracted therefrom to serve as gifts for the immigrants and train-men, to whose particular entertainment the evening was by common consent to be devoted.
Just as the lamps were lighted in the train, our hero, who had disappeared early in the afternoon, returned dragging after him a small, stunted pine tree, which seemed to have strayed away from its native forests on purpose for the celebration. On being admitted to the grand hall, Bob further added to the decorations a few strings of a queer, mossy sort of evergreen. Hereupon a very young man with light eyebrows, who had hitherto been inconspicuous, suddenly appeared from the depths of a battered trunk, over the edge of which he had for some time been bent like a siphon, and with a beaming face produced a box of veritable, tiny wax candles! He was “on the road,” he explained, for a large wholesale toy-shop, and these were samples. He guessed he could make it all right with the firm.
Of course the affair was a great success. I have no space to tell of the sheltered walk that Bob constructedof rugs, from car to car; of the beautified interior of the old baggage-car, draped with shawls and brightened with bits of ribbon; of the mute wonder of the poor immigrants, a number of whom had just arrived from Germany, and could not speak a word of English; of their unbounded delight when the glistening tree was disclosed, and the cries of “Weihnachtsbaum! Weihnachtsbaum!” from their rumpled children, whose faces waked into a glow of blissful recollection at the sight. Ah! if you could have seen the pretty gifts; the brave little pine (which all the managers agreed couldn’t possibly have been used had it been an inch taller); the improvised tableaux, wherein Bob successively personated an organ-grinder, a pug dog, and Hamlet, amid thunders of applause from the brakemen and engineers! Then the passengers sang a simple Christmas carol, Miss Raymond leading with her pure soprano, and Bob chiming in like the diapason of an organ.
Just as the last words died away a sudden hush came over the audience. Could it be an illusion, or did they hear the muffled but sweet notes of a church bell faintly sounding without? Tears came into the eyes of some of the roughest of the immigrants as they listened, and thought of a wee belfry somewhere in the Fatherland, where the Christmas bells were calling to prayers that night. The sound of the bells ceased, and the merriment went on, while the young man with eyebrows lighter than ever, but with radiant face, let himself quietly into thecar unnoticed. It had been his own thought to creep out into the storm, clear away the snow from the nearest locomotive bell, and ring it while the gayety was at its height.
All this indeed there was, and more; but to Bob, the joy and sweetness of the evening centered in one bright face. What mattered it if the wind roared and moaned about the lonely, snow-drifted train, while he could look into those brown eyes and listen to that voice for whose every tone he was fast learning to watch? Truly, it was a wonderful evening altogether.
Well, the blockade was raised, and the long railroad trip finished at last. But two of its passengers, at least, have agreed to enter upon a still longer journey.
She says it all began when he came staggering in with his armful of wood and his blue mittens; and he? he doesn’t care at all when it began. He only realizes the joy that has come to him, and believes that after a certain day next May it will be Christmas for him all the year round.
Everybody in that part of the city knew Old Claus; that is, they knew him by sight; very few had ever spoken to him or heard his voice. The grocer and the provision man, and one or two others said he was civil enough to them, that his name was Jonathan R. Claus, spelt with au, not aw, and that he paid his bills promptly. That was about all anybody knew of him.
What a surly, grim old man he was, as you met him on a cold winter’s afternoon on his way home from his marketing; his long white hair and beard blowing about his head, his forehead puckered into a frown, his stout cane striking the pavements as if he hated the very earth he walked on!
Grown people gave him the width of the sidewalk; children shouted after him,
“Old Claus,Show your claws!”
“Old Claus,Show your claws!”
“Old Claus,
Show your claws!”
and then dodged around the corner in terror, althoughhe had never been known to punish or even chide one of them, save by a dark look from beneath his shaggy eyebrows. Ah, a gloomy, silent, mysterious fellow he was, to be sure; and many a mother in that neighborhood frightened her child into good behavior by threatening to call in Old Claus.
One cold December evening, when the twilight had fallen early, hastened by leaden skies and a few shivering flakes of snow, he sat in his own room, solitary as usual, and even more than usually grim, for he was thinking over his past.
Now, thinking over one’s past may be a very cheerful occupation or a very gloomy one. Old Claus undoubtedly found his full of shadows.
He remembered how he was left an orphan, when still a small boy; how he had suffered from cold and want, and had been buffeted and scolded and ill-used, until he ran away from the people who had taken charge of him (he had no home nor friends); how he had worked hard, had saved his money, and had become a very rich man.
Still he had longed to be richer, and, retiring from regular business, he had gone far away to search for a sunken treasure in tropical seas. He had failed to find it, but more eager than ever, he mined for gold, without success. Again, it was the buried hoard of a pirate which attracted him; but months of fruitless labor had been thrown away in a vain attempt to discover exactly where it lay. So he had spent his years, always in search of a Treasure, which had become the ruling idea of his life;always disappointed; until, embittered, discouraged and alone in the world, though still rich, he had given up the pursuit.
The home he had chosen was as strange as the life he had lived; a huge, old-fashioned house, which had once been occupied by a wealthy family, but had long lain empty, save for the rats that scampered through its wide halls and gloomy chambers, and the spiders that spun their webs unhindered across the blurred window-panes.
The city had grown up about the house, and it was now part of a brick block. Indeed, one wing of the ancient building formed a portion of the tenement house next door, where it seemed as if men wrangled and staggered, and ragged women scolded and wept, and children cried from hunger and cold, all night long. But the walls were very thick, and the occupant of the lonely chamber heard them not.
“Christmas Eve,” muttered Old Claus to himself. “I heard them say it in the streets. Merry Christmas! merry, merry Christmas!” he repeated bitterly. “Right merry for me. What a wretched, useless failure of a wreck I am!”
As he spoke he stamped his foot angrily upon the floor. There was a crash in the room behind him. Looking over his shoulder, he found that a large picture, an old portrait, the frame of which had been built into the wall and alone remained of the former splendor of the mansion, lay face downward upon the floor. Jarred by his heavy footfall, thedecaying woodwork had at last given way, and let the canvas drop.
Claus’ glance wandered to the wall where it had been fastened. Then he started to his feet, the old fire returning to his eyes. In place of the picture was an opening, with a deep space beyond. He raised himself on tiptoe, and saw what appeared to be the top of a flight of steps, built into the thickness of the wall, and leading downward.
“Treasure at last!” he stammered, gazing greedily at the dusty steps, down which a huge rat scrambled, squeaking. “Treasure at last! I knew luck would turn! After all these years! It is mine, it is mine!”
Hastening to the mantel, he took down a small lamp, lighted it with trembling fingers, and dragging a chair to the wall beneath the aperture, climbed up to and into it. Yes, it was plainly a stone flight of steps. What bags of gold must lie at the bottom of that long-hidden passage?
He tested the stairway cautiously with his foot, and, finding it apparently secure, slowly descended, the space being barely wide enough for him to squeeze through.
Eight, nine, ten steps down. Then a sharp turn to the right! two more steps, and he emerged from the narrow passage into what once must have been a huge fireplace, having a hidden door in one side, some freak of the ancient builders, to allow a person to pass from one portion of the old house to the other without detection.
As Claus glanced about him his heart sank. There was no sign of a treasure. The chimney overhead had been stopped with stone slabs, and the original opening of the fireplace was closed by a wooden partition, one panel of which was hinged and bolted so as to form a small door. Doubtless the people in the next house were ignorant of this, and, probably, of the existence of the fireplace itself.
It was very cold, and the disappointed man shivered as he prepared to retrace his steps to his own quarters. Suddenly he heard a noise in the room beyond the fireboard. It was the sound of a child sobbing quietly to itself. In another moment a heavy, drunken step sounded on the bare floor.
“Are ye goin’ to stop cryin’, Moll, or will I give ye the stick agin?” demanded a woman’s harsh voice. “What’s the matter now?”
“I won’t—any—more,” he could hear the child answer. “I don’t—mean to. Only I was thinkin’ it was Christmas to-morrow, and I wouldn’t—get anything,—mother used to”—
“Stop that!” warningly.
It was evidently hard work to control the sobs, now. Old Claus clenched his fist, and resolved that if he heard the sound of a blow, that fireboard would go down.
There was silence for a minute. Then the woman staggered off, muttering: “Don’t let me hear any more from ye the night. Go to sleep, d’ ye hear? You must be off with yer basket agin in the mornin’.”
Five minutes later a singular sight might have been seen in front of the big house. It was nothing less than Old Claus himself, clad in his shaggy fur coat, setting forth through the darkness and snow, which was now falling fast.
Past liquor saloons ablaze with light and hung, alas! with holly and mistletoe; past the little Mission Church at the corner, where he lingered an instant to catch the notes of a glad Christmas carol; away from the wretched and squalid quarter of the city he marched, halting only when he reached a toy-shop, where there were multitudes of talking dolls and barking dogs and mewing cats and bleating sheep; where people tumbled over each other in their eagerness to buy, and blew into all the toy horns and jingled all the toy pianos and laughed from the pure joy of Christmastide, like God’s own little children.
It was a good half hour again before Old Claus dismissed at his own door the boy who had helped him bring home his bundles from that blessed toy-shop. The boy went off whistling, too, with a bright new silver dollar in his pocket.
It took the old man three trips to get his purchases down that secret stairway. I don’t know how he ever got the sled through anyway; nor the big doll with eyes that winked upside down, nor the sheep, nearly life-size, whichbaa-ed loudly in the passage; and the tricycle was the worst of all; but he did it and landed them safely in the old fireplace, which surely never contained such preciousfuel before. Why, the very smell of the toys, a delicious painty, gluey, varnishy, woolly, sawdusty smell, was enough to set you wild with delight. It brought to Old Claus some dim remembrance of his childhood, and made him pause to wipe away a tear with his shaggy sleeve. For all this time he was in fur coat and cap, with snow lying thick upon them.
Now came the trying moment. Could he open that long-disused door without waking the child, who now was evidently sleeping soundly?
Dear old door—I believe it knew, as well as you do, what was wanted of it. Never a squeak it gave, as Claus, with infinite pains, drew back the rusty bolt and softly opened it.
He stepped inside the room, shading the lamp with his hand. It was a very small room indeed, with great holes in the bare plastering, and a broken pane of glass through which the keen wind was blowing. The room was even colder than the fireplace.
In one corner was a small bed, and in it lay a little girl of perhaps six years, her tangled hair scattered over the bundle of ragged clothes—evidently her own poor little gown—that served for a pillow; the dingy counterpane drawn tightly up around her neck to keep out the bitter cold. There was a broken chair and wooden table in the room besides; nothing else.
From the back of the chair, which was propped against the wall close by the bed, hung one small stocking; so small that it seemed better fitted for adoll than a living human child; only no self-respecting doll would have worn a stocking so ragged.
The old man set down his lamp and tiptoed back to the fireplace. He took out the toys one by one, and placed them on the floor. He filled the poor little stocking with candy; the first package of which came near betraying him by falling directly through a large hole in the heel. Luckily he caught it before it reached the floor, and squeezed in a good-sized rubber ball to replace it.
Last of all he took up the sheep, with a sigh of relief at his success in depositing all his gifts in the room without disturbing the small sleeper.
But alas for human calculations! In his excitement he gave that dreadful sheep an unlucky squeeze, and without the slightest warning it gave utterance to another prolongedbaa-a-a!even louder than before.
The child opened her eyes wide and sat up in bed. There stood, in front of a new and cavernous fireplace in the wall, an old man with shaggy coat and cap, and flowing white beard, his stooping back sprinkled with snow, with a lamb in his arms, and surrounded with such a glory of toys as she had never dreamed of in her little starved life.
One moment only she gazed; then leaped from her bed and sprang into his arms, crying: “O Santa Claus! Santa Claus! Have you come! Oh, take me away with you, do, do!”
At the child’s first cry of “Santa Claus!” the old man stood stupefied, shaking his head and muttering“Jonathan R.”; but when she came flying to him, he caught her up in his arms, wrapping his great fur coat about her and holding them close to his heart—God’s little lamb and the woolly one—without a word.
Before he could fairly collect his wits, he heard that heavy, irregular footfall coming up the stairs.
He had only one thought—to save the child. Backing hastily into the fireplace he closed and bolted the door behind him, groped his way up the stone steps, and sat down in front of his own fire, breathless, with his new-found treasure still in his arms. The faint sound of a cry came up from the room below, but whether it was of terror, or delight at finding such extraordinary personal property miraculously substituted for the late occupant, he could not tell.
The light of the fire, on which Claus had thrown fresh fuel, shone upon the child face upraised to his.
“What is your name, little one?” he asked in tones he hardly recognized as his own.
They called her Moll, she said, but that was not her real name, which she had forgotten.
“How would you like to be called ‘Agnes’?” said Claus, his old eyes growing misty over some long-buried memory.
“Oh, that’s a nice name, Santa Claus! And I’msosleepy!”