"'TWELVE CAKES TO THE WIDOW M'CARTY!'"
The Misfit Christmas Puddings
WIDOW M'CARTY'S ABODE TEN-O'CLOCK ON CHRISTMAS EVE
GREATis the mission of the plum pudding to elevate and refine. Poor Mrs. M'Carty, who had been too tired even to throw a stick at the Dooleys, and had meant only to wait for the return of the children to seek her much-shared bed, now began to bethink herself of active preparations for the unexpected festivities of the morrow.
The fire was encouraged to bestir itself, a kettle of water was put on to heat, and pails and scrubbing-brush were brought from the lean-to.
At this juncture the returned sightseers burst into the room, Katy and Norah both talking at once. Terence and Denny were not far behind in their utterances, and though perhaps more coherent, were certainly not less enthusiastic. It was well that the eloquenceof tongues spoke in their wonder-filled eyes, for otherwise no mere mortal could have interpreted the steadily rising tones and varied inflections which were excitedly mingled in a Babel of sounds.
The scraping of snow and the confusion attendant upon their sudden entrance filled Mrs. M'Carty with new alarm, but she collected her wits enough to whisper with desperate vehemence, while she waved her scrubbing-cloth wildly:
"Whist now, will you, and mind that I don't hear another word out of your heads, or you'll be waking up Granny, for upon my soul, her eyes ain't been shut more than this blessed two minutes. I hope to goodness you won't be disturbing her, for I be just going to do up her cap for the Christmas. Now off with yourselves to bed, and not another word out of your heads to-night, till to-morrow. Och, Katy dear! What would you be telling me that for again? Sure you've repeated itthree times, not counting the twice of Terence's. Now, now, boys, will you mind your mother, and go to bed like good children, and be getting up bright and early with Christmas morning faces on you?"
The boys obeyed and were soon deep in dreams in which "cops" were selling newspapers out in the cold, and newsboys were in Huyler's warming their feet while ladies in fluffy furs treated them to candy and ice-cream.
The widow bestowed a grateful look on the two lads asleep in the bunk which had been built in the little jog between the kitchen and lean-to. Then she tiptoed past them into the inner room where she found Katy and Norah whispering excitedly and with no prospect of cessation until their mother's voice reminded them of their promise to be quiet.
"Now, child of grace, get into the bed," she said to Katy, "and don't be keepingyourselves awake till the morning, and don't be forgetting to say your prayers."
Mrs. M'Carty slipped back to the kitchen, where Grandad sat dozing in his one-armed rocking-chair, and immediately began to busy herself with fresh energy.
"Off with your shirt, Grandad," she said, cheerfully, as the old man gave a sleepy jerk to his head. "It's the best one you have, and I'll wash it out in a minute and iron it to-night. You can wrap that old shawl aboutyou, and while your shirt's a-soaking, I'll give you a brush over with a bit of soap and water, for it'll be that lively in the morning, there'll never be the bit of a chance, at all; and I'm not one to leave till the proper time them things I've the opportunity of doing now."
The shirt being consigned to the soaking process, Bridget next attacked her father. When his ablutions were finished, she pinned a shawl around his shoulders, and moved his chair nearer the fire. With his cheeks glowing from their recent administration of soap and water, Grandad watched the washing and starching of his blue gingham shirt, thinking the while of its stiffness, which would encase him on the morrow, but at the same time regarding it as one of those trials to be borne without complaint.
Mrs. M'Carty hung the shirt close to the fire to dry, while she "scrubbed thot strip in front of the sthove;" then she left the strip,"bekase," as she said in her state of bewilderment and joy, "Oi musht do the shirt whiles the irons is hot, an' it do beat all how fasht thim irons does het oop whin ye ain't waitin' on thim." So, getting up from her knees, and leaving a good-sized puddle for future attention, she proceeded to pound the iron on Grandad's shirt and one neck-cloth, turning now and then to the sweet-tempered old man, who sat smiling at her as she bustled to and fro.
"Ye'll be that fine to-morrow," said Bridget, "that you'll not be after knowing yourself, sure. And your hair will be combed that smooth, you'll look ten years younger. It does be, I mind, it's the hair that adds the years to your life."
Grandad Rafferty, his spirits undepressed by what sufferings the ordeal of starch and comb might have in store for him, tapped his empty pipe on the edge of the stove and responded softly,—
"'Tis ye, Biddy M'Carty, would hearten up a ghost, so ye would."
"It's a quare way ye have of jabberin' all through the night that a body can't get a wink of slape," came the querulous tones of Granny from her pallet in the farther corner of the inner room. "An' it's that cold in here—an' why in the world do ye be burnin' the fire in the night an' wasthin' the wood, an' we'll be sittin' 'round freezin' to-morra with no fire at all,—so we will."
For a moment Bridget's spirits fell, but the next instant they rose again.
"Wait a bit, now, Granny, and I'll be bringing you a warm iron to your feet, and before you know it you'll be dreaming of the smell of fresh peat coming in the door."
"Dhramin' is it, Oi'd be?" growled Granny, and in a moment more her cane was heard thumping vigorously on the floor. Bridget and Grandad had scarcely more than time to exchange a sympathetic glancewhen Granny appeared with her red flannel petticoat over her nightgown and a black and white shawl wrapped around her shoulders. She came hobbling in, sniffing the sudsy moisture and complaining:
"'IT'S MORE ROOMETIZ FOR ME, SO IT IS'"
"It's more roometiz for me, so it is.—Begorra, but it's piercin' cold in there.—It'syou that has the comfortable spot, Misther Rafferty. It do be that draughty when yer comin' through this way," and thus speaking her mind on a few points, Granny made her way slowly to her chair and seated herself in it.
Meantime Bridget was quietly raising geysers of suds in her endeavors to conceal the luckless cap.
"Bridget M'Carty," demanded Granny, "what on earth do ye be workin' at there that ye be puttin' out me eyes fairly, with splashin' soapsuds in them? Is it my cap yer sousin' up and down, now? Indade, then, and it is, an' me just wantin' it. No wonder I'll be gettin' more pain in my bones, with the wind blowin' like a penethratin' blast through the windy, an' me with no cap, an' ye kapin' yerself warm be exercisin'."
"Och, now, Granny," said Bridget, hoping to pacify her, "sure I thought it would be a grand surprise for you when you wokein the morning, to see them tie-ends hanging before your eyes all starched up, that Miss Barney's mother might just be envying you."
"Envyin' me, would she?" replied Granny. "Like enough 'twill not be dry by mornin' at all, an' whin I do put it on, I'll be gettin' that pain in me head agin."
Grandad's conciliatory remark was never heard, for Granny's mutterings continued while her patient daughter-in-law starched and ironed the cap. When it was finished and hung by the fire to air, Bridget, with a weary smile, turned to her father.
"Come now, Daddy," she said, "you'll not be wanting to get up if you don't be getting to your bed soon."
"Well, thin, if ye're meanin' to put the light out in me face, I'll go back to my bed before ye do," snapped Granny, and so she went.
When Grandad had been snugly tucked into his cot in the kitchen, and the pails andmops put out of sight, Bridget lay down to a well-earned sleep and dreamed that the fairies were pelting her with puddings, every third one of which fell into her mouth and was swallowed whole.
The Misfit Christmas Puddings
HERR BAUMGÄRTNER'S ESTABLISHMENT CHRISTMAS DAY
HERRBaumgärtner's first impulse, on finding out what had become of his Christmas puddings, was to send at once to the Widow M'Carty's and have them returned to him. Had it not been for the lateness of the hour, doubtless this is what would have happened.
But the night brings counsel, even in the matter of plum puddings, and by morning the baker had concluded that it was wiser to let the unlucky gifts remain in their misfit quarters. Perhaps Katrina's remark, that his customers would be wroth if they found they had eaten puddings that had been stored for a night, even, in so well-inhabited an abode, influenced his decision.
However that may be, the baker said to Katrina as he sat down to his breakfast:
"Vell, Katrina, if we haf given somedingsaway in the wrong place, we will not now take it back. But Katrina, dose beautiful puddings, and dose M'Cartys! ach! ach!" and he shook his head sorrowfully at the thought that these culinary triumphs should have fallen to those so incapable of appreciating a wonderful Baumgärtner plum pudding.
In the eyes of the baker, to give twelve Christmas puddings to the M'Cartys was indeed to cast one's pearls before swine.
Herr Baumgärtner could not remain out of sorts for any length of time, and when he found by his plate a gift from his beloved Katrina of a long meerschaum pipe from the Fatherland, he smiled and said:
"Ven I smokes dat pipe den I forget dose plum puddings."
The pipe, indeed, performed a placatory mission, for as the first rings of its smoke curled upward, it became a veritable pipe of peace.
Later the baker and Katrina attended church together, and at the close of the service Herr Baumgärtner left his daughter and wended his way to the bakery.
He tarried in front of the window occupied by the Christmas tree, whose gaily trimmed branches recalled to him so vividly the years when his little Fritz had furnished the joy and merriment of the holiday season. How the wee baby had bounded,—almost out of his mother's arms,—at sight of his first tree! Now the baker had only Katrina to cheer him, while he, in turn, wasdevoted to his daughter. His present errand to the bakery was to get some of her favorite Marzipan for their Christmas dinner, it having slipped his mind the night before in the distraction of the pudding calamity.
As he unlocked the door and entered the store, almost the first object to claim his attention was the last Christmas pudding "left standing alone; all its nut-brown companions labelled and gone." None of his clerks had dared to risk his position by meddling with that package. Herr Baumgärtner picked up the package, saying with a sigh, as he unwrapped it:
"Oh, well, you might as well go in the window and make a good show. Maybe I can sell you for New Year's day."
While the baker was busy arranging his wares to make room for the pudding, a man came sauntering slowly up the street, pausing as he came to the window. He was clad in a rough suit which here and there showedthe want of a prudent feminine stitch. The first glance showed him to be simply an honest Hibernian laborer. Further scrutiny disclosed the fact that he was a man who had passed through unusual experiences, for his bronzed face told of hardship and exposure. At each footfall he looked up imploringly at the passer-by, only to turn away with a sigh of disappointment. As he looked at the good things in the baker's window, he said to himself:
"Ah, my poor Bridget and the little ones are likely fasting, when they ought to be having the fill of the table. And myself looking every place for them till the feet of me is wore off entirely. The cottage is empty, and the priest is a new one, and can't tell me nothing. Mebbe they've gone to the old country, or mebbe they're all—" and here he shuddered and shut his lips tightly, for he would not admit the worst.
"Be jabers," his thoughts taking on anew turn, as he caught sight of a pudding being placed in the window before him, "if I could just find them, wouldn't I make the mouths of them water with that pudding. Like enough Patsy and Maggie and Norah and Katy ain't had a bite to eat of anything decent these six months. Heaven bless the spalpeens, how they would fall on that pudding! And me darling Biddy, bedad, ain't tasted one since she was living with the Church of Ireland minister in Limerick. And here I be, with money enough to buy them everything good, and not one out of them left to be buying for. Oh, well, I've no mind in me to eat myself, but I might as well step in and buy them two buns," and thereupon he entered the store.
The new customer did not look especially promising; still, the baker had known far shabbier individuals to invest a dollar, even, on a holiday, so he advanced with a smile and said:
"HIS GLANCE FELL UPON SOMETHING WHITE THAT LAY ON THE COUNTER"
"Vat can I do for you, my friend?"
Pointing to the large, well-sugared buns, the man began, "Give me two—" when his glance fell upon something white that lay on the counter,—that ubiquitous card that had wrought so much mischief; the card bearing the name and address of Mrs. Michael M'Carty.
"Vat's the matter mit you?" said the baker impatiently, anxious for him to complete his order.
"Oh, my God, what's this?" cried the man, snatching up the card.
"Dot? Vy, dat is one card to go mit one cake to the Widow M'Carty."
"Widdy, widdy, is it?" cried the man, angrily. "Sure the man that calls her that will answer to me for it. Why would she be a widdy, and me working and saving as a respectable husband should for her?"
"Wait awhile,—tell me,—was you Mr. Widow M'Carty?"
"Who would I be then, but Michael M'Carty? It's some of them blathering Barneys that's after calling me Bridget a widdy. Their lying tongues are all the time wagging with some scandal on a woman that hasn't a good strong man to protect her and the childers. But tell me quick, where are they, and are they alive, all alive?"
"I hear my Katrina speak about dem. But vere haf you been this long time? I t'ought you was drownded, already."
"Sure, 'twas meself thought so too, the whole of the night, and I wished I'd never stepped me foot on that old tub of aGo-Between, for it was the devil's own. When we got in Lake Superior, a storm came after us sudden, and we all went down together. I was in a hole of a place I had to slape in,—sure a dog couldn't close his eye in that corner,—and in the middle of the night, down they came hustling every one of usout. 'Say yer prayers,' says they, 'for we're a-goin' to the bottom, and the Lord help us. There's not one of yez will see yer darlints again.' The water was terrible boisterous, and grabbed everythin' off the decks. Faith, it wouldn't have been so bad if we'd a place left for the sole of our foot, but she was gone entirely. A board hit me and I hung on to it, and Pat Sweeny came up from down in the water and hung on with me, and the noises of that night I'll never be getting out of me head. When it come daylight we see the pilot-house a-floating, and we got on that, and Pat Sweeny waved his red handkerchief, and I tried to push us along with the board, to the land we see a long way off. In the middle of the morning, we spied a little boat coming to us, and may the blessed Virgin spare them two men in it as long as they live. It was a bare enough place we come to, but 'twas the land, and may I be struck dead if ever I take me two feet off it, for it's not thelikes of me will set foot on one of them traps of the devil again."
"Ach, Gott, das war wundervoll, wundervoll," said the baker, "but tell me vy you stayed so long away?"
"And what would the likes of me be doing with everything gone, but to be getting some money to come with? There were some copper mines there, and Pat and me went digging in the mines, and the engineer dying sudden-like with a fall down the shaft, it was me was there to be getting his job. I wrote Bridget as soon as ever I thought she would be looking for me coming home, and told her I wouldn't be there till I could earn some money to come by land, and what with the fine engineer wages I was getting, she needn't be expecting me till the end of the season. When I came home with me pile of money to give them all a grand Christmas, I found 'em lost on me, and I've looked every place these three days, and never asound of them have I heard till now, and God bless ye for the good words you're giving me this day.—Troth, now that I'm after finding them, I ought to be buying that grand pudding in the windy," and diving into his pocket, he produced a roll of bills.
"Nein, nein," said the baker, waving the money away, "dat pudding was not made to sell, it was made to gif away. You takes dat pudding to Mrs. M'Carty mit the gompliments of Herr Baumgärtner."
With a hearty Merry Christmas, Michael M'Carty hurried away with the pudding in one hand, and the card in the other. Herr Baumgärtner, taking his Marzipan, went home to tell Katrina the news, laughing over his Christmas joke, and chuckling to himself:
"Dat is vere dat pudding seems to belong!"
The Misfit Christmas Puddings
WIDOW M'CARTY'S ABODE CHRISTMAS DAY
MRS. M'CARTYrose early on Christmas morning, her mind bewildered by the fantastic visions of the night.
"Sure, them puddings was all a dream," she said to herself, as she kindled her fire, "and what's the good of such dreams as that, but just to make a body discouraged with the truth of the daytimes? But, any how, I'll look at where I dreamed I put them, and then my mind will be easy for me work."
More skeptical than hopeful, she went to the place where she had hidden them, and lo! to her great joy there they were,—twelve luscious, fruity puddings.
"And they're just bursting with richness, and begging to be ate," she said. "It'll be a grand day for the childer, and they shall have their fill, for it's many a long, hungryday they'll be seeing before another Christmas."
Breakfast was never a protracted function in the M'Carty household, but to Mrs. M'Carty, who was anxious to begin the festive preparations which the puddings had made possible, the scanty meal seemed unusually prolonged. Nothing but action could keep her from syndicating her secret before the proper moment, so while the repast was in progress, she hurried about doing, undoing, and doing over again, various household tasks. Finally Granny M'Carty, who had noticed Bridget's restlessness, exclaimed:
"Are ye crazy, then, Bridget M'Carty? It's the third time this day ye've spread me bed, and ye'll not lave a whole fither in me pillow with yer senseless beatin's."
"Well," said Mrs. M'Carty, ceasing from her labor, "if you're done with your breakfast, listen to me. Praise to the good SaintAntony, I found a ten-cent piece yesterday, I'd been saving that long I forgot I had it entirely, and with the help of Grandad's two lucky pennies he was never intending to spend,—may the saints spare him long to us,—I've a stick of candy apiece for the whole of you."
"'A STICK OF CANDY APIECE'"
"Hoorooh!" shouted all the little McCartys in chorus.
"Blessin's on the good Saint Antony!" said Grandad Rafferty, beaming on the excited children.
"Stop yer sphakin' with such a noise!" cried Granny. "Them racketin's would deafen the saints themselves, so they would."
"Then would them saints be getting ear-trumpets like Tim Barney's grandmother?" queried little Norah, climbing on the back of Granny's chair and peering over her shoulder.
"Go along with yez, an' don't be askin' such irriverent questions, an' kape yerself from the back of me chair, a-shakin' me roometiz all over me."
Bridget thumped on the table for quiet and proceeded to distribute the sticks of candy, each wrapped in a separate piece of paper. Grandad unrolled the paper and eyed his stick of candy lovingly.
"Troth, it's peppermint," he said, "an' there's nothin' like peppermint to comfort a body's stomick. It's that long since Itasted it, I'd clane forgot how it looked, bedad."
"Well, Bridget M'Carty," said Granny M'Carty, "It's ye that might have minded me health an' remembered that lemin with roometiz is like pourin' ile on fire. Ye must know, if ye have any sense,—which I misdoubt,—that roometiz hates lemin as bad as the devil hates holy wather," and she sniffed contemptuously.
"Never mind that, Granny," said Grandad. "Bridget rolled up them candy and never took note of the kinds, so there'd be no strivin' with the childers. I'll take yer lemin an' ye're welcome to me peppermint. 'Twill warm yer stomick an' yer feelin's, an' acushla machree, it's not so hard on the teeth ayther," and he surrendered his candy with a charming smile.
"Me teeth are as good as yours any day," retorted Granny, but she did not hesitate to make the exchange. However, she inspectedthe candy carefully and wiped it on the corner of her shawl before applying it to her mouth.
"Now, then," said Mrs. M'Carty, after the candy had disappeared, "listen while I do be telling you the order of the day. You boys, Denny and Terence, slip across to the pile of lumber handy on the tow-path, and bring me back three wide boards. We'll borry them for a table, and take them back when we're done. My family is all going to sit down to once to their Christmas dinner, the same as them rich folks do on the avenue. And there'll be a place for me poor Michael, that was and isn't. Run along now, boys, and pick clean ones, and you, Katy and Norah, wash the dishes, and when the table is fixed you can all go on the avenue and look in the windys, but mind you're home when the bells are ringing for twelve."
Their tasks were quickly finished, and eight little M'Cartys set off for their outing, two-year-oldPatsy being bestowed in a box nailed on an old sled, and drawn by the others in turn. Grandad Rafferty watched them until they were out of sight and sound.
"It's a fine time they'll be afther havin'," he said as he took little Ellen on his knee and settled himself comfortably in his chair,—or as comfortably as the unwonted stiffness of shirt and neckcloth would permit. Then he whispered a wonderful story to the baby, and though she could not understand a word, it served its purpose, for presently the little head nodded and the big blue eyes closed in slumber.
Granny M'Carty, who from the inner room had herself been observing the departure of her grandchildren toward the habitations of affluence, now returned to her seat by the fire.
"'Tis I would never let them childer go wanderin' off like that, with a chance of their never comin' home agin," she commented,"but annyhow it'll be sthill for a bit."
The children safely out of the way, Mrs. M'Carty began at once her arrangements for the feature of the day,—the Christmas dinner so bountifully provided with dessert.
She took from her chest her one linen table cloth, woven in a most elaborate design of shamrocks. Her husband had seen and admired the pattern, displayed in a shop window, one St. Patrick's Day, and it being in the first year of his marriage, when there was but Bridget to share his purse, he had bought the cloth and given it to her for a present. The occasions which had been deemed worthy so beautiful a table-cover, had been few and far removed, so the linen was "every bit as good as new."
"You're fine enough for the queen's use," said Mrs. M'Carty, apostrophizing the cloth as she spread it carefully on her improvised dining-table and smoothed its snowyfolds. "Sure, you're a trifle small for me big table, so I'll be putting you in the middle, and piecing you out at the two ends with me red and white Sunday table-cloths that ain't seen the daylight since we came to this sorry hole of a place, for it's not oilcloth that the M'Cartys shall be eating their dinner on this day."
The linen cloth being spread in the centre of the table and supplemented at either end with a "red Sunday table-cloth" of more prosperous days, Mrs. M'Carty took from the top shelf in the cupboard her "set of flowered dishes"—another early marital gift. Though cheap in quality, and the plates, cups, etc., in half-dozens instead of dozens, these dishes had been Mrs. M'Carty's special pride ever since Michael had proudly bestowed them upon her.
"Look, Biddy, me darlint," he had said. "I've brought you as grand a lot of dishes as ever I saw, and do you mind them posiesthey have? They're like the roses growing forninst Father Kelly's wall, where I used to meet you when you were Biddy Rafferty."
"Go along wid yer foolishness, Michael M'Carty," was Bridget's reply, but she had cherished the gift above all her other possessions, and like the table-cloth, the dishes were used but seldom.
"Bridget M'Carty!" cried Granny, when she saw Bridget setting out the dishes, "are ye usin' them dishes me poor b'y bought with his hard earnin's? I'd think ye'd more respect for Michael than to set out them fine plates to be broken by them careless haythins."
But Bridget assured Granny she would keep watch over the precious ware, and went on with her preparations as zealously as though she were preparing a banquet for noble folk. She had a small package of tea which had been given her by one of the conductors for whom she washed. He wasan Irish boy lately come from the old country, and Mrs. M'Carty's sympathy for his homesickness had won from him this Christmas remembrance. The tea was a most welcome gift, for her finances had not permitted her to buy this beverage for many days. She had not mentioned it, for she wished to have as many surprises as possible, for, thought she, "Surprises is about all they'll be getting."
Granny had followed her daughter-in-law's movements with a lofty, scornful look, but when she saw her take down the old brown teapot and give it a washing, she could not refrain from a question.
"Is it tay ye're afther havin'?" she asked, almost forgetting herself at the thought and speaking in an amiable tone.
"Yes, Granny, but I was intending it for a surprise."
"Wan time is as good as another for a surprise," said Granny. "If it's a good oneit gives a body somethin' pleasant to be thinkin' about, an' if it's a bad one, then the sooner ye're told the sooner ye do be gettin' over it."
The animated look in Granny's eyes showed that, in her opinion, this surprise was a good one, and Grandad Rafferty opened his eyes in astonishment when he heard her crooning a bit of the "Low-backed Car."
"It's the peppermint did it," said he to himself, "an' may the saints kape it lastin' till bedtime."
By noon the banqueting-hall of the M'Cartys presented a most festal appearance. The flowered dishes were displayed to the best advantage, and the red cotton table-cloths served the purpose of a color scheme. The baked apples adorned the centre of the table, flanked at either side by plates of bread. The oven door stood ajar, disclosing two dishes of steaming potatoes waiting tobe transferred to the table, and later to the plates and stomachs of the juvenile M'Cartys.
When the twelve o'clock bells began to ring, Bridget poured the water over the tea and set the teapot over the fire, where the beverage immediately began boiling with a vigor that would have appalled an epicurean taste. Granny M'Carty was moved up to the centre of the table on one side, and Grandad Rafferty was installed opposite. Little Ellen, in the charge of her grandfather, immediately preëmpted a spoon, and in her enjoyment of the new plaything brought it down with a smart rap on one of the plates.
"I told yez ye'd be afther havin' ev'ry last one of them dishes broke," scolded Granny. "Ye're that extravagant with yer things, Bridget M'Carty, it's no wonder ye went an' lost yer husband. An' where's them childers that was to be comin' home at twilve? Sure they never do as they're bid unless the devil's afther them, an' ifthey're not here soon the tay will be sphoiled entirely," and she sniffed the air anxiously.
At this critical moment the door, true to its habit, sprung open, and the eight laughing, panting, ruddy M'Carty heirs and heiresses filled the little room to overflowing. Their wraps were thrown aside and they were about to make a grand rush for the table when Mrs. M'Carty interposed.
"Never in me life have I see worse manners since me eyes had the misfortune to rest on them Dooleys down the tow-path. You're patterns in manners when you're asleep, but where do you keep your decency daytimes? Go to the shed and show yourselves to the water and soap, and don't be keeping me dinner waiting long, either."
Bang, thump, splash, grunt, gurgle, constituted the sign audible of the little M'Cartys' cleansing. The hands and faces were polished, the comb hastily passed round, and in they trooped, this time more quietly, asif they had scrubbed off some of their boisterous spirits.
Norah had found a bit of holly, with which she adorned the dish of baked apples, while Terence, with much effort, pulled from his pocket a package wrapped in pink paper and laid it with an important air on Granny's plate.
"Merry Christmas, with a present for you, Granny," he said.
"What's that you've been buying?" said Mrs. M'Carty, "and you with no money to buy nothing with."
"I didn't buy it," said Terence.
"I'll not have anythin' to do with stholen stuff, ye wicked craytur," exclaimed Granny, pushing the offending package away from her.
"I didn't steal it, neither," said Terence, proudly. "I leave such works for them Dooleys," and he held his head aloft and went over by his mother.
"I believe you, Terence, my boy," said Mrs. M'Carty. "But wherever did you get it?"
"He axed for it," interposed Katy. "We were that cold, and when we came to a drug-store, Terence, says he, 'Let's slip in and get warm and smell all them perfoomery and things.' And the drug-store man says, 'What does we be wanting,' and Terence says, 'We just came in to get warm, but we'd buy something if we had the money.' 'What would you buy?' said the man, and Terence says, 'Perfoomery for my mother, and stuff to cure Granny's roometiz.' 'Is that all ye want?' says the man; 'then get your fingers warm and take these to your mother and Granny, with a merry Christmas.'"
"And here's your perfoomery," cried Terence, handing a smaller pink package to his mother, who exclaimed over it with delight.
"Sure, it's better than flowers, and farmore lasting," she said, "and it's glad I am you brought it."
"I can't read this writin' at all, at all. The sphellin' is too small for me eyes," said Granny, once more becoming the centre of interest.
Mrs. M'Carty took the bottle and read aloud the directions.
"And you're to take a teaspoonful after each meal," she concluded.
"Humph!" snorted Granny. "An' does that drug-store man lay out to furnish me with the meals? I'd like to be told that now. Me that hasn't had a decint bit since ye let me poor Michael go off and get drownded in the cold wather."
The clatter attendant on the seating of the children at the table prevented the latter part of Granny's speech from being heard. The smaller M'Cartys were placed either side of Grandad, the older ones being seated by Granny. The potatoes were transferredto the board, and Mrs. M'Carty, taking the little Ellen, sat down at the nominal foot of the table, opposite the empty place set in memory of her husband. For awhile naught was spoken save only the few occasional words necessary in asking for more food. Bridget sipped a little tea, but the sight of the vacant chair quite destroyed her appetite. She looked thin and care-worn, and very unlike the brave wife who with cheery words had sped her husband on his unlucky voyage.
When the children's appetites were somewhat appeased, their tongues began to fly as they recounted the morning adventures,—the sights, the sounds, and all the little incidents which had gone to make up a happy morning.
Finally Bridget rapped on the table for silence.
"Whist again every last one of you while I make a request. Terence, me lad, slip overto the wood-box and bring whatever you find there. It's for your Grandad."
Terence quickly obeyed, while the others looked on in eager expectance. He returned with a round package wrapped in tissue and lace-trimmed paper and set it before Grandad, who undid it with surprising alacrity.
"May the saints presarve us!" he exclaimed. "If it isn't as fine a puddin' as my old eyes ever see in me life."
"Me, me!" cried little Patsy, "me wants a puddin'."
"Yes, me little Patsy," said Grandad, "ye shall have a bite as soon as my knife can cut it. There now, sit down, all of yez, till I have a chance at it,"—for the children were crowding about the old man to get a glimpse of the beautiful pudding. But before his knife had so much as touched it, Bridget interposed.
"Hold a bit," she said. "Katy, darling,run to the shed and look under the wash-tub and bring the contents to Granny."
Katy fairly flew to the shed and returned bearing aloft a package which in size, shape, and wrappings was identical with that which had just been set before Grandad. Granny opened it, displaying the mate to Grandad's pudding.
"Whee, whee!" cried little Patsy. "Me wants it! Me wants it!"
But Bridget was ready with a third order.
"Norah, my jewel, you'll likely find something to your credit forninst the dishpan."
Norah lifted the dishpan and in a trice pudding number three was standing beside its predecessors.
"I'll bet yer, kids," said Terence, the ready spokesman, "there's a pudding for every last one of us. Let's get busy and hunt. Sure, I see something under the stove."
Mrs. M'Carty let them hunt. They preferred this, and the fun ran high as one pudding after another was discovered. The house, though so small, held more hiding-places than one would have supposed, and it was some time before the last pudding consented to be found. Mrs. M'Carty allowed each one to cut his pudding and eat a generous portion. To more fastidious palates, cold plum pudding without sauce might have seemed a doubtful luxury, but to the little M'Cartys, who never before had tasted the dainty, the plum puddings were a veritable "feast of Lucullus." Baby Ellen was givena crumb or two, and she goo-ed, and gurgled, and smiled on them all as if she thought herself the cause of all this festivity.
"MRS. M'CARTY LET THEM HUNT"
"Praise the blessid saints," said Grandad,"they didn't forget us this Christmas day, an' these are grand puddin's."
"Grand indade," replied Granny. "If Bridget M'Cartyhad said her prayers proper-like, it's other things besides puddin's she would have asked the saints for, but she's that foolish, she can't keep two words in her head to once. When she thinks puddin's, she just thinks puddin's, an' not aven the sauce, bedad.""Annyhow, Granny, ye must say it was fine puddin's she did be thinkin'.""Av course they're fine, but there's nothin' but puddin's, an' I have to ate them or be stharvin', I expect," and Granny helped herself to the third piece and passed her cup to Bridget to be filled the fourth time.While the puddings were being eaten Mrs. M'Carty told the tale of the mysterious presents. So dramatic was her exposition of the twelve knocks that had been the precursors of the twelve puddings that when, as she finished, there came a loud and emphatic knock at the door, Grandad Rafferty, his mind on Bridget's story, ejaculated:"Another puddin'!"
"Grand indade," replied Granny. "If Bridget M'Cartyhad said her prayers proper-like, it's other things besides puddin's she would have asked the saints for, but she's that foolish, she can't keep two words in her head to once. When she thinks puddin's, she just thinks puddin's, an' not aven the sauce, bedad."
"Annyhow, Granny, ye must say it was fine puddin's she did be thinkin'."
"Av course they're fine, but there's nothin' but puddin's, an' I have to ate them or be stharvin', I expect," and Granny helped herself to the third piece and passed her cup to Bridget to be filled the fourth time.
While the puddings were being eaten Mrs. M'Carty told the tale of the mysterious presents. So dramatic was her exposition of the twelve knocks that had been the precursors of the twelve puddings that when, as she finished, there came a loud and emphatic knock at the door, Grandad Rafferty, his mind on Bridget's story, ejaculated:
"Another puddin'!"
"'IT'S MY MICHAEL,—MY HEART OF THE WORLD'"
"Annuzzer puddin'!" lisped little Patsy.
"May the saints forgit to sind us another puddin'!" said Granny M'Carty.
Before any one had thought to open the door, it opened from without, and there stood, looking in at the group, a tall, haggard, weary man.
"Holy Virgin save us, it's Michael's ghost!" cried Granny, covering her face with her hands.
For a full minute the inmates of the shanty and the man at the door stared at each other. Then Mrs. M'Carty heard the one word:
"Bridget!"
It was enough. Quite forgetting little Ellen, who tumbled unceremoniously to the floor, Mrs. M'Carty sprang from her chair.
"It's no ghost! It's no ghost!" she cried, sobbing and laughing. "It's my Michael,—my heart of the world,—my Michael,—come back from the dead," and she threw herself into his arms.
Exclamations and explanations were now the order of the day. Mrs. M'Carty in her Christmas lavishness had used all of the tea, but she reheated the contents of the teapot and cut a slice of pudding for her husband, but Michael, established in his erstwhile empty place at the table, was too happy for either eating or drinking.
The dinner lasted as long as did that of any of "swelldom's four hundred," for one cannot relate in a few moments the happenings of months, nor can so wonderful a gift as that of Katrina Baumgärtner be passed over with a few words.
When the tale of the puddings was ended Michael, with a merry twinkle in his eye, said to Norah:
"Norah, my jewel, be lookin' outside the door there, and see what you can be after findin'."
Eight little M'Cartys ran to the door. A scramble, a noisy return, and downon the table descended the thirteenth pudding.
At dusk Granny M'Carty and Grandad Rafferty sat in their accustomed places by the fire. Baby Ellen was fast asleep in Grandad's arms. The children were out for a run in the fresh air, and Bridget and Michael were enjoying a few moments of happy converse together in the lean-to.
Grandad rocked gently to and fro, nodding and smiling to himself as if his thoughts were very pleasant company. The sight of his cheerful face, dimly seen by the small lamp, was too much for Granny.
"It's meself," she began, "as can sit here with never a soul to be shpakin' to me, an' ev'ry one of me bones and nerves achin' with the excitemint of this day; an' it's ye, Misther Rafferty, that can sit there grinnin' and noddin' like a crazy loon. It's them that has a fine consait of themselves that getsalong in this world, I mind. An' look at them puddin's,—"
"Puddin's? Puddin's?" said Grandad, rousing from his reverie and looking about as if he expected to see a second installment.
"Yes, puddin's!" mimicked Granny. "What's to be done with the leavin's of them thirteen puddin's, the unlucky things?"
"Mrs. M'Carty, don't be callin' them puddin's unlucky. Sure, 'twas the thirteenth puddin' that let Michael be findin' his lost family. Think no more of them. Remember yer Michael that couldn't sthay lost, an' it's because ye was so lucky to be namin' him afther the good saint. Saint Michael an' the old dragon, ye mind,—"
"An' is it meself ye're afther callin' an old dragon?" almost screamed Granny.
"Indade and indade, Mrs. M'Carty," began Grandad, regretting his unfortunate allusion to the dragon, and anxious to avert the impending tirade, "I'm not callin' yean old dragon, at all, at all. It's—it's yer roometiz I mane. Yes, sure, it's that is the old dragon, an' Michael will fight it for yez, an' I know he'll conquer it entirely, just as sure as I know there was luck in them thirteen puddin's. An' Granny," he went on, growing still more Utopian in his predictions, "ye'll soon be walkin' 'round gay as a cricket, with never an ache or a pain to be throublin' yez."
"Are ye sure of all that, Misther Rafferty?" asked Granny eagerly. Grandad had conjured up too blissful a vision for even her gloomy spirits to withstand.
"Sure? Av course I'm sure!" answered Grandad promptly, and pounded his chair with emphasis. "It's as good as done this minit, an' there's such good times comin' for all of us, it's not aven the quane we'll be envyin'."
Granny sat for a few moments in silence. Then she turned to Grandad.
"An' did ye mind, Misther Rafferty," she said with a little brightness, "did ye mind, I say, that Michael had the gold ring on his finger?"
"I did that," answered Grandad. "Me two eyes took sight of it as soon as ever he sthirred his hand, an' it was shinin' as bright as ever it was before he went an' got drownded. An' that's another sign of good times comin' for us. An' listen, Mrs. M'Carty, it's for yer Michael bein' ev'ry bit as good as gold himself, that them saints went to all the throuble of undrownding him an' bringin' him back to us that nades him."
And for once Granny smilingly agreed.
THE END.