In Which High Voltage Develops in the Conversation
It was a warm, bright May day. There was not a cloud in the sky. Roger Delane had arrived and the Bings were giving a dinner that evening. The best people of Hazelmead were coming over in motor-cars. Phyllis and Roger had had a long ride together that day on the new Kentucky saddle horses. Mrs. Bing had spent the morning in Hazelmead and had stayed to lunch with Mayor and Mrs. Stacy. She had returned at four and cut some flowers for the table and gone to her room for an hour's rest when the young people returned. She was not yet asleep when Phyllis came into the big bedroom. Mrs. Bing lay among the cushions on hercouch. She partly rose, tumbled the cushions into a pile and leaned against them.
"Heavens! I'm tired!" she exclaimed. "These women in Hazelmead hang on to one like a lot of hungry cats. They all want money for one thing or another—Red Cross or Liberty bonds or fatherless children or tobacco for the soldiers or books for the library. My word! I'm broke and it seems as if each of my legs hung by a thread."
Phyllis smiled as she stood looking down at her mother.
"How beautiful you look!" the fond mother exclaimed. "If he didn't propose to-day, he's a chump."
"But he did," said Phyllis. "I tried to keep him from it, but he just would propose in spite of me."
The girl's face was red and serious. She sat down in a chair and began to remove her hat. Mrs. Bing rose suddenly, and stood facing Phyllis.
"I thought you loved him," she said with a look of surprise.
"So I do," the girl answered.
"What did you say?"
"I said no."
"What!"
"I refused him!"
"For God's sake, Phyllis! Do you think you can afford to play with a man like that? He won't stand for it."
"Let him sit for it then and, mother, you might as well know, first as last, that I am not playing with him."
There was a calm note of firmness in the voice of the girl. She was prepared for this scene. She had known it was coming. Her mother was hot with irritating astonishment. The calmness of the girl in suddenly beginning to dig a grave for this dear ambition—rich with promise—in the very day when it had come submissively to their feet, stung like the tooth of aserpent. She stood very erect and said with an icy look in her face:
"You young upstart! What do you mean?"
There was a moment of frigid silence in which both of the women began to turn cold. Then Phyllis answered very calmly as she sat looking down at the bunch of violets in her hand:
"It means that I am married, mother."
Mrs. Bing's face turned red. There was a little convulsive movement of the muscles around her mouth. She folded her arms on her breast, lifted her chin a bit higher and asked in a polite tone, although her words fell like fragments of cracked ice:
"Married! To whom are you married?"
"To Gordon King."
Phyllis spoke casually as if he were a piece of ribbon that she had bought at a store.
Mrs. Bing sank into a chair and coveredher face with her hands for half a moment. Suddenly she picked up a slipper that lay at her feet and flung it at the girl.
"My God!" she exclaimed. "What a nasty liar you are!"
It was not ladylike but, at that moment, the lady was temporarily absent.
"Mother, I'm glad you say that," the girl answered still very calmly, although her fingers trembled a little as she felt the violets, and her voice was not quite steady. "It shows that I am not so stupid at home as I am at school."
The girl rose and threw down the violets and her mild and listless manner. A look of defiance filled her face and figure. Mrs. Bing arose, her eyes aglow with anger.
"I'd like to know what you mean," she said under her breath.
"I mean that if I am a liar, you taught me how to be it. Ever since I was knee-high, you have been teaching me to deceivemy father. I am not going to do it any longer. I am going to find my father and tell him the truth. I shall not wait another minute. He will give me better advice than you have given, I hope."
The words had fallen rapidly from her lips and, as the last one was spoken, she hurried out of the room. Mrs. Bing threw herself on the couch where she lay with certain bitter memories, until the new maid came to tell her that it was time to dress.
She was like one reminded of mortality after coming out of ether.
"Oh, Lord!" she murmured wearily. "I feel like going to bed! HowcanI live through that dinner? Please bring me some brandy."
Phyllis learned that her father was at his office whither she proceeded without a moment's delay. She sent in word that she must see him alone and as soon as possible. He dismissed the men with whomhe had been talking and invited her into his private office.
"Well, girl, I guess I know what is on your mind," he said. "Go ahead."
Phyllis began to cry.
"All right! You do the crying and I'll do the talking," he went on. "I feel like doing the crying myself, but if you want the job I'll resign it to you. Perhaps you can do enough of that for both of us. I began to smell a rat the other day. So I sent for Gordon King. He came here this morning. I had a long talk with him. He told me the truth. Why didn't you tell me? What's the good of having a father unless you use him at times when his counsel is likely to be worth having? I would have made a good father, if I had had half a chance. I should like to have been your friend and confidant in this important enterprise. I could have been a help to you. But, somehow, I couldn't get on the board of directors. You and your mother havebeen running the plant all by yourselves and I guess it's pretty near bankrupt. Now, my girl, there's no use crying over spilt tears. Gordon King is not the man of my choice, but we must all take hold and try to build him up. Perhaps we can make him pay."
"I do not love him," Phyllis sobbed.
"You married him because you wanted to. You were not coerced?"
"No, sir."
"I'm sorry, but you'll have to take your share of the crow with the rest of us," he went on, with a note of sternness in his tone. "My girl, when I make a contract I live up to it and I intend that you shall do the same. You'll have to learn to love and cherish this fellow, if he makes it possible. I'll have no welching in my family. You and your mother believe in woman's rights. I don't object to that, but you mustn't think that you have the right to break your agreements unlessthere's a good reason for it. My girl, the marriage contract is the most binding and sacred of all contracts. I want you to do your best to make this one a success."
There was the tinkle of the telephone bell. Mr. Bing put the receiver to his ear and spoke into the instrument as follows:
"Yes, she's here! I knew all the facts before she told me. Mr. Delane? He's on his way back to New York. Left on the six-ten. Charged me to present his regrets and farewells to you and Phyllis. I thought it best for him to know and to go. Yes, we're coming right home to dress. Mr. King will take Mr. Delane's place at the table. We'll make a clean breast of the whole business. Brace up and eat your crow with a smiling face. I'll make a little speech and present Mr. and Mrs. King to our friends at the end of it. Oh, now, cut out the sobbing and leave this unfinished business to me and don't worry. We'll be home in three minutes."
In Which Judge Crooker Delivers a Few Opinions
The pride of Bingville had fallen in the dust! It had arisen and gone on with soiled garments and lowered head. It had suffered derision and defeat. It could not ever be the same again. Sneed and Snodgrass recovered, in a degree, from their feeling of opulence. Sneed had become polite, industrious and obliging. Snodgrass and others had lost heavily in stock speculation through the failure of a broker in Hazelmead. They went to work with a will and without the haughty independence which, for a time, had characterized their attitude. The spirit of the Little Shepherd had entered the hearts and home of Emanuel Baker and his wife.Pauline and the baby were there and being tenderly loved and cared for. But what humility had entered that home! Phyllis and her husband lived with her parents, Gordon having taken a humble place in the mill. He worked early and late. The Bings had made it hard for him, finding it difficult to overcome their resentment, but he stood the gaff, as they say, and won the regard of J. Patterson although Mrs. Bing could never forgive him.
In June, there had been a public meeting in the Town Hall addressed by Judge Crooker and the Reverend Mr. Singleton. The Judge had spoken of the grinding of the mills of God that was going on the world over.
"Our civilization has had its time of trial not yet ended," he began. "Its enemies have been busy in every city and village. Not only in the cities and villages of France and Belgium have they been busy, but in those of our own land. The Gothsand Vandals have invaded Bingville. They have been destroying the things we loved. The false god is in our midst. Many here, within the sound of my voice, have a god suited to their own tastes and sins—an obedient, tractable, boneless god. It is my deliberate opinion that the dances and costumes and moving pictures we have seen in Bingville are doing more injury to Civilization than all the guns of Germany. My friends, you can do nothing worse for my daughter than deprive her of her modesty and I would rather, far rather, see you slay my son than destroy his respect for law and virtue and decency.
"The jazz band is to me a sign of spiritual decay. It is a step toward the jungle. I hear in it the beating of the tom-tom. It is not music. It is the barbaric yawp of sheer recklessness and daredevilism, and it is everywhere.
"Even in our economic life we are dancing to the jazz band and with utterrecklessness. American labor is being more and more absorbed in the manufacture of luxuries—embroidered frocks and elaborate millinery and limousines and landaulets and rich upholstery and cord tires and golf courses and sporting goods and great country houses—so that there is not enough labor to provide the comforts and necessities of life.
"The tendency of all this is to put the stamp of luxury upon the commonest needs of man. The time seems to be near when a boiled egg and a piece of buttered bread will be luxuries and a family of children an unspeakable extravagance. Let us face the facts. It is up to Vanity to moderate its demands upon the industry of man. What we need is more devotion to simple living and the general welfare. In plain old-fashioned English we need the religion and the simplicity of our fathers."
Later, in June, a strike began in the bigplant of J. Patterson Bing. The men demanded higher pay and shorter days. They were working under a contract but that did not seem to matter. In a fight with "scabs" and Pinkerton men they destroyed a part of the plant. Even the life of Mr. Bing was threatened! The summer was near its end when J. Patterson Bing and a committee of the labor union met in the office of Judge Crooker to submit their differences to that impartial magistrate for adjustment. The Judge listened patiently and rendered his decision. It was accepted.
When the papers were signed, Mr. Bing rose and said, "Your Honor, there's one thing I want to say. I have spent most of my life in this town. I have built up a big business here and doubled the population. I have built comfortable homes for my laborers and taken an interest in the education of their children, and built a library where any one could find the bestbooks to read. I have built playgrounds for the children of the working people. If I have heard of any case of need, I have done my best to relieve it. I have always been ready to hear complaints and treat them fairly. My men have been generously paid and yet they have not hesitated to destroy my property and to use guns and knives and clubs and stones to prevent the plant from filling its contracts and to force their will upon me. How do you explain it? What have I done or failed to do that has caused this bitterness?"
"Mr. Bing, I am glad that you ask me that question," the old Judge began. "It gives me a chance to present to you, and to these men who work for you, a conviction which has grown out of impartial observation of your relations with each other.
"First, I want to say to you, Mr. Bing, that I regard you as a good citizen. Your genius and generosity have put this community under great obligation. Now, inheading toward the hidden cause of your complaint, I beg to ask you a question at the outset. Do you know that unfortunate son of the Widow Moran known as the Shepherd of the Birds?"
"I have heard much about him," Mr. Bing answered.
"Do you know him?"
"No. I have had letters from him acknowledging favors now and then, but I do not know him."
"We have hit at once the source of your trouble," the Judge went on. "The Shepherd is a representative person. He stands for the poor and the unfortunate in this village. You have never gone to see him because—well, probably it was because you feared that the look of him would distress you. The thing which would have helped and inspired and gladdened his heart more than anything else would have been the feel of your hand and a kind and cheering word and sympathetic counsel.Under those circumstances, I think I may say that it was your duty as a neighbor and a human being to go to see him. Instead of that you sent money to him. Now, he never needed money. In the kindest spirit, I ask you if that money you sent to him in the best of good-will was not, in fact, a species of bribery? Were you not, indeed, seeking to buy immunity from a duty incumbent upon you as a neighbor and a human being?"
Mr. Bing answered quickly, "There are plenty of people who have nothing else to do but carry cheer and comfort to the unfortunate. I have other things to do."
"That, sir, does not relieve you of the liabilities of a neighbor and a human being, in my view. If your business has turned you into a shaft or a cog-wheel, it has done you a great injustice. I fear that it has been your master—that it has practised upon you a kind of despotism. Youwould better get along with less—far less business than suffer such a fate. I don't want to hurt you. We are looking for the cause of a certain result and I can help you only by being frank. With all your generosity you have never given your heart to this village. Some unkind people have gone so far as to say that you have no heart. You can not prove it with money that you do not miss. Money is good but it must be warmed with sympathy and some degree of sacrifice. Has it never occurred to you that the warm hand and the cheering word in season are more, vastly more, than money in the important matter of making good-will? Unconsciously, you have established a line and placed yourself on one side of it and the people on the other. Broadly speaking, you are capital and the rest are labor. Whereas, in fact, you are all working men. Some of the rest have come to regard you as their natural enemy. They ought toregard you as their natural friend. Two kinds of despotism have prevented it. First, there is the despotism of your business in making you a slave—so much of a slave that you haven't time to be human; second, there is the despotism of the labor union in discouraging individual excellence, in demanding equal pay for the faithful man and the slacker, and in denying the right of free men to labor when and where they will. All this is tyranny as gross and un-American as that of George the Third in trying to force his will upon the colonies. If America is to survive, we must set our faces against every form of tyranny. The remedy for all our trouble and bitterness is real democracy which is nothing more or less than the love of men—the love of justice and fair play for each and all.
"You men should know that every strike increases the burdens of the people. Every day your idleness lifts the price of theirnecessities. Idleness is just another form of destruction. Why could you not have listened to the counsel of Reason in June instead of in September, and thus have saved these long months of loss and hardship and bitter violence? It was because the spirit of Tyranny had entered your heart and put your judgment in chains. It had blinded you to honor also, for your men were working under contract. If the union is to command the support of honest men, it must be honest. It was Tyranny that turned the treaty with Belgium into a scrap of paper. That kind of a thing will not do here. Let me assure you that Tyranny has no right to be in this land of ours. You remind me of the Prodigal Son who had to know the taste of husks and the companionship of swine before he came to himself. Do you not know that Tyranny is swine and the fodder of swine? It is simply human hoggishness.
"I have one thing more to say and I amfinished. Mr. Bing, some time ago you threw up your religion without realizing the effect that such an act would be likely to produce on this community. You are, no doubt, aware that many followed your example. I've got no preaching to do. I'm just going to quote you a few words from an authority no less respectable than George Washington himself. Our history has made one fact very clear, namely, that he was a wise and far-seeing man."
Judge Crooker took from a shelf, John Marshall's "Life of Washington," and read:
"'It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government and let us, with caution, indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.
"'Let it simply be asked where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if a sense of religious obligationdesert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice?"
"Let me add, on my own account, that the treatment you receive from your men will vary according to their respect for morality and religion.
"They could manage very well with an irreligious master, for you are only one. But an irreligious mob is a different and highly serious matter, believe me. Away back in the seventeenth century, John Dryden wrote a wise sentence. It was this:
"'I have heard, indeed, of some very virtuous persons who have ended unfortunately but never of a virtuous nation; Providence is engaged too deeply when the cause becomes general.
"'If virtue is the price of a nation's life, let us try to keep our own nation virtuous.'"
Mr. Bing and his men left the Judge'soffice in a thoughtful mood. The next day, Judge Crooker met the mill owner on the street.
"Judge, I accept your verdict," said the latter. "I fear that I have been rather careless. It didn't occur to me that my example would be taken so seriously. I have been a prodigal and have resolved to return to my father's house."
"Ho, servants!" said the Judge, with a smile. "Bring forth the best robe and put it on him and put a ring on his finger and shoes on his feet and bring hither the fatted calf and kill it and let us eat and be merry."
"We shall have to postpone the celebration," said Mr. Bing. "I have to go to New York to-night, and I sail for England to-morrow. But I shall return before Christmas."
A little farther on Mr. Bing met Hiram Blenkinsop. The latter had a plank on his shoulder.
"I'd like to have a word with you," said the mill owner as he took hold of the plank and helped Hiram to ease it down. "I hear many good things about you, Mr. Blenkinsop. I fear that we have all misjudged you. If I have ever said or done anything to hurt your feelings, I am sorry for it."
Hiram Blenkinsop looked with astonishment into the eyes of the millionaire.
"I—I guess I ain't got you placed right—not eggzac'ly," said he. "Some folks ain't as good as they look an' some ain't as bad as they look. I wouldn't wonder if we was mostly purty much alike, come to shake us down."
"Let's be friends, anyhow," said Mr. Bing. "If there's anything I can do for you, let me know."
That evening, as he sat by the stove in his little room over the garage of Mr. Singleton with his dog Christmas lying beside him, Mr. Blenkinsop fell asleepand awoke suddenly with a wild yell of alarm.
"What's the matter?" a voice inquired.
Mr. Blenkinsop turned and saw his Old Self standing in the doorway.
"Nothin' but a dream," said Blenkinsop as he wiped his eyes. "Dreamed I had a dog with a terrible thirst on him. Used to lead him around with a rope an' when we come to a brook he'd drink it dry. Suddenly I felt an awful jerk on the rope that sent me up in the air an' I looked an' see that the dog had turned into an elephant an' that he was goin' like Sam Hill, an' that I was hitched to him and couldn't let go. Once in a while he'd stop an' drink a river dry an' then he'd lay down an' rest. Everybody was scared o' the elephant an' so was I. An' I'd try to cut the rope with my jack knife but it wouldn't cut—it was so dull. Then all of a sudden he'd start on the run an' twitch me over the hills an' mountings, an' metakin' steps a mile long an' scared to death."
"The fact is you're hitched to an elephant," his Old Self remarked. "The first thing to do is to sharpen your jack knife."
"It's Night an' Silence that sets him goin'," said Blenkinsop. "When they come he's apt to start for the nighest river. The old elephant is beginnin' to move."
Blenkinsop put on his hat and hurried out of the door.
Which Tells of a Merry Christmas Day in the Little Cottage of the Widow Moran
Night and Silence are a stern test of wisdom. For years, the fun loving, chattersome Blenkinsop had been their enemy and was not yet at peace with them. But Night and Silence had other enemies in the village—ancient and inconsolable enemies, it must be said. They were the cocks of Bingville. Every morning they fell to and drove Night and Silence out of the place and who shall say that they did not save it from being hopelessly overwhelmed. Day was their victory and they knew how to achieve it. Noise was the thing most needed. So they roused the people and called up the lights and set the griddles rattling. The great, white cockthat roosted near the window in the Widow Moran's hen-house watched for the first sign of weakness in the enemy. When it came, he sent forth a bolt of sound that tumbled Silence from his throne and shook the foundations of the great dome of Night. It rang over the housetops and through every street and alley in the village. That started the battle. Silence tried in vain to recover his seat. In a moment, every cock in Bingville was hurling bombs at him. Immediately, Darkness began to grow pale with fright. Seeing the fate of his ally, he broke camp and fled westward. Soon the field was clear and every proud cock surveyed the victory with a solemn sense of large accomplishment.
The loud victorious trumpets sounding in the garden near the window of the Shepherd awoke him that Christmas morning. The dawn light was on the windows.
"Merry Christmas!" said the littleround nickel clock in a cheerful tone. "It's time to get up!"
"Is it morning?" the Shepherd asked drowsily, as he rubbed his eyes.
"Sure it's morning!" the little clock answered. "That lazy old sun is late again. He ought to be up and at work. He's like a dishonest hired man."
"He's apt to be slow on Christmas morning," said the Shepherd.
"Then people blame me and say I'm too fast," the little clock went on. "They don't know what an old shirk the sun can be. I've been watching him for years and have never gone to sleep at my post."
After a moment of silence the little clock went on: "Hello! The old night is getting a move on it. The cocks are scaring it away. Santa Claus has been here. He brought ever so many things. The midnight train stopped."
"I wonder who came," said the Shepherd.
"I guess it was the Bings," the clock answered.
Just then it struck seven.
"There, I guess that's about the end of it," said the little clock.
"Of what?" the Shepherd asked.
"Of the nineteen hundred and eighteen years. You know seven is the favored number in sacred history. I'm sure the baby would have been born at seven. My goodness! There's a lot of ticking in all that time. I've been going only twelve years and I'm nearly worn out. Some young clock will have to take my job before long."
These reflections of the little clock were suddenly interrupted. The Shepherd's mother entered with a merry greeting and turned on the lights. There were many bundles lying about. She came and kissed her son and began to build a fire in the little stove.
"This'll be the merriest Christmas inyer life, laddie boy," she said, as she lit the kindlings. "A great doctor has come up with the Bings to see ye. He says he'll have ye out-o'-doors in a little while."
"Ho, ho! That looks like the war was nearly over," said Mr. Bloggs.
Mrs. Moran did not hear the remark of the little tin soldier so she rattled on:
"I went over to the station to meet 'em last night. Mr. Blenkinsop has brought us a fine turkey. We'll have a gran' dinner—sure we will—an' I axed Mr. Blenkinsop to come an' eat with us."
Mrs. Moran opened the gifts and spread them on the bed. There were books and paints and brushes and clothing and silver articles and needle-work and a phonograph and a check from Mr. Bing.
The little cottage had never seen a day so full of happiness. It rang with talk and merry laughter and the music of the phonograph. Mr. Blenkinsop had come in his best mood and apparel with the dogChristmas. He helped Mrs. Moran to set the table in the Shepherd's room and brought up the platter with the big brown turkey on it, surrounded by sweet potatoes, all just out of the oven. Mrs. Moran followed with the jelly and the creamed onions and the steaming coffee pot and new celery. The dog Christmas growled and ran under the bed when he saw his master coming with that unfamiliar burden.
"He's never seen a Christmas dinner before. I don't wonder he's kind o' scairt! I ain't seen one in so long, I'm scairt myself," said Hiram Blenkinsop as they sat down at the table.
"What's scairin' ye, man?" said the widow.
"'Fraid I'll wake up an' find myself dreamin'," Mr. Blenkinsop answered.
"Nobody ever found himself dreamin' at my table," said Mrs. Moran. "Grab the carvin' knife an' go to wurruk, man."
"I ain't eggzac'ly used to this kind ofa job, but if you'll look out o' the winder, I'll have it chopped an' split an' corded in a minute," said Mr. Blenkinsop.
He got along very well with his task. When they began eating he remarked, "I've been lookin' at that pictur' of a girl with a baby in her arms. Brings the water to my eyes, it's so kind o' life like and nat'ral. It's an A number one pictur'—no mistake."
He pointed at a large painting on the wall.
"It's Pauline!" said the Shepherd.
"Sure she's one o' the saints o' God!" the widow exclaimed. "She's started a school for the children o' them Eytalians an' Poles. She's tryin' to make 'em good Americans."
"I'll never forget that night," Mr. Blenkinsop remarked.
"If ye don't fergit it, I'll never mend another hole in yer pants," the widow answered.
"I've never blabbed a word about it to any one but Mr. Singleton."
"Keep that in yer soul, man. It's yer ticket to Paradise," said the widow.
"She goes every day to teach the Poles and Italians, but I have her here with me always," the Shepherd remarked. "I'm glad when the morning comes so that I can see her again."
"God bless the child! We was sorry to lose her but we have the pictur' an' the look o' her with the love o' God in her face," said the Widow Moran.
"Now light yer pipe and take yer comfort, man," said the hospitable widow, after the dishes were cleared away. "Sure it's more like Christmas to see a man an' a pipe in the house. Heavens, no! A man in the kitchen is worse than a hole in yer petticoat."
So Mr. Blenkinsop sat with the Shepherd while the widow went about her work. With his rumpled hair, cleanshaven face, long nose and prominent ears, he was not a handsome man.
"This is the top notch an' no mistake," he remarked as he lighted his pipe. "Blenkinsop is happy. He feels like his Old Self. He has no fault to find with anything or anybody."
Mr. Blenkinsop delivered this report on the state of his feelings with a serious look in his gray eyes.
"It kind o' reminds me o' the time when I used to hang up my stockin' an' look for the reindeer tracks in the snow on Christmas mornin'," he went on. "Since then, my ol' socks have been full o' pain an' trouble every Christmas."
"Those I knit for ye left here full of good wishes," said the Shepherd.
"Say, when I put 'em on this mornin' with the b'iled shirt an' the suit that Mr. Bing sent me, my Old Self came an' asked me where I was goin', an' when I said I was goin' to spen' Christmas with arespectable fam'ly, he said, 'I guess I'll go with ye,' so here we be."
"The Old Selves of the village have all been kicked out-of-doors," said the Shepherd. "The other day you told me about the trouble you had had with yours. That night, all the Old Selves of Bingville got together down in the garden and talked and talked about their relatives so I couldn't sleep. It was a kind of Selfland. I told Judge Crooker about it and he said that that was exactly what was going on in the Town Hall the other night at the public meeting."
"The folks are drunk—as drunk as I was in Hazelmead last May," said Mr. Blenkinsop. "They have been drunk with gold and pleasure——"
"The fruit of the vine of plenty," said Judge Crooker, who had just come up the stairs. "Merry Christmas!" he exclaimed as he shook hands. "Mr. Blenkinsop, you look as if you were enjoying yourself."
"An' why not when yer Self has been away an' just got back?"
"And you've killed the fatted turkey," said the Judge, as he took out his silver snuff box. "One by one, the prodigals are returning."
They heard footsteps on the stairs and the merry voice of the Widow Moran. In a moment, Mr. and Mrs. Bing stood in the doorway.
"Mr. and Mrs. Bing, I want to make you acquainted with my very dear friend, Robert Moran," said Judge Crooker.
There were tears in the Shepherd's eyes as Mrs. Bing stooped and kissed him. He looked up at the mill owner as the latter took his hand.
"I am glad to see you," said Mr. Bing.
"Is this—is this Mr. J. Patterson Bing?" the Shepherd asked, his eyes wide with astonishment.
"Yes, and it is my fault that you donot know me better. I want to be your friend."
The Shepherd put his handkerchief over his eyes. His voice trembled when he said: "You have been very kind to us."
"But I'm really hoping to do something for you," Mr. Bing assured him. "I've brought a great surgeon from New York who thinks he can help you. He will be over to see you in the morning."
They had a half-hour's visit with the little Shepherd. Mr. Bing, who was a judge of good pictures, said that the boy's work showed great promise and that his picture of the mother and child would bring a good price if he cared to sell it. When they arose to go, Mr. Blenkinsop thanked the mill owner for his Christmas suit.
"Don't mention it," said Mr. Bing.
"Well, it mentions itself purty middlin' often," Mr. Blenkinsop laughed.
"Is there anything else I can do for you?" the former asked.
"Well, sir, to tell ye the dead hones' truth, I've got a new ambition," said Mr. Blenkinsop. "I've thought of it nights a good deal. I'd like to be sextunt o' the church an' ring that ol' bell."
"We'll see what can be done about it," Mr. Bing answered with a laugh, as they went down-stairs with Judge Crooker, followed by the dog Christmas, who scampered around them on the street with a merry growl of challenge, as if the spirit of the day were in him.
"What is it that makes the boy so appealing?" Mr. Bing asked of the Judge.
"He has a wonderful personality," Mrs. Bing remarked.
"Yes, he has that. But the thing that underlies and shines through it is his great attraction."
"What do you call it?" Mrs. Bing asked.
"A clean and noble spirit! Is there anyother thing in this world that, in itself, is really worth having?"
"Compared with him, I recognize that I am very poor indeed," said J. Patterson Bing.
"You are what I would call a promising young man," the Judge answered. "If you don't get discouraged, you're going to amount to something. I am glad because you are, in a sense, the father of the great family of Bingville."
THE END