THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS
Dorothy was scolded. There her own family--father, Joe and Roger, to say
nothing of dear Aunt Winnie, and the cousins Ned and Nat--were waiting
for her important advice about a lot of Christmas things, and she had
ridden off with Dr. Gray, attending to the gloomy task of having a sick
child and her mother placed in a sanitarium.
But she succeeded, and when on the following day she visited Emily and
her mother, she found the nurses busy in an outer hall, fixing up the
Christmas tree that Mr. Sanders had insisted upon bringing all the way
from the farmhouse where Dorothy had left it for little Emily.
The very gifts that Dorothy left unopened out there, when she found the
child sick, the nurses were placing on the tree, waiting to surprise
Emily when she would open her eyes on the real Christmas day.
And there had been added to these a big surprise indeed, for Mr. Wolters
was so pleased with the result of his charity, that he added to the
hospital donation a personal check for Mrs. Tripp and her daughter. The
check was placed in a tiny feed bag, from which a miniature horse
(Emily's pet variety of toy) was to eat his breakfast on Christmas
morning.
Major Dale did not often interfere with his daughter's affairs, but this
time his sister, Mrs. White, had importuned him, declaring that Dorothy
would take up charity work altogether if they did not insist upon her
taking her proper position in the social world. It must be admitted that
the kind old major believed that more pleasure could be gotten out of
Dorothy's choice than that of his well-meaning, and fashionable, sister.
But Winnie, he reflected, had been a mother to Dorothy for a number of
years, and women, after all, knew best about such things.
It was only when Dorothy found the major alone in his little den off his
sleeping rooms that the loving daughter stole up to the footstool, and,
in her own childish way, told him all about it. He listened with
pardonable pride, and then told Dorothy that too much charity is bad for
the health of growing girls. The reprimand was so absurd that Dorothy
hugged his neck until he reminded her that even the breath of a war
veteran has its limitations.
So Emily was left to her surprises, and now, on the afternoon of the
night before Christmas, we find Dorothy and Mabel, with Ned, Nat and Ted,
busy with the decorations of the Cedars. Step ladders knocked each other
down, as the enthusiastic boys tried to shift more than one to exactly
the same spot in the long library. Kitchen chairs toppled over just as
Dorothy or Mabel jumped to save their slippered feet, and the long
strings of evergreens, with which all hands were struggling, made the
room a thing of terror for Mrs. White and Major Dale.
The scheme was to run the greens in a perfect network across the beamed
ceiling, not in the usual "chandelier-corner" fashion, but latticed after
the style of the Spanish serenade legend.
At intervals little red paper bells dangled, and a prettier idea for
decoration could scarcely be conceived. To say that Dorothy had invented
it would not do justice to Mabel, but however that may be, all credit,
except stepladder episodes, was accorded the girls.
"Let me hang the big bell," begged Ted, "if there is one thing I have
longed for all my life it was that--to hang a big 'belle'."
He aimed his stepladder for the middle of the room, but Nat held the
bell.
"She's my belle," insisted Nat, "and she's not going to be hanged--she'll
be hung first," and he caressed the paper ornament.
"If you boys do not hurry we will never get done," Dorothy reminded them.
"It's almost dark now."
"Almost, but not quite," teased Ted. "Dorothy, between this and dark,
there are more things to happen than would fill a hundred stockings. By
the way, where do we hang the hose?"
"We don't," she replied. "Stockings are picturesque in a kitchen, but
absurd in such a bower as this."
"Right, Coz," agreed Ned, deliberately sitting down with a wreath of
greens about his neck. "Cut out the laundry, ma would not pay my little
red chop-suey menu last week, and I may have to wear a kerchief on Yule
day."
"Oh, don't you think that--sweet!" exulted Mabel, making a true lover's
knot of the end of her long rope of green that Nat had succeeded in
intertwining with Dorothy's 'cross town line'.
"Delicious," declared Ned, jumping up and placing his arms about her
neck.
"Stop," she cried. "I meant the bow."
"Who's running this show, any way?" asked Ted. "Do you see the time,
Frats?"
The mantle clock chimed six. Ned and Nat jumped up, and shook themselves
loose from the stickery holly leaves as if they had been so many
feathers.
"We must eat," declared Ned, dramatically, "for to-morrow we die!"
"We cannot have tea until everything is finished," Dorothy objected. "Do
you think we girls can clean up this room?"
"Call the maids in," Ned advised, foolishly, for the housemaids at the
Cedars were not expected to clean up after the "festooners."
Dorothy frowned her reply, and continued to gather up the ends of
everything. Mabel did not desert either, but before the girls realized
it, the boys had run off--to the dining room where a hasty meal, none the
less enjoyable, was ready to be eaten.
"What do you suppose they are up to?" Mabel asked.
"There is something going on when they are in such a hurry. What do you
say if we follow them? It is not dark, and they can't be going far,"
answered Dorothy.
Mabel gladly agreed, and, a half hour later, the two girls cautiously
made their way along the white road, almost in the shadow of three jolly
youths. Occasionally they could hear the remarks that the boys made.
"They are going to the wedding!" Dorothy exclaimed. "The seven o'clock
wedding at Winter's!"
Mabel did not reply. The boys had turned around, and she clutched
Dorothy's arm nervously. Instinctively both girls slowed their pace.
"They did not see us," Dorothy whispered, presently. "But they are
turning into Sodden's!"
Sodden's was the home of one of the boys' chums--Gus Sodden by name. He
was younger than the others, and had the reputation of being the most
reckless chap in North Birchland.
"But," mused Mabel, "the wedding is to be at the haunted house! I should
be afraid----"
"Mabel!" Dorothy exclaimed, "you do not mean to say that you believe in
ghosts!"
"Oh--no," breathed Mabel, "but you know the idea is so creepy."
"That is why," Dorothy said with a light laugh, "we have to creep along
now. Look at Ned. He must feel our presence near."
The boys now were well along the path to the Sodden home. It was situated
far down in a grove, to which led a path through the hemlock trees. These
trees were heavy with the snow that they seemed to love, for other sorts
of foliage had days before shed the fall that had so gently stolen upon
them--like a caress from a white world of love.
"My, it is dark!" demurred Mabel, again.
"Mabel Blake!" accused Dorothy. "I do believe you are a coward!"
It was lonely along the way. Everyone being busy with Christmas at home,
left the roads deserted.
"What do you suppose they are going in there for?" Mabel finally
whispered.
"We will have to wait and find out," replied Dorothy. "When one starts
out spying on boys she must be prepared for all sorts of surprises."
"Oh, there comes Gus! Look!" Mabel pointed to a figure making tracks
through the snow along the path.
"And--there are the others. It did not take them long to make up. They
are--Christmas--Imps. Such make-ups!" Dorothy finished, as she beheld the
boys, in something that might have been taken, or mistaken, for stray
circus baggage.
Even in their disguise it was easy to recognize the boys. Ned wore a
kimono--bright red. On his head was the tall sort of cap that clowns and
the old-fashioned school dunce wore. Nat was "cute" in somebody's short
skirt and a shorter jacket. He wore also a worsted cap that was really,
in the dim light, almost becoming. Ted matched up Nat, the inference
being that they were to be Christmas attendants on Santa Claus.
The girls stepped safely behind the hedge as the procession passed. The
boys seemed too involved in their purpose to talk.
"Now," said Dorothy, "we may follow. I knew they were up to something
big."
"Aren't they too funny!" said Mabel, who had almost giggled disastrously
as the boys passed. "I thought I would die!"
There was no time to spare now, for the boys were walking very quickly,
and it was not so easy for the girls to keep up with them and at the same
time to keep away from them.
Straight they went for what was locally called the "haunted" house. This
was a fine old mansion, with big rooms and broad chimneys, which had once
been the home of a family of wealth. But there had been a sad tragedy
there, and after that it had been said that ghosts held sway at the
place. It had been deserted for two years, but now, with the former owner
dead, a niece of the family, fresh from college, had insisted upon being
married there, and the house had been accordingly put into shape for the
ceremony.
It was to be a fashionable wedding, at the hour of six, and people had
kept the station agent busy all day inquiring how to reach the scene of
the wedding.
Lights already burned brightly in the rooms, that could be seen to be
decorated in holiday style. People fluttered around and through the long
French windows; the young folks, boys and girls, being hidden in
different quarters, could alike see something of what was going on in the
haunted house.
"They're coming!" Dorothy heard Nat exclaim, just as he ducked in by the
big outside chimney. The broad flue was at the extreme end of the house,
forming the southern part of the library, just off the wide hall that ran
through the middle of the place. Dorothy and Mabel had taken refuge in
one of the many odd corners of the big, old fashioned porch, which partly
encircled this wing, and commanding a wonderful view of the interior of
the house, the halls and library, and long, narrow drawing room.
There was a smothered laugh at the corner of the porch where the boys had
ducked, and the girls watched in wonder. The latter saw Nat boost Ned up
the side of the porch column, and Ted followed nimbly. In tense silence
the girls listened to their footsteps cross the porch roof, then as
scraping and slipping and much suppressed mirth floated down.
"They're going down the chimney!" declared Dorothy, in astonishment.
"They surely are!" affirmed Mabel, leaning far over the porch rail.
"But, Doro, what of the fire?"
"They don't use that chimney. They use the one on the other side of the
house, and the one in the kitchen."