Despite the many mechanical operations performed upon the family clock
by the little M'Cartys, it ticked away the minutes, and the hours, and
the days faithfully. Even on this special Christmas Eve when the
fortunes of its owners seemed at their very lowest ebb, it did not so
much as moderate its voice or slacken its movements. When the hour
arrived that its long hand should point straight upward and its short
hand straight downward, the bells of the city began to ring, and the
whistles of the city began to blow, announcing, with much clamor and
discordance, that another day of labor was ended.
At the shriek of the first whistle Grandad Rafferty, who sat by the
fire with baby Ellen on his knee, looked up at the clock and nodded to
it approvingly.
"Arrah now, ye little leprechaune that works while the rest do be
shlapin', ye're tellin' the truth same as ever, for it's time for them
that's workin' to be sthoppin'. I mind when I was young an' sphry how
glad I was to lave me workin' an' run home to me swate Maggie, God
rest her soul! And when she see me comin' over the hill, she'd be
steppin' down the lane to mate me. And afther supper I'd smoke me
dudheen whilst Maggie redded up the cabin and then--"
"True for ye," broke in Granny M'Carty from her seat on the opposite
side of the fire. She could not abide Grandad Rafferty's
reminiscences, for they recalled to her the happy days in the old
country,--the place to which her heart turned ever with longing,
though she never expected to put foot again on its green turf. "It's
ye that would sit and smoke an' yer Maggie workin' her legs off
slavin' for yez. Och, it's the men have the aisy time in this life,
but it's them same, I'm thinkin', that will pay for it by a longer
sthop in purgatory, and I hope they will, so I do."
"Indade, now, Mrs. M'Carty," began Grandad Rafferty, soothingly,
"sure, the men have--"
"Indade, then, they have not!" contradicted Granny. "Look at them men
that's goin' home this minit,"--waving her hand as if toward a
procession of laborers passing before her. "What have they to do? In
the mornin' they're off with a fine lunch in their pails, an' never a
bed to make, or a floor to swape, or a childer to clane, or a male to
be cookin'. It's the womin must sthay at home and mind all that. And
when they're home at night they'll eat their supper an' likely grumble
at it, then sit at their ease an' smoke. Troth, if I had the word--"
"Musha, musha, Mrs. M'Carty!" said Grandad. "Ye're clane forgettin'
the men work hard all day, that the womin may sthay safe at home with
their jewels of childers."
"Jewels of childers, indade!" exclaimed Granny, her attention turned
to a new grievance. "Them kind of jewels poor folks could do well
withoot."
"Listen to that now, Ellen, me jewel," said Grandad Rafferty,
addressing himself to the baby on his knee. "Listen, but don't ye
belave a worrd ye're hearin'. Yer Granny would not part with yez for
long money. Would ye, Mrs. M'Carty? An' is she not ev'ry bit as fine a
child as yer Michael when he wor a baby?"
"Me Michael--may the Hivens be his bed--had the sense to be born a
b'y, an' there was but two of him, an' here's yer grandchilder
springin' up like blades of the grass for number. Oh, Michael,
Michael," wailed Granny, "if ye could only see yer old mither now,
'tis not aisy ye'd rest in yer grave if ye had a grave, which ye
haven't, worse luck. Here I be, with never a dacent bit or sup, me
that in the old counthry had bacon with me praties an' a fine shawl
fer Sunday," and at this point Granny began to weep.
"Whist now, whist, Granny!" cried Mrs. M'Carty, coming in from the
lean-to where she had been to bestow the insignia of her office, her
board and tubs. "Don't be grieving with yerself. I'll make the supper
an' ye'll feel better when ye have something warm in yer stomick. It's
not much we have, but when Dinny and Terence grow a bit more--"
"Grow is it?" exclaimed Granny, finding in Bridget's words another
source of wrath. "Ye'd betther be prayin' the saints to kape thim from
growin'. Their clothes is far too small fer their size this minit."
"Now Granny, it's yerself knows me prayers won't keep them boys from
growing, but it's hoping I am that the clothes will come with their
bigness."
"That's like yer foolishness, Bridget M'Carty," retorted Granny. "It's
ye that is always expectin' somethin' betther the morrow. It's the
worst ye should be lookin' for, so it is, for it's that ye'll be
afther gettin', more like."
"Now Granny," replied Mrs. M'Carty, "it's never a minit I'll be
wasting getting ready for troubles, for when troubles come they're a
different sort entirely than them you do be ready for."
At this moment the door, true to its habit of flying open at any and
all times, swung briskly on its hinges, and admitted Denny and Terence
returned from their sale of evening papers. Terence carried a small
package while Denny waved aloft a branch of evergreen which he had
rescued from the street.
"Look every one of you and see what Terence is after bringing," cried
Denny.
"Ye've left the door open on me poor old bones," complained Granny.
Five little M'Cartys sprang to shut the door.
"It's samples I have--enough for the whole of us," said Terence,
proudly displaying the contents of his bundle. "And it's a bit of milk
you put with it and it's cooked. I seen them on the counter when I ran
in a grocery to warm my fingers. 'Take one,' the card said, and I
asked the clerk an' he says, 'Take two, you'll be a good advertisement
for it.'"
"Wheat Krakle, it is," said Denny, taking up one of the samples and
reading the label. "Better than meat, and more n-o-u nur, r-i ri,
s-h-i-n-g shing, nourishing, whatever that may be. And I says to
Terence, 'what's two of them with twelve of us?' and says I, 'let's
ask 'round and get one apiece,' and here you have them."
Granny who, before the opening of the package, had hoped it might
contain a "bit o' bacon, or a dhrawin' o' tay," of which luxuries she
had been deprived for some time, leaned back in her chair with a
groan.
"Och hone, it's just one more of them new aitin's to sphile my
stomick," she said. "May the devil fly away with them that makes them.
Sure along with them haythinish sthuffs I've ate since poor Michael
died on us, me insides feel like Brian O'Connell's oatfield in the old
counthry, an' that same was half-bog an' half-bushes, bad scran to
it!"
"Now then, Mrs. M'Carty," said Grandad Rafferty, as usual finding some
good in everything, "have ye no thought how ye're savin' yer teeth
with these new aitin's that shlip down so aisy ye're not to the
throuble of chewin' them?"
But Granny was not to be mollified, and she refused to sit down with
either of the relays of the family which gathered at the tiny table
and partook of the food that was "Better than meat and far more
nourishing."
Supper being over and the dishes hastily washed by Katy, the four
elder M'Cartys were allowed to set forth for an evening walk to admire
the festive preparations for the morrow's holiday,--a holiday in the
pleasures of which they had no hope of sharing. Four more M'Cartys
were despatched to their humble couches, two of them, owing to
Granny's faultfinding, having been spanked vigorously before being
turned over to the arms of Morpheus. After all, perhaps the latter
pair were the ones to be envied, as the heat thus engendered made the
scantiness of the bedding less apparent.
Granny M'Carty in the easiest chair and Grandad Rafferty in the next
easiest, sat in silence on either side of the little stove that did
double duty as heater and cooker. Presently they both fell nodding,
and in their dreams wandered away to the green fields of Erin, living
over again in their visions the days of their vanished youth.
[Illustration: "TO ADMIRE THE FESTIVE PREPARATIONS"]
Now that there was no immediate need for action, Mrs. M'Carty gathered
the little Ellen in her arms and sank down on a stool behind the
stove. And as she sat there Memory came and stood by her and pointed
back to other and happier Christmas Eves when she and Michael had made
many a plan to delight the hearts of their numerous brood. The plans
were simple enough, to be sure, but the children were too healthily
happy to be critical. She recalled the rare Christmas Day when turkey
had graced their board, and Michael, in Sunday attire, had sat at the
head of the table and labored manfully with the unfamiliar joints of
the holiday bird.
[Illustration: "AND AS SHE SAT THERE MEMORY CAME AND STOOD BY HER"]
"And now," her thought coming back to the present, "I've nothing for
them children, barring the matter of a stick of candy that's hardly
worth the mentioning, and for the Christmas eatings I've nought but a
handful of apples the grocer gave Katy the morning, and a few
potatoes, scarce enough for two apiece. And winter that long and
dreary, and just my two hands to earn the bread to keep the souls in
the whole of us. Oh, worra, worra, whatever shall I do without my
Michael?" and Bridget, feeling herself practically alone, for Grandad
and Granny still slumbered peacefully, gave vent to her feelings in a
heavy sigh. The sound, however, was loud enough to rouse Grandad, who,
in his assumed office of comforter-in-general to the M'Carty family,
was ever on the alert to perform his duties. He leaned forward and
looked anxiously into Bridget's face.
"Biddy, darling," he cried, "sure ye're not grievin' on the blessid
Christmas Eve? It's hard for yez with Michael dead an' gone, but
grievin' won't bring him back. Think of them that ye have left,--them
fine childers, an' Granny there. An' ye've me, but the saints know
ye're betther off withoot me, that am just a care to yez and that lame
I can't even lift a finger to help yez."
"Now Grandad," cried Bridget, "it's I that am ashamed of you, I am,
you that are a comfort, every minit, and no care to be speaking
about. And I wasn't forgetting the children, either. They do be plenty
of care, so they do, but they give a body a deal of comfort, and not a
finger of them could I spare. And Granny there, sure she does be a bit
cross now and then along with her rheumatism, but it keeps a body from
thinking of worse things when she do be telling the faults of us. And
when she's sleeping so sweet-like as she do be now, she's never a bit
of care or worry. No, Daddy, it was of my hard work I was thinking,
and wondering how I'd get enough to keep us alive this freezing
winter."
"Troth, now listen, Biddy!" said Grandad, ready with his word of
cheer. "I was just afther dreamin' of a red hen, an' whenever I dream
of a red hen, it's good news I'm soon hearin'."
Granny awoke just in time to hear the last sentence.
"Is it a hen ye dreamed ye were?" she queried. "It's because of eatin'
that stuff that's not good for the hens, that gave yez them bad
dreams."
Then another phase of the cereal question presenting itself she turned
to Mrs. M'Carty.
"Bridget M'Carty, is it them same hen aitin's ye're givin' us for our
dinner the morrow? Tell me that now?"
So unexpectedly questioned as to her resources for the morrow's
provisions, Bridget was startled into the admission that there was
nothing in store save a few potatoes and the gift of apples; and the
apples, like most gifts to the poor, could not be inspected too
closely.
"And it's all from my never getting pay for my washing. Not a penny
did they give Katy, and me telling her to wait. Whatever they do be
thinking a poor woman is washing their clothes for I do'no. To keep
her hands red and sore, and her back just breaking with the bending
over the tub, belike. I was to be getting two dollars, and now they'll
be waiting till after Christmas to pay, and it's us will be waiting
till after Christmas to eat. Sure it's just nothing we have to expect
for our Christmas dinner, bedad."
"Well, there now, honey," said Grandad Rafferty, undismayed at the
prospect of a dinnerless day. "We'll never mind all that, for them
that's expectin' nothin' will never have disappointment to be
mournin'."
Granny M'Carty, on hearing Bridget's recital broke forth into genuine
Irish lamentations such as she had not indulged in since the news of
Michael's untimely death, her wailings interspersed with the most
direful prophecies of what was in store for the family.
_Fifth Episode_