Pushing his adventurous shins through the deep snow that had fallen
overnight, and encouraged by the glee of his little sister, following in
the open way that he made, a sturdy small boy, the son of Grayville's
most distinguished citizen, struck his foot against something of which
there was no visible sign on the surface of the snow. It is the purpose
of this narrative to explain how it came to be there.
No one who has had the advantage of passing through Grayville by day can
have failed to observe the large stone building crowning the low hill to
the north of the railway station--that is to say, to the right in going
toward Great Mowbray. It is a somewhat dull-looking edifice, of the
Early Comatose order, and appears to have been designed by an architect
who shrank from publicity, and although unable to conceal his work--even
compelled, in this instance, to set it on an eminence in the sight of
men--did what he honestly could to insure it against a second look. So
far as concerns its outer and visible aspect, the Abersush Home for Old
Men is unquestionably inhospitable to human attention. But it is a
building of great magnitude, and cost its benevolent founder the profit
of many a cargo of the teas and silks and spices that his ships brought
up from the under-world when he was in trade in Boston; though the main
expense was its endowment. Altogether, this reckless person had robbed
his heirs-at-law of no less a sum than half a million dollars and flung
it away in riotous giving. Possibly it was with a view to get out of
sight of the silent big witness to his extravagance that he shortly
afterward disposed of all his Grayville property that remained to him,
turned his back upon the scene of his prodigality and went off across
the sea in one of his own ships. But the gossips who got their
inspiration most directly from Heaven declared that he went in search of
a wife--a theory not easily reconciled with that of the village
humorist, who solemnly averred that the bachelor philanthropist had
departed this life (left Grayville, to wit) because the marriageable
maidens had made it too hot to hold him. However this may have been, he
had not returned, and although at long intervals there had come to
Grayville, in a desultory way, vague rumors of his wanderings in strange
lands, no one seemed certainly to know about him, and to the new
generation he was no more than a name. But from above the portal of the
Home for Old Men the name shouted in stone.
Despite its unpromising exterior, the Home is a fairly commodious place
of retreat from the ills that its inmates have incurred by being poor
and old and men. At the time embraced in this brief chronicle they were
in number about a score, but in acerbity, querulousness, and general
ingratitude they could hardly be reckoned at fewer than a hundred; at
least that was the estimate of the superintendent, Mr. Silas Tilbody. It
was Mr. Tilbody's steadfast conviction that always, in admitting new old
men to replace those who had gone to another and a better Home, the
trustees had distinctly in will the infraction of his peace, and the
trial of his patience. In truth, the longer the institution was
connected with him, the stronger was his feeling that the founder's
scheme of benevolence was sadly impaired by providing any inmates at
all. He had not much imagination, but with what he had he was addicted
to the reconstruction of the Home for Old Men into a kind of "castle in
Spain," with himself as castellan, hospitably entertaining about a score
of sleek and prosperous middle-aged gentlemen, consummately good-humored
and civilly willing to pay for their board and lodging. In this revised
project of philanthropy the trustees, to whom he was indebted for his
office and responsible for his conduct, had not the happiness to appear.
As to them, it was held by the village humorist aforementioned that in
their management of the great charity Providence had thoughtfully
supplied an incentive to thrift. With the inference which he expected to
be drawn from that view we have nothing to do; it had neither support
nor denial from the inmates, who certainly were most concerned. They
lived out their little remnant of life, crept into graves neatly
numbered, and were succeeded by other old men as like them as could be
desired by the Adversary of Peace. If the Home was a place of punishment
for the sin of unthrift the veteran offenders sought justice with a
persistence that attested the sincerity of their penitence. It is to one
of these that the reader's attention is now invited.
In the matter of attire this person was not altogether engaging. But for
this season, which was midwinter, a careless observer might have looked
upon him as a clever device of the husbandman indisposed to share the
fruits of his toil with the crows that toil not, neither spin--an error
that might not have been dispelled without longer and closer observation
than he seemed to court; for his progress up Abersush Street, toward the
Home in the gloom of the winter evening, was not visibly faster than
what might have been expected of a scarecrow blessed with youth, health,
and discontent. The man was indisputably ill-clad, yet not without a
certain fitness and good taste, withal; for he was obviously an
applicant for admittance to the Home, where poverty was a qualification.
In the army of indigence the uniform is rags; they serve to distinguish
the rank and file from the recruiting officers.
As the old man, entering the gate of the grounds, shuffled up the broad
walk, already white with the fast-falling snow, which from time to time
he feebly shook from its various coigns of vantage on his person, he
came under inspection of the large globe lamp that burned always by
night over the great door of the building. As if unwilling to incur its
revealing beams, he turned to the left and, passing a considerable
distance along the face of the building, rang at a smaller door emitting
a dimmer ray that came from within, through the fanlight, and expended
itself incuriously overhead. The door was opened by no less a personage
than the great Mr. Tilbody himself. Observing his visitor, who at once
uncovered, and somewhat shortened the radius of the permanent curvature
of his back, the great man gave visible token of neither surprise nor
displeasure. Mr. Tilbody was, indeed, in an uncommonly good humor, a
phenomenon ascribable doubtless to the cheerful influence of the season;
for this was Christmas Eve, and the morrow would be that blessed 365th
part of the year that all Christian souls set apart for mighty feats of
goodness and joy. Mr. Tilbody was so full of the spirit of the season
that his fat face and pale blue eyes, whose ineffectual fire served to
distinguish it from an untimely summer squash, effused so genial a glow
that it seemed a pity that he could not have lain down in it, basking in
the consciousness of his own identity. He was hatted, booted,
overcoated, and umbrellaed, as became a person who was about to expose
himself to the night and the storm on an errand of charity; for Mr.
Tilbody had just parted from his wife and children to go "down town" and
purchase the wherewithal to confirm the annual falsehood about the
hunch-bellied saint who frequents the chimneys to reward little boys and
girls who are good, and especially truthful. So he did not invite the
old man in, but saluted him cheerily:
"Hello! just in time; a moment later and you would have missed me. Come,
I have no time to waste; we'll walk a little way together."
"Thank you," said the old man, upon whose thin and white but not ignoble
face the light from the open door showed an expression that was perhaps
disappointment; "but if the trustees--if my application--"
"The trustees," Mr. Tilbody said, closing more doors than one, and
cutting off two kinds of light, "have agreed that your application
disagrees with them."
Certain sentiments are inappropriate to Christmastide, but Humor, like
Death, has all seasons for his own.
"Oh, my God!" cried the old man, in so thin and husky a tone that the
invocation was anything but impressive, and to at least one of his two
auditors sounded, indeed, somewhat ludicrous. To the Other--but that is
a matter which laymen are devoid of the light to expound.
"Yes," continued Mr. Tilbody, accommodating his gait to that of his
companion, who was mechanically, and not very successfully, retracing
the track that he had made through the snow; "they have decided that,
under the circumstances--under the very peculiar circumstances, you
understand--it would be inexpedient to admit you. As superintendent and
_ex officio_ secretary of the honorable board"--as Mr. Tilbody "read his
title clear" the magnitude of the big building, seen through its veil of
falling snow, appeared to suffer somewhat in comparison--"it is my duty
to inform you that, in the words of Deacon Byram, the chairman, your
presence in the Home would--under the circumstances--be peculiarly
embarrassing. I felt it my duty to submit to the honorable board the
statement that you made to me yesterday of your needs, your physical
condition, and the trials which it has pleased Providence to send upon
you in your very proper effort to present your claims in person; but,
after careful, and I may say prayerful, consideration of your case--with
something too, I trust, of the large charitableness appropriate to the
season--it was decided that we would not be justified in doing anything
likely to impair the usefulness of the institution intrusted (under
Providence) to our care."
They had now passed out of the grounds; the street lamp opposite the
gate was dimly visible through the snow. Already the old man's former
track was obliterated, and he seemed uncertain as to which way he should
go. Mr. Tilbody had drawn a little away from him, but paused and turned
half toward him, apparently reluctant to forego the continuing
opportunity.
"Under the circumstances," he resumed, "the decision--"
But the old man was inaccessible to the suasion of his verbosity; he had
crossed the street into a vacant lot and was going forward, rather
deviously toward nowhere in particular--which, he having nowhere in
particular to go to, was not so reasonless a proceeding as it looked.
And that is how it happened that the next morning, when the church bells
of all Grayville were ringing with an added unction appropriate to the
day, the sturdy little son of Deacon Byram, breaking a way through the
snow to the place of worship, struck his foot against the body of Amasa
Abersush, philanthropist.