Christmas Eve had come and the year of 1850. For two weeks snow
had rushed over the creaking gable of the forest above Martha
Vaughn's, to pile in drifts or go hissing down the long hillside.
A freezing blast had driven it to the roots of the stubble and sown
it deep and rolled it into ridges and whirled it into heaps and
mounds, or flung it far in long waves that seemed to plunge, as if
part of a white sea, and break over fence and roof and chimney in
their downrush. Candle and firelight filtered through frosty panes
and glowed, dimly, under dark fathoms of the snow sheet now flying
full of voices. Mrs. Vaughn opened her door a moment to peer out.
A great horned owl flashed across the light beam with a snap and
rustle of wings and a cry "oo-oo-oo," lonely, like that, as if it
were the spirit of darkness and the cold wind. Mrs. Vaughn
started, turning quickly and closing the door.
"Ugh! what a sound," said Polly. "It reminds me of a ghost story."
"Well," said the widow, "that thing belongs to the only family o'
real ghosts in the world."
"What was it?" said a small boy. There were Polly and three
children about the fireplace.
"An air cat," said she, shivering, her back to the fire. "They go
'round at night in a great sheet o' feathers an' rustle it, an' I
declare they do cry lonesome. Got terrible claws, too!"
"Ever hurt folks?" one of the boys inquired.
"No; but they're just like some kinds o' people--ye want to let 'em
alone. Any one that'll shake hands with an owl would be fool
enough to eat fish-hooks. They're not made for friendship--those
owls."
"What are they made for?" another voice inquired.
"Just to kill," said she, patting a boy's head tenderly. "They're
Death flying round at night--the angel o' Death for rats an'
rabbits an' birds an' other little creatures. Once,--oh, many
years ago,--it seemed so everything was made to kill. Men were
like beasts o' prey, most of 'em; an' they're not all gone yet.
Went around day an' night killing. I declare they must have had
claws. Then came the Prince o' Peace."
"What did he do to 'em, mother?" said Paul--a boy of seven.
"Well, he began to cut their claws for one thing," said the mother.
"Taught 'em to love an' not to kill. Shall I read you the
story--how he came in a manger?"
"B'lieve I'd rather hear about Injuns," said the boy.
"We shall hear about them too," the mother added. "They're like
folks o' the olden time. They make a terrible fuss; but they've
got to hold still an' have their claws cut."
Presently she sat down by a table, where there were candles, and
began reading aloud from a county paper. She read anecdotes of
men, remarkable for their success and piety, and an account of
Indian fighting, interrupted, as a red man lifted his tomahawk to
slay, by the rattle of an arrow on the buttery door.
It was off the cross-gun of young Paul. He had seen everything in
the story and had taken aim at the said Indian just in the nick of
time.
She read, also, the old sweet story of the coming of the Christ
Child.
"Some say it was a night like this," said she, as the story ended.
Paul had listened, his thin, sober face glowing.
"I'll bet Santa Claus was good to him," said he. "Brought him
sleds an' candy an' nuts an' raisins an' new boots an' everything."
"Why do you think so?" asked his mother, who was now reading
intently.
"'Cos he was a good boy. He wouldn't cry if he had to fill the
wood box; would he, mother?"
That query held a hidden rebuke for his brother Tom.
"I do not know, but I do not think he was ever saucy or spoke a bad
word."
"Huh!" said Tom, reflectively; "then I guess he never had no
mustard plaster put on him."
The widow bade him hush.
"Er never had nuthin' done to him, neither," the boy continued,
rocking vigorously in his little chair.
"Mustn't speak so of Christ," the mother added.
"Wal," said Paul, rising, "I guess I'll hang up my stockin's."
"One'll do, Paul," said his sister Polly, with a knowing air.
"No, 'twon't," the boy insisted. "They ain't half 's big as yours.
I'm goin' t' try it, anyway, an' see what he'll do to 'em."
He drew off his stockings and pinned them carefully to the braces
on the back of a chair.
"Well, my son," said Mrs. Vaughn, looking over the top of her
paper, "it's bad weather; Santa Claus may not be able to get here."
"Oh, yes, he can," said the boy, confidently, but with a little
quiver of alarm in his voice. "I'm sure he'll come. He has a team
of reindeers. 'An' the deeper the snow the faster they go.'"
Soon the others bared their feet and hung their stockings on four
chairs in a row beside the first.
Then they all got on the bed in the corner and pulled a quilt over
them to wait for Santa Claus. The mother went on with her reading
as they chattered.
Sleep hushed them presently. But for the crackling of the fire,
and the push and whistle of the wind, that room had become as a
peaceful, silent cave under the storm.
The widow rose stealthily and opened a bureau drawer. The row of
limp stockings began to look cheerful and animated. Little
packages fell to their toes, and the shortest began to reach for
the floor. But while they were fat in the foot they were still
very lean in the leg.
Her apron empty, Mrs. Vaughn took her knitting to the fire, and
before she began to ply the needles, looked thoughtfully at her
hands. They had been soft and shapely before the days of toil. A
frail but comely woman she was, with pale face, and dark eyes, and
hair prematurely white.
She had come west--a girl of nineteen--with her young husband, full
of high hopes. That was twenty-one years ago, and the new land had
poorly kept its promise.
And the children--"How many have you?" a caller had once inquired.
"Listen," said she, "hear 'em, an' you'd say there were fifteen,
but count 'em an' they're only four."
The low, weathered house and sixty acres were mortgaged. Even the
wilderness had not wholly signed off its claim. Every year it
exacted tribute, the foxes taking a share of her poultry, and the
wild deer feeding on her grain.
A little beggar of a dog, that now lay in the firelight, had
offered himself one day, with cheerful confidence, and been
accepted. Small, affectionate, cowardly, irresponsible, and
yellow, he was in the nature of a luxury, as the widow had once
said. He had a slim nose, no longer than a man's thumb, and ever
busy. He was a most prudent animal, and the first day found a
small opening in the foundation of the barn through which he betook
himself always at any sign of danger. He soon buried his bones
there, and was ready for a siege if, perchance, it came. One blow
or even a harsh word sent him to his refuge in hot haste. He had
learned early that the ways of hired men were full of violence and
peril. Hospitality and affection had won his confidence but never
deprived him of his caution.
Presently there came a heavy step and a quick pull at the
latch-string. An odd figure entered in a swirl of snow--a real
Santa Claus, the mystery and blessing of Cedar Hill. For five
years, every Christmas Eve, in good or bad weather, he had come to
four little houses on the Hill, where, indeed, his coming had been
as a Godsend. Whence he came and who he might be none had been
able to guess. He never spoke in his official capacity, and no
citizen of Faraway had such a beard or figure as this man. Now his
fur coat, his beard, and eyebrows were hoary with snow and frost.
Icicles hung from his mustache around the short clay pipe of
tradition. He lowered a great sack and brushed the snow off it.
He had borne it high on his back, with a strap at each shoulder.
The sack was now about half full of things. He took out three big
bundles and laid them on the table. They were evidently for the
widow herself, who quickly stepped to the bedside.
"Come, children," she whispered, rousing them; "here is Santa
Claus."
They scrambled down, rubbing their eyes. Polly took the hands of
the two small boys and led them near him. Paul drew his hand away
and stood spellbound, eyes and mouth open. He watched every motion
of the good Saint, who had come to that chair that held the little
stockings. Santa Claus put a pair of boots on it. They were
copper-toed, with gorgeous front pieces of red morocco at the top
of the leg. Then, as if he had some relish of a joke, he took them
up, looked them over thoughtfully, and put them in the sack again,
whereupon the boy Paul burst into tears. Old Santa Claus, shaking
with silent laughter, replaced them in the chair quickly,
As if to lighten the boy's heart he opened a box and took out a
mouth-organ. He held it so the light sparkled on its shiny side.
Then he put his pipe in his pocket and began to dance and play
lively music. Step and tune quickened. The bulky figure was
flying up and down above a great clatter of big boots, his head
wagging to keep time. The oldest children were laughing, and the
boy Paul, he began to smile in the midst of a great sob that shook
him to the toes. The player stopped suddenly, stuffed the
instrument in a stocking, and went on with his work. Presently he
uncovered a stick of candy long as a man's arm. There were spiral
stripes of red from end to end of it. He used it for a fiddle-bow,
whistling with terrific energy and sawing the air. Then he put
shawls and tippets and boots and various little packages on the
other chairs.
At last he drew out of the sack a sheet of pasteboard, with string
attached, and hung it on the wall. It bore the simple message,
rudely lettered in black, as follows:--
"Mery Crismus. And Children i have the
honnor to remane, Yours Respec'fully
SANDY CLAUS."
His work done, he swung the pack to his shoulders and made off as
they all broke the silence with a hearty "Thank you, Santa Claus!"
They listened a moment, as he went away with a loud and merry laugh
sounding above the roar of the wind. It was the voice of a big and
gentle heart, but gave no other clew. In a moment cries of
delight, and a rustle of wrappings, filled the room. As on wings
of the bitter wind, joy and good fortune had come to them, and, in
that little house, had drifted deep as the snow without.
The children went to their beds with slow feet and quick pulses.
Paul begged for the sacred privilege of wearing his new boots to
bed, but compromised on having them beside his pillow. The boys
went to sleep at last, with all their treasures heaped about them.
Tom shortly rolled upon the little jumping-jack, that broke away
and butted him in the face with a loud squawk. It roused the boy,
who promptly set up a defence in which the stuffed hen lost her
tail-feathers and the jumping-jack was violently put out of bed.
When the mother came to see what had happened, order had been
restored--the boys were both sleeping.
It was an odd little room under bare shingles above stairs. Great
chests, filled with relics of another time and country, sat against
the walls. Here and there a bunch of herbs or a few ears of corn,
their husks braided, hung on the bare rafters. The aroma of the
summer fields--of peppermint, catnip, and lobelia--haunted it.
Chimney and stovepipe tempered the cold. A crack in the gable end
let in a sift of snow that had been heaping up a lonely little
drift on the bare floor. The widow covered the boys tenderly and
took their treasures off the bed, all save the little wooden
monkey, which, as if frightened by the melee, had hidden far under
the clothes. She went below stairs to the fire, which every cold
day was well fed until after midnight, and began to enjoy the sight
of her own gifts. They were a haunch of venison, a sack of flour,
a shawl, and mittens. A small package had fallen to the floor. It
was neatly bound with wrappings of blue paper. Under the last
layer was a little box, the words "For Polly" on its cover. It
held a locket of wrought gold that outshone the light of the
candles. She touched a spring, and the case opened. Inside was a
lock of hair, white as her own. There were three lines cut in the
glowing metal, and she read them over and over again:--
"Here are silver and gold,
The one for a day of remembrance between thee and dishonour,
The other for a day of plenty between thee and want."
She went to her bed, presently, where the girl lay sleeping, and,
lifting dark masses of her hair, kissed a ruddy cheek. Then the
widow stood a moment, wiping her eyes.