bedclothes. After a while she became aware of a storm of words from her
husband, and she got up, subdued as much as possible her agitation, and
tried to answer his frantic questions.
"How much did he give you, old stupid?" he screamed; "can't you speak,
or are you struck dumb? Wake up! I just wish I could reach you! I'd
shake you till your teeth rattled!"
If his vicious looks were a sign, it was evident that he only lacked the
strength to be as good as his word.
Ann roused herself from her stupour and spoke at last.
"I don't know. I'll count it." She unrolled the bills and began.
"O Lord!" she exclaimed excitedly, "here's ten-dollar bills! One,
two, three, and a twenty--that makes five--and five are
fifty-five--sixty--seventy--eighty--eighty-five--ninety--one
hundred--and two and five are seven, and two and one are ten,
twenty--twenty-five--one hundred and twenty-five! Why, I'm rich!" she
shouted. "Bless the Lord! Oh, this is the glorious Christmas Day! I knew
He'd provide. Katey! Katey!" she screamed at the door of the other room,
where the child lay asleep. "Merry Christmas to you, darlin'! Now you
can have some shoes! and a new dress! and--and--breakfast, and a regular
Christmas dinner! Oh! I believe I shall go crazy!"
But she did not. Joy seldom hurts people, and she was brought back to
everyday affairs by the querulous voice of her husband.
"Now I will have my tea, an' a new blanket, an' some tobacco--how I have
wanted a pipe!" and he went on enumerating his wants while Ann bustled
about, putting away most of her money, and once more getting ready to go
out.
"I'll run out and get some breakfast," she said "but don't you tell a
soul about the money."
"No! they'll rob us!" shrieked the old man.
"Nonsense! I'll hide it well, but I want to keep it a secret for another
reason. Mind, Katey, don't you tell?"
"No!" said Katey, with wide eyes. "But can I truly have a new frock,
Mammy, and new shoes--and is it really Christmas?"
"It's really Christmas, darlin'," said Ann, "and you'll see what
mammy'll bring home to you, after breakfast."
The luxurious meal of sausages, potatoes, and hot tea was soon smoking
on the table, and was eagerly devoured by Katey and her father. But Ann
could not eat much. She was absent-minded, and only drank a cup of tea.
As soon as breakfast was over, she left Katey to wash the dishes, and
started out again.
She walked slowly down the street, revolving a great plan in her mind.
"Let me see," she said to herself. "They shall have a happy day for
once. I suppose John'll grumble, but the Lord has sent me this money,
and I mean to use part of it to make one good day for them."
Having settled this in her mind, she walked on more quickly, and visited
various shops in the neighbourhood. When at last she went home, her big
basket was stuffed as full as it could hold, and she carried a bundle
besides.
"Here's your tea, John," she said cheerfully, as she unpacked the
basket, "a whole pound of it, and sugar, and tobacco, and a new pipe."
"Give me some now," said the old man eagerly; "don't wait to take out
the rest of the things."
"And here's a new frock for you, Katey," old Ann went on, after making
John happy with his treasures, "a real bright one, and a pair of shoes,
and some real woollen stockings; oh! how warm you'll be!"
"Oh, how nice, Mammy!" cried Katey, jumping about. "When will you make
my frock?"
"To-morrow," answered the mother, "and you can go to school again."
"Oh, goody!" she began, but her face fell. "If only Molly Parker could
go too!"
"You wait and see," answered Ann, with a knowing look. "Who knows what
Christmas will bring to Molly Parker?"
"Now here's a nice big roast," the happy woman went on, still unpacking,
"and potatoes and turnips and cabbage and bread and butter and coffee
and----"
"What in the world! You goin' to give a party?" asked the old man
between the puffs, staring at her in wonder.
"I'll tell you just what I am going to do," said Ann firmly, bracing
herself for opposition, "and it's as good as done, so you needn't say a
word about it. I'm going to have a Christmas dinner, and I'm going to
invite every blessed soul in this house to come. They shall be warm and
full for once in their lives, please God! And, Katey," she went on
breathlessly, before the old man had sufficiently recovered from his
astonishment to speak, "go right upstairs now, and invite every one of
'em from the fathers down to Mrs. Parker's baby to come to dinner at
three o'clock; we'll have to keep fashionable hours, it's so late now;
and mind, Katey, not a word about the money. And hurry back, child, I
want you to help me."
To her surprise, the opposition from her husband was less than she
expected. The genial tobacco seemed to have quieted his nerves, and even
opened his heart. Grateful for this, Ann resolved that his pipe should
never lack tobacco while she could work.
But now the cares of dinner absorbed her. The meat and vegetables were
prepared, the pudding made, and the long table spread, though she had to
borrow every table in the house, and every dish to have enough to go
around.
At three o'clock when the guests came in, it was really a very pleasant
sight. The bright warm fire, the long table, covered with a substantial,
and, to them, a luxurious meal, all smoking hot. John, in his neatly
brushed suit, in an armchair at the foot of the table, Ann in a bustle
of hurry and welcome, and a plate and a seat for every one.
How the half-starved creatures enjoyed it; how the children stuffed and
the parents looked on with a happiness that was very near to tears; how
old John actually smiled and urged them to send back their plates again
and again, and how Ann, the washerwoman, was the life and soul of it
all, I can't half tell.
After dinner, when the poor women lodgers insisted on clearing up, and
the poor men sat down by the fire to smoke, for old John actually passed
around his beloved tobacco, Ann quietly slipped out for a few minutes,
took four large bundles from a closet under the stairs, and disappeared
upstairs. She was scarcely missed before she was back again.
Well, of course it was a great day in the house on the alley, and the
guests sat long into the twilight before the warm fire, talking of their
old homes in the fatherland, the hard winter, and prospects for work in
the spring.
When at last they returned to the chilly discomfort of their own rooms,
each family found a package containing a new warm dress and pair of
shoes for every woman and child in the family.
"And I have enough left," said Ann the washerwoman, to herself, when she
was reckoning up the expenses of the day, "to buy my coal and pay my
rent till spring, so I can save my old bones a bit. And sure John can't
grumble at their staying now, for it's all along of keeping them that I
had such a blessed Christmas day at all."
FOOTNOTE:
[K] From "Kristy's Queer Christmas," Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1904.
XVII
A CHRISTMAS STAR[L]
KATHERINE PYLE
"COME now, my dear little stars," said Mother Moon, "and I will tell you
the Christmas story."
Every morning for a week before Christmas, Mother Moon used to call all
the little stars around her and tell them a story.
It was always the same story, but the stars never wearied of it. It was
the story of the Christmas star--the Star of Bethlehem.
When Mother Moon had finished the story the little stars always said:
"And the star is shining still, isn't it, Mother Moon, even if we can't
see it?"
And Mother Moon would answer: "Yes, my dears, only now it shines for
men's hearts instead of their eyes."
Then the stars would bid the Mother Moon good-night and put on their
little blue nightcaps and go to bed in the sky chamber; for the stars'
bedtime is when people down on the earth are beginning to waken and see
that it is morning.
But that particular morning when the little stars said good-night and
went quietly away, one golden star still lingered beside Mother Moon.
"What is the matter, my little star?" asked the Mother Moon. "Why don't
you go with your little sisters?"
"Oh, Mother Moon," said the golden star. "I am so sad! I wish I could
shine for some one's heart like that star of wonder that you tell us
about."
"Why, aren't you happy up here in the sky country?" asked Mother Moon.
"Yes, I have been very happy," said the star; "but to-night it seems
just as if I must find some heart to shine for."
"Then if that is so," said Mother Moon, "the time has come, my little
star, for you to go through the Wonder Entry."
"The Wonder Entry? What is that?" asked the star. But the Mother Moon
made no answer.
Rising, she took the little star by the hand and led it to a door that
it had never seen before.
The Mother Moon opened the door, and there was a long dark entry; at the
far end was shining a little speck of light.
"What is this?" asked the star.
"It is the Wonder Entry; and it is through this that you must go to find
the heart where you belong," said the Mother Moon.
Then the little star was afraid.
It longed to go through the entry as it had never longed for anything
before; and yet it was afraid and clung to the Mother Moon.
But very gently, almost sadly, the Mother Moon drew her hand away. "Go,
my child," she said.
Then, wondering and trembling, the little star stepped into the Wonder
Entry, and the door of the sky house closed behind it.
The next thing the star knew it was hanging in a toy shop with a whole
row of other stars blue and red and silver. It itself was gold.
The shop smelled of evergreen, and was full of Christmas shoppers, men
and women and children; but of them all, the star looked at no one but a
little boy standing in front of the counter; for as soon as the star saw
the child it knew that he was the one to whom it belonged.
The little boy was standing beside a sweet-faced woman in a long black
veil and he was not looking at anything in particular.
The star shook and trembled on the string that held it, because it was
afraid lest the child would not see it, or lest, if he did, he would not
know it as his star.
The lady had a number of toys on the counter before her, and she was
saying: "Now I think we have presents for every one: There's the doll
for Lou, and the game for Ned, and the music box for May; and then the
rocking horse and the sled."
Suddenly the little boy caught her by the arm. "Oh, mother," he said. He
had seen the star.
"Well, what is it, darling?" asked the lady.
"Oh, mother, just see that star up there! I wish--oh, I do wish I had
it."
"Oh, my dear, we have so many things for the Christmas-tree," said the
mother.
"Yes, I know, but I do want the star," said the child.
"Very well," said the mother, smiling; "then we will take that, too."
So the star was taken down from the place where it hung and wrapped up
in a piece of paper, and all the while it thrilled with joy, for now it
belonged to the little boy.
It was not until the afternoon before Christmas, when the tree was being
decorated, that the golden star was unwrapped and taken out from the
paper.
"Here is something else," said the sweet-faced lady. "We must hang this
on the tree. Paul took such a fancy to it that I had to get it for him.
He will never be satisfied unless we hang it on too."
"Oh, yes," said some one else who was helping to decorate the tree; "we
will hang it here on the very top."
So the little star hung on the highest branch of the Christmas-tree.
That evening all the candles were lighted on the Christmas-tree, and
there were so many that they fairly dazzled the eyes; and the gold and
silver balls, the fairies and the glass fruits, shone and twinkled in
the light; and high above them all shone the golden star.
At seven o'clock a bell was rung, and then the folding doors of the room
where the Christmas-tree stood were thrown open, and a crowd of children
came trooping in.
They laughed and shouted and pointed, and all talked together, and after
a while there was music, and presents were taken from the tree and given
to the children.
How different it all was from the great wide, still sky house!
But the star had never been so happy in all its life; for the little boy
was there.
He stood apart from the other children, looking up at the star, with his
hands clasped behind him, and he did not seem to care for the toys and
the games.
At last it was all over. The lights were put out, the children went
home, and the house grew still.
Then the ornaments on the tree began to talk among themselves.
"So that is all over," said a silver ball. "It was very gay this
evening--the gayest Christmas I remember."
"Yes," said a glass bunch of grapes; "the best of it is over. Of course
people will come to look at us for several days yet, but it won't be
like this evening."
"And then I suppose we'll be laid away for another year," said a paper
fairy. "Really it seems hardly worth while. Such a few days out of the
year and then to be shut up in the dark box again. I almost wish I were
a paper doll."
The bunch of grapes was wrong in saying that people would come to look
at the Christmas-tree the next few days, for it stood neglected in the
library and nobody came near it. Everybody in the house went about very
quietly, with anxious faces; for the little boy was ill.
At last, one evening, a woman came into the room with a servant. The
woman wore the cap and apron of a nurse.
"That is it," she said, pointing to the golden star.
The servant climbed up on some steps and took down the star and put it
in the nurse's hand, and she carried it out into the hall and upstairs
to a room where the little boy lay.
The sweet-faced lady was sitting by the bed, and as the nurse came in
she held out her hand for the star.
"Is this what you wanted, my darling?" she asked, bending over the
little boy.
The child nodded and held out his hands for the star; and as he clasped
it a wonderful, shining smile came over his face.
The next morning the little boy's room was very still and dark.
The golden piece of paper that had been the star lay on a table beside
the bed, its five points very sharp and bright.
But it was not the real star, any more than a person's body is the real
person.
The real star was living and shining now in the little boy's heart, and
it had gone out with him into a new and more beautiful sky country than
it had ever known before--the sky country where the little child angels
live, each one carrying in its heart its own particular star.
FOOTNOTE:
[L] Published by permission of the American Book Co.
XVIII
THE QUEEREST CHRISTMAS[M]
GRACE MARGARET GALLAHER
BETTY stood at her door, gazing drearily down the long, empty corridor
in which the breakfast gong echoed mournfully. All the usual brisk
scenes of that hour, groups of girls in Peter Thomson suits or starched
shirt-waists, or a pair of energetic ones, red-cheeked and shining-eyed
from a run in the snow, had vanished as by the hand of some evil
magician. Silent and lonely was the corridor.
"And it's the day before Christmas!" groaned Betty. Two chill little
tears hung on her eyelashes.
The night before, in the excitement of getting the girls off with all
their trunks and packages intact, she had not realized the homesickness
of the deserted school. Now it seemed to pierce her very bones.
"Oh, dear, why did father have to lose his money? 'Twas easy enough last
September to decide I wouldn't take the expensive journey home these
holidays, and for all of us to promise we wouldn't give each other as
much as a Christmas card. But now!" The two chill tears slipped over the
edge of her eyelashes. "Well, I know how I'll spend this whole day;
I'll come right up here after breakfast and cry and cry and cry!"
Somewhat fortified by this cheering resolve, Betty went to breakfast.
Whatever the material joys of that meal might be, it certainly was not
"a feast of reason and a flow of soul." Betty, whose sense of humour
never perished, even in such a frost, looked round the table at the
eight grim-faced girls doomed to a Christmas in school, and quoted
mischievously to herself: "On with the dance, let joy be unconfined."
Breakfast bolted, she lagged back to her room, stopping to stare out of
the corridor windows.
She saw nothing of the snowy landscape, however. Instead, a picture, the
gayest medley of many colours and figures, danced before her eyes:
Christmas-trees thumping in through the door, mysterious bundles
scurried into dark corners, little brothers and sisters flying about
with festoons of mistletoe, scarlet ribbon and holly, everywhere sound
and laughter and excitement. The motto of Betty's family was: "Never do
to-day what you can put off till to-morrow"; therefore the preparations
of a fortnight were always crowded into a day.
The year before, Betty had rushed till her nerves were taut and her
temper snapped, had shaken the twins, raged at the housemaid, and had
gone to bed at midnight weeping with weariness. But in memory only the
joy of the day remained.
"I think I could endure this jail of a school, and not getting one
single present, but it breaks my heart not to give one least little
thing to any one! Why, who ever heard of such a Christmas!"
"Won't you hunt for that blue----"
"Broken my thread again!"
"Give me those scissors!"
Betty jumped out of her day-dream. She had wandered into "Cork" and the
three O'Neills surrounded her, staring.
"I beg your pardon--I heard you--and it was so like home the day before
Christmas----"
"Did you hear the heathen rage?" cried Katherine.
"Dolls for Aunt Anne's mission," explained Constance.
"You're so forehanded that all your presents went a week ago, I
suppose," Eleanor swept clear a chair. "The clan O'Neill is never
forehanded."
"You'd think I was from the number of thumbs I've grown this morning.
Oh, misery!" Eleanor jerked a snarl of thread out on the floor.
Betty had never cared for "Cork" but now the hot worried faces of its
girls appealed to her.
"Let me help. I'm a regular silkworm."
The O'Neills assented with eagerness, and Betty began to sew in a
capable, swift way that made the others stare and sigh with relief.
The dolls were many, the O'Neills slow. Betty worked till her feet
twitched on the floor; yet she enjoyed the morning, for it held an
entirely new sensation, that of helping some one else get ready for
Christmas.
"Done!"
"We never should have finished if you hadn't helped! Thank you, Betty
Luther, very, _very_ much! You're a duck! Let's run to luncheon
together, quick."
Somehow the big corridors did not seem half so bleak echoing to those
warm O'Neill voices.
"This morning's just spun by, but, oh, this long, dreary afternoon!"
sighed Betty, as she wandered into the library. "Oh, me, there goes
Alice Johns with her arms loaded with presents to mail, and I can't give
a single soul anything!"
"Do you know where 'Quotations for Occasions' has gone?" Betty turned to
face pretty Rosamond Howitt, the only senior left behind.
"Gone to be rebound. I heard Miss Dyce say so."
"Oh, dear, I needed it so."
"Could I help? I know a lot of rhymes and tags of proverbs and things
like that."
"Oh, if you would help me, I'd be so grateful! Won't you come to my
room? You see, I promised a friend in town, who is to have a Christmas
dinner, and who's been very kind to me, that I'd paint the place cards
and write some quotation appropriate to each guest. I'm shamefully late
over it, my own gifts took such a time; but the painting, at least, is
done."
Rosamond led the way to her room, and there displayed the cards which
she had painted.
"You can't think of my helplessness! If it were a Greek verb now, or a
lost and strayed angle--but poetry!"
Betty trotted back and forth between the room and the library, delved
into books, and even evolved a verse which she audaciously tagged "old
play," in imitation of Sir Walter Scott.
"I think they are really and truly very bright, and I know Mrs. Fernell
will be delighted." Rosamond wrapped up the cards carefully. "I can't
begin to tell you how you've helped me. It was sweet in you to give me
your whole afternoon."
The dinner-bell rang at that moment, and the two went down together.
"Come for a little run; I haven't been out all day," whispered Rosamond,
slipping her hand into Betty's as they left the table.
A great round moon swung cold and bright over the pines by the lodge.
"Down the road a bit--just a little way--to the church," suggested
Betty.
They stepped out into the silent country road.
"Why, the little mission is as gay as--as Christmas! I wonder why?"
Betty glanced at the bright windows of the small plain church. "Oh, some
Christmas-eve doings," she answered.
Some one stepped quickly out from the church door.
"Oh, Miss Vernon, I am relieved! I had begun to fear you could not
come."
The girls saw it was the tall old rector, his white hair shining silver
bright in the moonbeams.
"We're just two girls from the school, sir," said Rosamond.
"Dear, dear!" His voice was both impatient and distressed. "I hoped you
were my organist. We are all ready for our Christmas-eve service, but we
can do nothing without the music."
"I can play the organ a little," said Betty. "I'd be glad to help."
"You can? My dear child, how fortunate! But--do you know the service?"
"Yes, sir, it's my church."
No vested choir stood ready to march triumphantly chanting into the
choir stalls. Only a few boys and girls waited in the dim old choir
loft, where Rosamond seated herself quietly.
Betty's fingers trembled so at first that the music sounded dull and far
away; but her courage crept back to her in the silence of the church,
and the organ seemed to help her with a brave power of its own. In the
dark church only the altar and a great gold star above it shone bright.
Through an open window somewhere behind her she could hear the winter
wind rattling the ivy leaves and bending the trees. Yet, somehow, she
did not feel lonesome and forsaken this Christmas eve, far away from
home, but safe and comforted and sheltered. The voice of the old rector
reached her faintly in pauses; habit led her along the service, and the
star at the altar held her eyes.
Strange new ideas and emotions flowed in upon her brain. Tears stole
softly into her eyes, yet she felt in her heart a sweet glow. Slowly the
Christmas picture that had flamed and danced before her all day, painted
in the glory of holly and mistletoe and tinsel, faded out, and another
shaped itself, solemn and beautiful in the altar light.
"My dear child, I thank you very much!" The old rector held Betty's hand
in both his. "I cannot have a Christmas morning service--our people have
too much to do to come then--but I was especially anxious that our
evening service should have some message, some inspiration for them, and
your music has made it so. You have given me great aid. May your
Christmas be a blessed one."
"I was glad to play, sir. Thank you!" answered Betty, simply.
"Let's run!" she cried to Rosamond, and they raced back to school.
She fell asleep that night without one smallest tear.
The next morning Betty dressed hastily, and catching up her mandolin,
set out into the corridor.
Something swung against her hand as she opened the door. It was a great
bunch of holly, glossy green leaves and glowing berries, and hidden in
the leaves a card:
"Betty, Merry Christmas," was all, but only one girl wrote that dainty
hand.
"A winter rose," whispered Betty, happily, and stuck the bunch into the
ribbon of her mandolin.
Down the corridor she ran until she faced a closed door. Then, twanging
her mandolin, she burst out with all her power into a gay Christmas
carol. High and sweet sang her voice in the silent corridor all through
the gay carol. Then, sweeter still, it changed into a Christmas hymn.
Then from behind the closed doors sounded voices:
"Merry Christmas, Betty Luther!"
Then Constance O'Neill's deep, smooth alto flowed into Betty's soprano;
and at the last all nine girls joined in "Adeste Fideles." Christmas
morning began with music and laughter.
"This is your place, Betty. You are lord of Christmas morning."
Betty stood, blushing, red as the holly in her hand, before the
breakfast table. Miss Hyle, the teacher at the head of the table, had
given up her place.
The breakfast was a merry one. After it somebody suggested that they all
go skating on the pond.
Betty hesitated and glanced at Miss Hyle and Miss Thrasher, the two
sad-looking teachers.
She approached them and said, "Won't you come skating, too?"