“I looked. An old man was coming along the lane. His hair and beard were
as white as cotton-wool. He had a face like the sort of apple that keeps
well in winter; his coat was old and brown. There was snow about him in
patches, and he carried a small fir-tree.
“The same conviction seized upon us both. With one breath we exclaimed,
‘_It’s old Father Christmas!_’
“I know now that it was only an old man of the place, with whom we did
not happen to be acquainted, and that he was taking a little fir-tree up
to the Hall, to be made into a Christmas tree. He was a very
good-humored old fellow, and rather deaf, for which he made up by
smiling and nodding his head a good deal, and saying, ‘Aye, aye, _to_ be
sure!’ at likely intervals.
“As he passed us and met our earnest gaze, he smiled and nodded so
earnestly that I was bold enough to cry, ‘Good-evening, Father
Christmas!’
“‘Same to you!’ said he, in a high-pitched voice.
“‘Then you _are_ Father Christmas,’ said Patty.
“‘And a happy New Year,’ was Father Christmas’ reply, which rather put
me out. But he smiled in such a satisfactory manner, that Patty went on,
‘You’re very old, aren’t you?’
“‘So I be, miss, so I be,’ said Father Christmas, nodding.
“‘Father says you’re eighteen hundred and thirty years old,’ I muttered.
“‘Aye, aye, to be sure,’ said Father Christmas, ‘I’m a very long age.’
“A _very_ long age, thought I, and I added, ‘You’re nearly twice as old
as Methusaleh, you know,’ thinking that this might not have struck him.
“‘Aye, aye,’ said Father Christmas; but he did not seem to think
anything of it. After a pause he held up the tree, and cried, ‘D’ye know
what this is, little miss?’
“‘A Christmas tree,’ said Patty.
“And the old man smiled and nodded.
“I leant over the wall, and shouted, ‘But there are no candles.’
“‘By-and-by,’ said Father Christmas nodding as before. ‘When it’s dark
they’ll all be lighted up. That’ll be a fine sight!’
“‘Toys too, there’ll be, won’t there?’ said Patty.
“Father Christmas nodded his head. ‘And sweeties,’ he added,
expressively.
“I could feel Patty trembling, and my own heart beat fast. The thought
which agitated us both, was this—‘Was Father Christmas bringing the
tree to us?’ But very anxiety, and some modesty also, kept us from
asking outright.
“Only when the old man shouldered his tree, and prepared to move on, I
cried in despair, ‘Oh, are you going?’
“‘I’m coming back by-and-by,’ said he.
“‘How soon?’ cried Patty.
“‘About four o’clock,’ said the old man smiling, ‘I’m only going up
yonder.’
“And, nodding and smiling as he went, he passed away down the lane.
“‘Up yonder.’ This puzzled us. Father Christmas had pointed, but so
indefinitely, that he might have been pointing to the sky, or the
fields, or the little wood at the end of the Squire’s grounds. I thought
the latter, and suggested to Patty that perhaps he had some place
underground like Aladdin’s cave, where he got the candles, and all the
pretty things for the tree. This idea pleased us both, and we amused
ourselves by wondering what Old Father Christmas would choose for us
from his stores in that wonderful hole where he dressed his
Christmas-trees.
“‘I wonder, Patty,’ said I, ‘why there’s no picture of Father
Christmas’s dog in the book.’ For at the old man’s heels in the lane
there crept a little brown and white spaniel, looking very dirty in the
snow.
“‘Perhaps it’s a new dog that he’s got to take care of his cave,’ said
Patty.
“When we went in-doors we examined the picture afresh by the dim light
from the passage window, but there was no dog there.
“My father passed us at this moment, and patted my head. ‘Father,’ said
I, ‘I don’t know, but I do think Old Father Christmas is going to bring
us a Christmas-tree to-night.’
“‘Who’s been telling you that?’ said my father. But he passed on before
I could explain that we had seen Father Christmas himself, and had had
his word for it that he would return at four o’clock, and that the
candles on his tree would be lighted as soon as it was dark.
“We hovered on the outskirts of the rooms till four o’clock came. We sat
on the stairs and watched the big clock, which I was just learning to
read; and Patty made herself giddy with constantly looking up and
counting the four strokes, towards which the hour hand slowly moved. We
put our noses into the kitchen now and then, to smell the cakes and get
warm, and anon we hung about the parlor door, and were most unjustly
accused of trying to peep. What did we care what our mother was doing in
the parlor?—we, who had seen Old Father Christmas himself, and were
expecting him back again every moment!
“At last the church clock struck. The sounds boomed heavily through the
frost, and Patty thought there were four of them. Then, after due
choking and whirring, our own clock struck, and we counted the strokes
quite clearly—one! two! three! four! Then we got Kitty’s shawl once
more, and stole out into the back-yard. We ran to our old place, and
peeped, but could see nothing.
“‘We’d better get up on to the wall,’ I said; and with some difficulty
and distress from rubbing her bare knees against the cold stones, and
getting the snow up her sleeves, Patty got on to the coping of the
little wall. I was just struggling after her, when something warm and
something cold coming suddenly against the bare calves of my legs, made
me shriek with fright. I came down ‘with a run,’ and bruised my knees,
my elbows, and my chin; and the snow that hadn’t gone up Patty’s
sleeves, went down my neck. Then I found that the cold thing was a dog’s
nose and the warm thing was his tongue; and Patty cried from her post of
observation, ‘It’s Father Christmas’s dog and he’s licking your legs.’
“It really was the dirty little brown and white spaniel; and he
persisted in licking me, and jumping on me, and making curious little
noises, that must have meant something if one had known his language. I
was rather harassed at the moment. My legs were sore, I was a little
afraid of the dog and Patty was very much afraid of sitting on the wall
without me.
“‘You won’t fall,’ I said to her. ‘Get down, will you?’ I said to the
dog.
“‘Humpty Dumpty fell off a wall,’ said Patty.
“‘Bow! wow!’ said the dog.
“I pulled Patty down, and the dog tried to pull me down; but when my
little sister was on her feet, to my relief, he transferred his
attentions to her. When he had jumped at her, and licked her several
times, he turned round and ran away.
“‘He’s gone,’ said I; ‘I’m so glad.’
“But even as I spoke he was back again, crouching at Patty’s feet, and
glaring at her with eyes the color of his ears.
“Now, Patty was very fond of animals, and when the dog looked at her she
looked at the dog, and then she said to me, ‘He wants us to go with
him.’
“On which (as if he understood our language, though we were ignorant of
his) the spaniel sprang away, and went off as hard as he could; and
Patty and I went after him, a dim hope crossing my mind—‘Perhaps Father
Christmas had sent him for us.’
“The idea was rather favored by the fact that the dog led us up the
lane. Only a little way; then he stopped by something lying in the
ditch—and once more we cried in the same breath, ‘It’s Old Father
Christmas!’