The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1885-12-25


covered his balance, and PuHs sprang away
with little black-and-tan yelp. He was en-
tlrely safe in a moment behind Batty Perouse,
and looked out from his refuge with bark al
ready to let go. He would have preferred the
other side of fence, but had deal of conf
dence In Batty. That was more than Bltty
had in himself, for he backed off toward the
edge OF the sidewalk, and his eyes grew wider
as he looked up at Grandfather Starin.
The old man paused and looked down, and
a great hoarse croak came struggling up to
his hard mouth. 1t tried twice, and the sec
ond time it sounded like:
wish you Merry Christmas I"
Batty instantly responded:
mo, sir. 1t can't come. We've got ours
ALI that belongs to us. Fathers got the rest
where he is. Mother said So"
There came another harsh croak that Batty
could not understand, and the old man walked
on. Puns came around in front of Batty, and
began to look brave.
Jim Denike says there isn't any Christmas
in him. Puns. Jim knows. He's been to
one, He said so, and he saw Sandy Claws"
AT that very moment Jim was on his way
home from Sheaver's wood with sled-load OF
evergreens. At the top of he hill he had
paused until Deacon Travers and his team
should climb past him, SO that he could "coast
1t" down the road to the level, for there was
not another team coming.
."Wish you Merry Christmas" said Jim, and
his eyes had bad twinkle in them.
"Christmas," grunted the deacon.
You're the luckiest man around here" said
Jim. Nobody else'l have more'n one Christ
mas, and you'll have two."
what do you mean, you"
why, little Batty Perouse says his mother
said you never let go of anything you once
got your hands on. You must have stuck to
you did Of
You saucy young rascal !" exclaimed the
deacon, as he sprang from his sleigh, but as
his feet touched the snow there was heaped-
up sled with black-eyed boy on it, CHANGING
away down the hill at an express train speed.
"He got her old house awful cheap" said
jim, as the swift air made his cheeks tingle
'He might as well have Christmas present
OF what some folks think about it,
Deacon Travers drove on, grumbllng:
Justice is justice. I'd no idee she had any
hard feelin's about it. and her fathers rich
man, too Richer'n am"
Beyond the long slide at the foot of the hill
the sled-load of greens had to be dragged,
and Jim was little out of breath when he
met old Judge Peters, the lawyer carrying a
huge turkey in each hand. A man is never
more helpless than when his hands are full.
''Guess you didn't raise 'em, judge. Wish
you merry Christmas"
RAISE EN-? No. Merry Christmas" said
the lawyer, crustily. 81 don't raise poultry,
Guess not" said Jim. Little Batty Pc
rouse asked me what a fee was. He said his
mother said you raised 'em. Real fat ones.
Were they fatter'n them turkeys?"
He received no answer whatever, but if
either OF those turkeys had been a brick he
might have had one and the LAWYERS face was
turkey red" as he walked %. Before the
sled was in Mr.. Denikes front yard, Grand
father Starin had shut his own gate behind
him. He went around to the side door, and
that carried him past the sitting room window,
and somehow or other heistopped and looked
In: 1t was a pleasant cosy sort of room, with
bright wood fire blazing in an old-fashioned,
open-faced, "Franklin" stove. Right in front
OF the fire sat an old lady, and her face had
w1thered, worn-out look, but there was faint
glow upon it that may have come from the
blazing hickory. She was knitting, and her
lips moved as If she was singing something,
and her foot rested on the rocker OF great
wooden cradle.
"Sakes alive She's crazy!" exclaimed
Grandfather Starin, and yet he walked very
slowly, indeed, to the side door and into the
house. She heard his heavy feet on the snow
on the doorsteps, but he did not hear her say:
Hes coming. oh, dear! II Testers baby
were here It's all can do"
Maria" said he, as he walked in, show did
you ever get that thing down out of the store
room? What did you do it for?
II couldn't help doing ii, somehow. Pears
to me almost as if it wasn't just empty. To-
morrow's-"
Then she stopped, but the knitting and
rocking went steadily on. Grandfather Starin \
looked into the cradle for moment and then
he turned silently away. 1t had been choked
up with blankets and such matters from the
storeroom, and the lat little pillow was dinted
deeply in the middle, as if small head had
been lying there. Grandmother Starin had
done all that, saying to herself:
That's just the way it used 10 look after /
took her nm. He ami hnlp ran,nr, nh
how do wish Christmas would come again to
this house I"
The old man attended to his duties as usual
indoors and out, and then he came back to sit
down and wait for supper. His wife had gone
into the kitchen to stir up the ''help' and to
take look at the milk-pans. While she was
there no less than five different errand-boys
came to the kitchen door with wrapped-up
parcelsfor Squire Starin. But she did not
open one of them. She did but turn them
over and draw her breath little hard and say
to herself:
''There can't be no Christmas in 'em, or
they wouldn't ha' come to this house. It's
curious, though, and he doesn't seem to want
to say anything"
There he sat by the fire, grim and silent.
His boots came off, one by one, at long inter-
walls, and his slippers came on. His wife had
put them there for him, and she must have
put something into them, for his right foot
crept out and out until the toe of that slipper
rested upon the rocker of the cradle.
''Now, l kind o. WONDER" he said, to him
self, ga mans memory isn't in his feet.
There's something the matter with my mem
ory," and the cradle began TO rock, slowly and
gently, as If it were trying to stir him up and
put him in mind OF something. Then it
stopped, and he arose and looked over at
book which lay upon Handicapped work
table where his wife had left her knitting,
"What has she been a-reading OFF"
The spectacles she had dropped upon the
open page seemed to mark place for his eyes
to begin at; but once more the harsh, hoarse
croak, without any words, arose in the throat
Of Grandfather Starin.
If the words the spectacles pointed at could
have found their way up-but they could not
they would have been: