/I ^*^<u/ &~^3 
 
 
 ._ 

 
 
 NANCY S 
 COUNTRY CHRISTMAS
 
 Nancy s 
 Country Christmas 
 
 AND OTHER STORIES 
 
 BY 
 
 ELEANOR HOYT 
 
 Author of " The Misdemeanors of Nancy" 
 
 Frontiipiece by Anna U^helan Belts 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 
 1904
 
 Copyright, 1901, by 
 
 Harper & Brothers 
 
 Copyright, 1901, 1902, by 
 
 John Wanamaker 
 
 Copyright, 1903, by 
 
 The Curtis Publishing Company 
 
 Copyright, 1903, by 
 
 P. F. Collier & Son 
 
 Copyright, 1904, by 
 
 The Library Publishing Company 
 
 Copyright, 1904, by 
 The Ridgway-Thayer Company 
 
 Copyright, 1902, 1904, by 
 
 Doubleday, Page & Company 
 
 Published, October, 1904
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 I. Nancy s Country Christmas 
 II. In Oklahoma 
 
 III. The Little God and the 
 
 Machine 
 
 IV. In the Light of the Christ 
 
 mas Candles . 
 
 V. A Visiting Peer . 
 
 VI. The Vanishing Boarder 
 
 VII. Gowns and a Gobolink 
 
 VIII. A Disturber of the Peace . 
 
 IX. The Littlest Sister . 
 
 X. Women are Made Like That 
 
 97 
 117 
 
 H5 
 165 
 189 
 207 
 
 2136137
 
 NANCY S 
 COUNTRY CHRISTMAS
 
 NANCY S COUNTRY CHRISTMAS 
 
 MOLLY BLESSINGTON was reponsi- 
 ble for the whole affair. At least, 
 that is Nancy s theory. 
 
 It was in the summer of 98 that the Bless- 
 ingtons bought their country place at Hilldale, 
 New Hampshire. When November came 
 Molly s enthusiasm was still intact, and she 
 flatly refused to go back to city duresse and 
 open the big town house. 
 
 "We ll stay here and entertain a Christmas 
 house-party," she said cheerfully. Dick Bless- 
 ington did not yearn for a merry Yule-tide in 
 the wilds of New England; but, being wise in 
 his generation, he did not mention that fact. 
 
 "Nobody will come," he asserted hopefully. 
 " You couldn t get any of the fellows up here 
 if you d promise all of them ten-thousand- 
 dollar cheques in their Christmas stockings." 
 
 "They 11 all come." 
 
 "But why?" 
 
 "I ll have Nancy. So I ll have the men, 
 and, having eligible men, girls will be a drug 
 in the market. It s quite simple." 
 
 3
 
 4 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 Mr. Blessington recognised the force of the 
 logic, but fired a final gun. 
 
 "She won t come." 
 
 "She has promised." 
 
 Molly s impromptus are usually the result 
 of careful planning. Her husband lighted a 
 cigar and resigned himself to the inevitable. 
 
 " I suppose you ve invited the gang al 
 ready?" 
 
 "Yes, dear." 
 
 She looked at him and he struggled for stern 
 disapproval. Then they both laughed. The 
 Blessingtons are very young and exceeding 
 foolish. 
 
 At three o clock on the afternoon of Decem 
 ber 24th an express train thundered into a little 
 New England station, spilled Nancy and a 
 few other passengers on a snow-drifted plat 
 form, and whizzed away into the driving 
 storm. On the other side of the station a 
 stunted engine was fidgeting and hurling ill- 
 natured remarks at three ramshackle, com 
 fortless cars. The exiles from the through 
 line boarded the stuffy, stove-heated train. 
 The engine went through a final paroxysm of 
 rage and pulled sulkily out into a whirling 
 white world. 
 ,.- Nancy tucked herself into a grimy red plush
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 5 
 
 seat and gave herself up to thinking unutter 
 able things about her dressmaker. If that 
 obnoxious person had sent the promised 
 gowns home on time, the young woman for 
 whose use the gowns were intended would now 
 have been wearing the delectable new tea- 
 gown in front of a blazing log-fire at The Oaks, 
 instead of rattling along in an air-tight oven 
 over a fluted road-bed. The past thought that 
 some six or seven young men were missing 
 that tea-gown afforded a certain solace. Nancy 
 wondered, with something approaching cheer 
 fulness, whether they had all taken her train 
 the day before. On the whole, perhaps, it was 
 amusing to be a day behind schedule time. 
 
 The conductor called out the stations in a 
 fretful bawl. They all sounded more or less 
 alike in his translation. Nancy dozed, and 
 dreamed, and awoke, and dozed again. Finally 
 she slept soundly, huddled in a corner. 
 
 She awoke with a start. The window was 
 black. Ill-smelling lamps had been lighted. 
 Only three other passengers were left in the 
 car. An awful misgiving smote her. She had 
 a vision of a Christmas pudding vanishing in 
 a storm-swept distance. The train was due 
 in Hilldale at seven-thirty. Had she been 
 carried past? She felt for her watch, then
 
 6 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 remembered it had not been wound in days. 
 She looked for the conductor. He had 
 fled to other haunts. She opened her 
 lips to ask a nodding old man for infor 
 mation, but it wasn t necessary. The train 
 stopped with a lurch. A youthful brakeman 
 opened the front door and yelled " Hilldale ! " 
 Nancy blessed her guardian angel, gathered 
 up her bag and umbrella, and hurried out 
 through the rear door. A moment later she 
 was standing on a tiny platform, beside a 
 bandbox station. 
 
 No one of the six to give her effusive 
 welcome? She looked about her incredu 
 lously. 
 
 Then she registered a mental vow that the 
 storm-bound laggards should pay heavily for 
 their defection before the season of good 
 will to men had passed. 
 
 At least, Molly had sent the carriage. It 
 was waiting farther down the platform a snug 
 brougham, looking out of place in the vast 
 solitude. 
 
 Nancy struggled toward it, against the 
 howling wind. 
 
 There was a snow-man on the box. 
 
 "You came for me?" asked Nancy. 
 
 The snow-man touched his huge white hat.
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 7 
 
 "Yes, miss," he said, with muffled respect. 
 "Atkins will get your boxes." 
 
 He leaned over and opened the door. 
 
 Nancy climbed in and sank back upon the 
 cushion. This was more like it. 
 
 The carriage rolled away, but not swiftly, 
 for the horses were floundering breast-high 
 in drifts. 
 
 The drive was a long one, but at last the 
 carriage stopped before a rambling old stone 
 house. The door flew open, letting a great 
 wave of light and colour surge out into the 
 night. A man ran down the steps. In the 
 darkness Nancy could not recognise him. 
 She looked past him, expecting to see Molly s 
 face in the doorway, but it wasn t there. 
 
 The man opened the carriage door. Nancy 
 stepped out. A jest was on her lips, but it 
 was never launched; the lips were otherwise 
 engaged. The man had gathered the young 
 woman into a vigorous embrace, and was 
 kissing her with an enthusiasm that left her 
 no breath for protest. Then he lifted her in 
 his arms, carried her lightly up the steps, and 
 set her down on the broad veranda. 
 
 "Merry Christmas!" he said jovially. 
 
 For once in her career Nancy Reynolds was 
 speechless. Words seemed so hopelessly in-
 
 8 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 adequate. The light streaming out from the 
 hall fell upon her bewildered and angry face. 
 
 The Man looked down at her, started, stared 
 and backed violently away from her. 
 
 "Good Lord!" he stammered, in awestruck 
 tones. "G good Lord!" Then he added, 
 in a small, hushed voice that quavered: "I 
 thought you were Nell." 
 
 The scathing remarks for which Nancy 
 racked her brain refused to be dragged into the 
 open. She felt a horrible conviction that 
 inside of thirty, seconds she would inevitably 
 cry. 
 
 "Where s Molly?" she asked weakly. 
 
 " Molly ? " The man s face was a blank. 
 
 "Isn t this Mr. Blessington s place?" 
 
 " Blessington s ? " He was a mere helpless 
 echo. Nancy s wrath surged higher. Her ex 
 pression spurred the echo into original utter 
 ance. 
 
 "Why, no. My name is Monroe. I was 
 expecting my sister. But won t you come in ? 
 You mustn t stand out here. I m very sorry. 
 I don t see I don t know I I- -" He 
 trailed off into utter rout and confusion, and 
 his unexpected guest stepped into the big hall. 
 
 It was a cheerful place. Huge logs blazed 
 gaily on the hearth and sent flickering shadows
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 9 
 
 over the panelled wainscoting, the rugs, the 
 tall book-cases, the curving stairway. The 
 red shades of the lamps seemed as warm as the 
 dancing flames. Easy chairs were drawn in 
 vitingly near the fire. The odor of cigar 
 smoke clung to the air. The big table was 
 littered with books and magazines. Through 
 a half-open door to the left there was a glimpse 
 of another table, where shaded candle-light fell 
 softly upon white napery and china and glass. 
 
 Nancy was cold, despite her burning wrath. 
 Incidentally, she was very hungry. She looked 
 appreciatively toward the fire. She shot a 
 glance toward the festive promise behind the 
 half-open door. Then she lifted her eyes and 
 looked, fairly and squarely, at six-feet-two of 
 mute masculine misery. 
 
 The anger in her eyes was diluted with 
 curiosity. Nell s brother was good to look at, 
 even when hopelessly embarrassed and dis 
 tinctly afraid of a small, insulted young 
 woman. His blue eyes held a desperate appeal 
 for mercy. Alarm and amusement were 
 struggling with his clean-cut lips. 
 
 He was a gentleman. The most casual 
 glance would have decided that. Nancy 
 turned to the fire. After all, if one must be 
 kissed and carried up front steps by a
 
 io Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 stranger, things might have been worse; but 
 she held fast to her injured dignity. 
 
 " Could you direct me to Mrs. Blessington s ? " 
 she asked, icily. 
 
 The man looked unhappy. 
 
 " I wish I could help you, but I don t know 
 of any such place. It can t be near here." 
 
 "But this is Hilldale." 
 
 "Oh, no! This is Hinsdale. Hilldale is 
 about fifty miles farther west." 
 
 Nancy dropped limply into a chair. 
 
 " I thought the brakeman called Hilldale. I 
 was half asleep. Could you let your coachman 
 take me back to the station?" 
 
 The man looked more embarrassed than 
 ever. 
 
 "But there s no train to-night." 
 
 Nancy gasped. 
 
 " Then if you would please tell me where to 
 find a hotel or a boarding-place." 
 
 "I m afraid there s nothing of the kind 
 within miles. You see, there s no village here 
 nothing but the station." 
 
 The haughty guest was rapidly reaching a 
 state of confusion equal to that of her 
 host. 
 
 "The station " she began; but he inter 
 rupted her.
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas n 
 
 " Miserable little hole. The agent lives there 
 alone." 
 
 "If I could drive to a village," Nancy 
 faltered. 
 
 "There isn t one within eighteen miles, and 
 you couldn t get there to-night over these 
 roads." 
 
 Nancy longed for her wrath of an earlier 
 moment. Anything would be better than 
 crying, and she felt that tears were due. One 
 actually broke loose and rolled dismally down 
 her cheek. 
 
 The man stepped forward impulsively. 
 
 "Don t," he said entreatingly. "You will 
 be quite all right here. I m delighted to be of 
 service. Of course, it is annoying for you, and 
 you are disappointed and miserable, but Mrs. 
 Wilson will make you comfortable to-night, 
 and to-morrow I ll do anything I can. Just 
 consider the house yours. Now, if Nell were 
 only here. I m such a duffer. I Oh, 
 don t, please don t." 
 
 The tears were trickling fast now. Nancy 
 dabbed hastily at her eyes with a limp wad of 
 kerchief. 
 
 "I m j j ust t t ired and c cold," 
 she said, miserably. 
 
 Mine host disappeared. In a moment he
 
 12 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 came back with a decanter, a glass, and a fat, 
 elderly woman to whom he was offering voluble, 
 if confusing, explanation. 
 
 When she saw Nancy, she brushed the 
 Man- Body away unceremoniously. 
 
 "Why, you poor lamb," she clucked, like a 
 comfortable mother-hen, and in a jiffy she 
 had whisked off the damp coat and hat, tucked 
 two cushions behind the limp little figure, put 
 a footstool under two diminutive feet, and 
 administered a heroic dose of whisky. The 
 ineffectual masculine stood by, awkwardly 
 holding the decanter and looking relieved. 
 
 "You ll stay right here the night," clucked 
 the housekeeper. " Miss Nell s room s all ready. 
 You just rest there a minute and then I ll take 
 you up-stairs. You ll be needing your dinner, 
 poor child." 
 
 Fifteen minutes later Nancy came slowl.y 
 down the curving stairway. She was dry and 
 warm, and her spirits had soared. 
 
 Her host stood waiting on the hearth-rug, 
 and came forward with ill-concealed trepida 
 tion to meet her. 
 
 They looked at each other politely. Then, 
 suddenly, Nancy laughed. When Nancy laughs 
 her dimples have their way. 
 
 Colin Monroe went down before the dimples.
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 13 
 
 "And I didn t know what I was kissing," 
 he reflected, ruefully. 
 
 It was a pleasant little dinner. Visions of 
 Molly and the six rose occasionally before 
 Nancy s eyes. The thought of her mother s 
 sentiments, could she but behold her wandering 
 child, deepened the pink in her cheeks; but 
 her conscience was clear. 
 
 As for Colin Monroe, he vowed a royal 
 offering to the god of chance. To expect a 
 sister even the dearest of sisters and to get 
 this ! He sighed for satisfaction, and beamed 
 across the holly at the young woman in the 
 blue travelling frock. 
 
 "I m so sorry you should be disappointed 
 about your sister s coming," murmured Nancy, 
 sympathetically. 
 
 "Oh, I m glad it that is, I m sure nothing s 
 wrong. She probably telegraphed, but tele 
 grams usually reach this out-of-the-way place 
 a week after they are sent." 
 
 "Has she been gone long?" Nancy asked. 
 
 "Years. You see, it s like this. We all 
 lived here when Nell and I were youngsters. 
 Then we lost our father and mother, and this 
 old home was sold. I went to school, and 
 spent my holidays in the office of a bachelor 
 uncle. Nell went abroad with an aunt and
 
 14 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 has been there ever since. I finished college, 
 settled down to work, and had no chance to go 
 to Europe. This fall my uncle dropped off 
 suddenly, poor old chap. He left me his money. 
 There s a lot of it. Then Nell wrote that they 
 were coming back to America to stay, and 
 would be in New York December 23d. It 
 struck me it would be a lark to buy the old 
 home, get it as nearly into the old shape as 
 possible, and have the little sister come here 
 for Christmas. She liked the idea, and it all 
 went smoothly until 
 
 "I came," finished Nancy, apologetically. 
 "I m so sorry." 
 
 " Don t be sorry," urged the devoted brother. 
 "I m not at least (with a pang of contrition 
 for his own disloyalty), I d like to see Nell, but 
 oh, hang it ! A fellow couldn t be sorry, 
 you know." 
 
 Nancy smiled. 
 
 After dinner they put up holly. There was 
 a load of it, and acquaintance ripens astonish 
 ingly under the influence of Christmas holly. 
 There s some insidious spirit of festivity and 
 good-will lurking in the Yule-tide green-and- 
 red; and when step-ladders wobble, and hands 
 touch, and holly-berry crimson is reflected in 
 dimpled cheeks, and a maid looks up and a
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 15 
 
 man looks down well, acquaintance makes 
 progress. Nancy has helped many a man put 
 up holly. In fact, she s by way of being a 
 connoisseur on Christmas decoration. 
 
 When, at a discreetly early hour, she said 
 good-night, she left behind her six-feet-two 
 of shining radiance. 
 
 Christmas morning dawned clear and cold. 
 It was nine o clock before Nancy strolled 
 down into the holly-decked hall. Since there 
 would be no train until noon, why hurry? 
 
 Her host had already breakfasted when she 
 put in an appearance; but, while she lingered 
 over her coffee, he came in, clad in riding 
 clothes and glowing from the tingling cold. 
 
 "I ve been down to the station," he an 
 nounced, after Christmas greetings, " and I 
 have bad news for you." 
 
 His air of joyous elation was a misfit upon a 
 bearer of sad tidings, and he realised it; but 
 his effort to look politely sympathetic was a 
 dismal failure. 
 
 "Everything is tied up along the line. 
 There will be no train through from either 
 direction before evening, if then." 
 
 His smile was openly radiant. 
 
 Nancy has better control over her facial 
 muscles. She looked pathetically distressed.
 
 1 6 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 "And it isn t possible to drive to Hilldale?" 
 
 "Out of the question." 
 
 " Then I must impose upon you a few hours 
 longer." She left the table, walked to the 
 window, and stood looking out at the snow. 
 Suddenly she turned. Her eyes were dancing; 
 her dimples \vere riotous; she looked uncom 
 monly like a very bad child. She held out her 
 hand. 
 
 "Isn t it a lark?" she said gaily. "What 
 shall we play? I feel equal to pussy wants a 
 corner, or tag." 
 
 "Post-office," suggested the Man-Body, 
 promptly. 
 
 "Not enough of us," objected Nancy. 
 
 "Plenty," insisted the Man-Body, firmly. 
 " The basic principle of post-office requires 
 only two. It s the same way with pillows 
 and keys. Would you rather play that?" 
 
 "Got any marshmallows ? " asked the bad 
 child. 
 
 "Oodles of em." 
 
 "And chestnuts?" 
 
 "Rather." 
 
 " We ll roast them after a while. What 
 would you and your sister have done, if she 
 had come? Let s pretend I am your sister?" 
 
 The man shook his head vehemently.
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 17 
 
 "No; I d rather not play that." 
 
 "But what would you have done this 
 morning?" 
 
 He hesitated, and eyed her dubiously, as if 
 questioning her capacity for sympathy. 
 
 "Well I think, may be Nell s changed; 
 but if she hasn t, I ve an idea we d go all over 
 the old house and stay for a while in the school 
 room and nursery. Great Scott ! what merry 
 war we did raise up there ! And we d explore 
 the attic, too. Nell adored the attic." 
 
 Nancy s dimples deepened. Her face was 
 eager. 
 
 "I suppose it wouldn t be proper," she 
 said, regretfully. 
 
 "Nonsense! Wilson!" 
 
 Mrs. Wilson came in from the dining-room, 
 smiling like a fat and benign fairy godmother. 
 
 "I m going to show Miss Reynolds the house. 
 She likes old mahogany. Will you let me 
 have the keys?" 
 
 She handed him a jangling bunch. " You ll 
 find everything in order, sir," she said proudly. 
 
 They did. 
 
 When Wilson made an excursion to the 
 school-room at twelve o clock, she stood in the 
 doorway and smiled with every crease in her 
 fat face.
 
 i8 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 The open fire had been lighted and was 
 burning famously. Old school-books, port 
 folios and child rubbish strewed the room. 
 
 Flat on the floor before the fire sat Nancy, 
 toasting a plump marshmallow and burning 
 her face to fiery crimson. Beside her was 
 six-feet-two of boy, absorbed in spinning a 
 somewhat decrepit top, and talking eagerly. 
 
 Wilson didn t listen, but she caught some 
 thing about " a jolly good licking for it, but it 
 was a bully swim." 
 
 " Well, would you look at them Christmas 
 babies?" she said, chuckling to herself, as she 
 hurried down stairs. A little later, she reap 
 peared at the school-room door, bearing a tray. 
 On it was a plate piled with thin bread and 
 butter and a pot of strawberry jam. 
 
 "If you please, sir, it s time for school 
 room lunch," she said. 
 
 The culprits started, blushed, and gave way 
 to shamfaced mirth. 
 
 The housekeeper beamed approval. 
 
 "Indeed, it s like old times, sir, and I m 
 that glad to see it." 
 
 She left them sitting side by side on the 
 floor, gravely consuming bread and butter 
 and strawberry jam. 
 
 When the old clock upon the stairs struck
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 19 
 
 one, they still sat there, although the bread 
 and butter and jam had disappeared. 
 
 The boy gave the burning logs a final poke. 
 
 "Come we haven t seen the attic, and 
 dinner will be at two to-day. Beastly business, 
 this tucking a stodging meal into the middle 
 of a holiday." 
 
 Nancy scrambled to her feet. 
 
 "Twelve slices of bread and butter and 
 jam are calculated to promote prejudice against 
 it! Where s the attic?" 
 
 Together they climbed the steep stairs, and 
 stood in a huge, low-ceilinged garret, whose 
 unpainted walls and rafters, mellowed by time, 
 were turned into a golden-brown by the sun 
 light, filtering through dormer windows and 
 dancing dust motes. 
 
 With a sigh of profound content, Nancy sat 
 down upon a horse-hair trunk. 
 
 "I ve dreamed of an attic like this, all my 
 life," she said ecstatically. 
 
 " I never knew there were so many boxes 
 and trunks in the world. Didn t your ancestors 
 ever throw away anything?" 
 
 The boy shook his head. "They were 
 thrifty souls but the savages escaped a lot, 
 didn t they? All this truck might have gone 
 into missionary boxes, and then there d have
 
 20 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 been a first-class attic spoiled to breed vanity 
 in the natives of Booriboola Gha. Everything 
 our family ever discarded or outwore is here 
 except the trousers of my early youth. After 
 I d worn them for a brief season of sporting- 
 life, there wasn t enough of them left for heir 
 looms. My baby-clothes are in the piebald 
 trunk in the corner, though." 
 
 He turned a key, lifted a lid, and held up, 
 fitted on his thumb and forefinger, a diminutive 
 lace baby-cap. 
 
 "Seems absurdly inadequate, doesn t it? 
 They say it was distinctly becoming in its day. 
 Wilson comes up and weeps over this trunk 
 at frequent intervals. She tells me I was a 
 very superior variety of baby. 
 
 "Do you like old-fashioned finery? My 
 great-great-grandmother s wedding-clothes are 
 in that trunk you re sitting on. Grandfather s, 
 too. Great swells, the dear old souls were, in 
 their day." 
 
 "Show me," begged Nancy. 
 
 The Boy struggled with a rusty lock, and 
 finally opened the brass-bound trunk, from 
 which a whiff of jasmine escaped as though 
 glad of freedom. 
 
 "They say the little old lady always had a 
 faint odour of jasmine clinging about her.
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas ai 
 
 She lived to be seventy-two, but she was a 
 coquette and a belle to the end of her days." 
 
 Nancy was on her knees beside him, her eyes 
 shining with interest, but suspiciously misty. 
 
 "The Dear!" she murmured to herself. 
 "The Dear- 
 
 And the Boy, being a Man Body, and not 
 compact of sentiment nor quick of fancy, 
 wondered vaguely at the tender little voice 
 thrill that paid tribute across the years to the 
 youth and daintiness, the beauty, and coquetry, 
 and romance of the bride long dead. 
 
 It was Nancy who lifted out the quaint, old 
 gown of white brocade, and shook out the 
 gleaming folds. Little white slippers, with 
 extravagantly high heels, and huge paste 
 buckles, white open-work stockings, a lace 
 scarf, a fan, some girlish trinkets, a bundle of 
 ribbon-tied letters, and several daguerreotypes 
 were with the wedding-gown. 
 
 "It s too perfect," sighed Nancy. "I didn t 
 suppose such stage properties ever did really 
 exist." 
 
 " Grandad did a little in the line of glad rags 
 himself," said the irreverent Boy, holding up 
 a gorgeous embroidered waistcoat. 
 
 " Nell and I used to dress up in these things. 
 They d fit us better now than they did then.
 
 22 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 I m just about the old gentleman s size, and, 
 they say, I look like him." 
 
 He stopped suddenly. 
 
 Nancy was looking at him with suppressed 
 question and entreaty in every line of her 
 vivid face. He made a wild effort to read the 
 unspoken wish. 
 
 " You and your sister will have to masquerade 
 again when she comes," the young woman said, 
 patting the high-heeled slippers wistfully. 
 
 A light broke in upon the Boy s fumbling 
 brain. 
 
 "Would you would you like Oh, I say, 
 would you like to do it?" he stammered hope 
 fully. 
 
 "I d adore it!" 
 
 She hugged the wedding-gown in her en 
 thusiasm, then gathered up the rest of the 
 treasure trove and turned toward the stair, but 
 at the top she hesitated. 
 
 " You don t think they d mind ? Perhaps it 
 isn t fair. Do you think they d hate to have 
 anybody else wear 
 
 "They d be glad," interrupted the Boy, with 
 conviction. Then, as he looked at the lovely 
 flushed face, he added: "They d be proud!" 
 Half an hour later, a handsome young buck, in 
 the most elaborate of Colonial costumes, stood
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 23 
 
 beside the big fireplace in the hall, smiling 
 whimsically down at his strapping figure in its 
 dandified attire, and settling his lace ruffles 
 with the air of a Beau Brummel. 
 
 Wilson had been called into consultation 
 by Nancy, and silence reigned upstairs. 
 
 Suddenly there was borne to the ears of the 
 waiting gallant the click of tiny heels, the 
 swish of silken skirts. 
 
 Down the broad stairway came a dream of 
 olden-times a bewitching, coquettish figure in 
 a white brocade gown, whose billowing 
 fulness could not disguise the girl s slender 
 grace. Yellow old lace fell away softly from 
 white dimpled arms and shoulders ; and above 
 smiled a gay, charming face, framed in sunny 
 chestnut hair, whose waving masses were 
 drawn high on the head and fastened by a 
 jewelled comb. 
 
 The vision paused on the landing, and looked 
 down at the Big Boy, who had left the hearth 
 rug and stood waiting at the bottom of the 
 stairs. 
 
 There was a brave light in his eyes, and his 
 heart was beating tumultuously under the gay- 
 embroidered waistcoat. 
 
 "You are be-au-ti-ful ! " said the vision 
 fervently.
 
 24 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 He held out his hands to her. 
 
 "You are His voice stuck in his 
 
 throat, but his eyes were eloquent. "Lucky 
 Grandad," he murmured under his breath; and 
 Nancy blushed as the handsome gallant, in 
 bridal finery, led her, in courtly fashion, to the 
 dining-room, where Wilson beamed approval 
 of the little comedy. 
 
 Christmas dinner was in the middle of the 
 day, and it went off merrily. 
 
 With the plum-pudding, conversation veered 
 to personalities. 
 
 "Have I made a good substitute?" Nancy 
 asked, demurely. "Am I a decent small 
 sister, as sisters go?" 
 
 " Ripping ! " said the big boy, with emphasis. 
 " I wish no, by Jove, I don t. Are you sure 
 you haven t been bored?" 
 
 "Positive. I ve been a sister to a great 
 many big boys, but I ve never had such a 
 good time doing it." 
 
 He eyed her doubtfully. 
 
 "Still I don t know," he began. There 
 was a pause. " I rather wish I hadn t spent 
 the time telling you about the swimming-hole 
 and the bulldog and the governess. I didn t 
 realise I m afraid I ll be sorrier later. You 
 see, you are going so soon, and there s so little
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 25 
 
 time, and such a lot to say. The governess 
 doesn t seem one of the important things. 
 My sense of proportion wasn t in working 
 order this morning. Now, this afternoon, 
 we ll " 
 
 The maid retreated to the butler s pantry. 
 She may have been moved by the necessity of 
 procuring cracked ice. She may have been 
 prompted by discretion. But she came back 
 immediately. 
 
 "If you please, sir, Watson s just been to 
 station, and he says the road s clear earlier than 
 was expected. The up train ll be along in about 
 an hour, sir, and the drifts is so bad it 11 take 
 some time to get to the station." 
 
 Having thrown the bomb, she fled. 
 
 The big boy was a Man-Body again. He 
 was sitting up very straight, and looking at 
 Nancy with a hurt in his eyes. 
 
 "I knew I d be sorry," he said, slowly. 
 
 Nancy smiled at him. 
 
 "But it was a beautiful game, and you 
 haven t been dreadfully lonely without youi 
 sister, have you?" 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 "I m so very glad," she said, softly. "Of 
 course, it wasn t my fault she disappointed 
 you, but I couldn t help feeling guilty because
 
 26 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 I came instead of her. And I ve tried so hard 
 to do just what she would have done." 
 
 There was a little break in her voice. It 
 sounded like sentiment. Bobby would have 
 sworn it was amusement. 
 
 The Man-Body sat silent. 
 
 The atmosphere was a trifle oppressive. 
 
 "I must hurry, I suppose," Nancy said, 
 rising. He rose, too, and stood looking down 
 at her. 
 
 "You ll be in town this winter?" she asked. 
 "You must let us show you that we, too, can 
 be hospitable. My father will want to thank 
 you." 
 
 Still he said nothing. 
 
 " I should be so gla4 to meet the sister to 
 whom I ve been understudy." 
 
 At last he made a remark, but it sounded 
 exceedingly irrelevant. 
 
 "And I didn t appreciate it when I did it," 
 he said, wonderingly. 
 
 For some reason or other Nancy blushed. 
 
 The distance from the Monroe house to the 
 station is much shorter than the distance from 
 the station to the Monroe house. Nancy 
 noted this fact as interesting to a statistician. 
 Yet the train came puffing in as the brougham 
 drew up beside the platform.
 
 Nancy s Country Christmas 27 
 
 The Man-Body put his guest into a seat and 
 had another attack of explosive silence. 
 
 " You ve been awfully good," she said. " I ll 
 never forget it. No one could have made an 
 awkward situation less awkward or more 
 delightful." 
 
 She introduced a period, but he didn t take 
 advantage of it. He only looked at her help 
 lessly. Outside, somewhere, the conductor 
 was calling " All aboard ! " 
 
 "A big brother is the nicest Christmas 
 present I ve ever had," Nancy went on, very 
 gently. "I ve never had a real one. It was 
 a nice game. I d like to play sister to you 
 for keeps. 
 
 " God forbid ! " the Man-Body said fervently 
 and swung himself off the moving train.
 
 IN OKLAHOMA
 
 IN OKLAHOMA 
 
 THERE are several ways of seeing Okla 
 homa. There is only one way of 
 knowing the Territory. 
 
 The Congressman and the red-haired girl 
 proved that. 
 
 They travelled from New York to Bluffville 
 on the same car. He was looking for wheat 
 statistics. She was in search of new expe 
 riences, and incidentally of a brother who had 
 started a lumber-yard in Bluffville. 
 
 Both travellers saw Oklahoma after a 
 fashion, but only the red-haired girl learned to 
 know it. That was because the Congressman, 
 with masculine logic, contended that the way 
 to see a country was to travel about it, while 
 the girl, with feminine intuition, divined that 
 the real way to accomplish the end was to 
 sit on a lumber-pile and look at the country 
 through the eyes and the words of the men who 
 made it. 
 
 There were a few Eastern women in Bluff 
 ville, but they were married, and several years 
 in the Territory had rubbed off the old hall- 
 Si
 
 32 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 mark; so Wilson s sister made rather a sen 
 sation. 
 
 Billings, the saloon-keeper, saw her first. 
 
 "Say, boys," he announced. "There s a 
 red-headed girl sitting on a pile of two-by- 
 fours up in Wilson s lumber-yard, and she s a 
 peach." 
 
 The boys were doubters. They strolled, 
 singly and collectively, past the lumber-yard, 
 and Billings s reputation for veracity soared 
 above par. 
 
 Dawson wasn t contented with walking by 
 the yard. He lighted a large cigar, by way of 
 steadying his nerves, pulled his hat further 
 over his eyes, and turned into Wilson s office. 
 Half an hour later he was back in the saloon. 
 
 "She s his sister, Miss Betty Wilson, from 
 New York, and she s the real thing," he said, 
 with a deep conviction. 
 
 Meanwhile, the girl on the lumber-pile was 
 feeling vaguely disappointed. She looked off 
 across the plain, whose monotonous level was 
 broken only by occasional farm buildings, and 
 she wondered how one could live in a treeless 
 country and not go mad. 
 
 Then she turned and looked down the wide, 
 dusty main street of the town. It was flanked 
 by rows of one-story wooden buildings, and
 
 In Oklahoma 
 
 33 
 
 ended in an open square surrounding a squat 
 brick court-house, at whose door two sickly 
 poplars stood guard, like exiled and home 
 sick grenadiers. From the main street the 
 town wandered off in forlorn little shacks and 
 tiny, neat, cottages, dotted indiscriminately 
 along broad, dirty roads, that bore sounding 
 titles. 
 
 It was all ugly drearily ugly. The girl had 
 lunched with one of her brother s married 
 friends, and eaten chicken croquettes and salted 
 almonds and other Philistine fare, in a tiny square 
 house whose good rugs and books and pictures 
 and china seemed as much out of place as a faun 
 in a button-factory. Betty wasn t old enough to 
 see the dramatic interest of the surf -line, where 
 east broke against west, and she went away 
 from that luncheon exceedingly sorrowful. 
 Salted almonds and embroidered doilies, and 
 not a cowboy or an Indian within sight. Was 
 this what she had gone out into the wilderness 
 to see ? 
 
 The street in front of the lumber-yard s office 
 was lined with wagons and cow-ponies, and 
 crowds of roughly clad men thronged the 
 wooden sidewalks. On the opposite corner a 
 number of horse-traders were gathered round 
 a bunch of broncos, and teamsters had halted
 
 34 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 their loaded wagons to talk with the swaggering, 
 loud-voiced group. 
 
 Suddenly something happened, and the red- 
 haired girl sat up. A long, lean man, in riding 
 clothes and sombrero, stood facing three burly, 
 thick-set traders. 
 
 "You ll swallow that or an ounce of lead," 
 roared one of the trio, drawing a revolver. 
 
 The crowd surged back out of range. 
 
 "You re a d horse-thief, and I can 
 prove it," said the man in front of the shining 
 steel barrel. He moved quickly, as he spoke, 
 and a bullet buried itself in the buildings 
 behind him. 
 
 The three men lunged toward him, and he 
 backed up against a wagon full of cord-wood. 
 Something flashed in his hand. There was a 
 second shot, then another, and another. Two 
 men lay in the street. The cowboy stood un 
 hurt, save for a red streak broadening on his 
 cheek. 
 
 The third horse-trader brought his heavy 
 whip-butt down viciously upon the cowboy s 
 right wrist and the revolver spun across the 
 road, but the disarmed man reached for a 
 stick of wood with his left hand, and the last 
 of his assailants went down in a crumpled heap. 
 
 The crowd closed in. When it opened out,
 
 In Oklahoma 35 
 
 two men were being loaded into an empty 
 wagon. One supported by friends, was limping 
 toward the drugstore, and the cowboy, followed 
 by an admiring throng, was slouching carelessly 
 into the nearest saloon. 
 
 A loose-jointed, keen-eyed man dropped 
 down upon the lumber-pile beside the red- 
 haired girl. 
 
 "Pretty scrap, wasn t it?" he drawled, as 
 he lighted his pipe. The girl recognised the 
 sheriff, to whom she had been introduced, 
 with due ceremony, earlier in the day. 
 
 "Aren t you going to arrest anybody?" she 
 inquired breathlessly. 
 
 "What d I do that for?" asked the Majesty 
 of the Law, in mild surprise. 
 
 "Do you allow fights like that on your town 
 streets?" 
 
 He shifted his pipe, and expectorated cheer 
 fully. " Why, Jim licked, didn t he ? " 
 
 "The cowboy did." 
 
 "That s Jim and they were three to one 
 agin him, weren t they?" 
 
 "Why, yes; but " 
 
 "Well, if they couldn t take care of them 
 selves, they needed killing, and Jim don t seem 
 to need me to take care of him. Nobody s 
 badly hurt, anyhow, and I can t see as I ve a
 
 36 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 call to jug anybody for that row. It kind of 
 settled itself." 
 
 When the red -haired girl went to bed that 
 night she was distinctly cheerful. After all, 
 things did happen in Oklahoma. 
 
 All sorts and conditions of men floated in 
 and out of Wilson s lumber-yard. Some of 
 them wanted lumber. Some liked Dick Wilson, 
 and showed it by loafing in his office. After 
 Dick s sister arrived, they came thicker and 
 faster than ever. 
 
 She chummed with them all, and held 
 court on a pile of joists which made a good 
 place from which to watch the street. Every 
 man within a radius of seventy-five miles 
 around Bluffville took his turn at entertain 
 ing her, but the men who most persistently 
 acted as guide, philosopher, and friend were 
 the philosophical sheriff and Tom Bailey, gam 
 bler, dead-shot, and Harvard graduate. Some 
 brothers would have shied at Tom. Dick 
 Wilson only grinned. 
 
 "He ll spoil your taste for Willy boys, 
 Betty," he said; "but he ll not hurt you, and 
 he knows the Territory. Don t hurt him." 
 
 So the couple sat together under the shade 
 of the lumber-shed very often, and the gambler 
 told the red-haired girl about the people who
 
 In Oklahoma 37 
 
 passed, and about a good many people who 
 didn t pass. 
 
 "That s Slim Jim," he said one day, as he 
 and Betty looked down the street from their 
 vantage point on the lumber-pile. "Did you 
 ever meet him ? 
 
 "No, but I ve seen him fight." 
 
 "That s good. He s a dabster at it, isn t 
 he? But eating is his long suit. He can eat 
 more than any man in the Strip, and there 
 isn t a boarding-house keeper who will board 
 him at regular rates; but he can t get an extra 
 ounce of flesh on those bones. 
 
 " He s an old Texas man. He says he can 
 go broke anywhere with perfect impunity. All 
 he needs to do is to tell the first man he meets 
 a hard-luck story, and pump up a cough. 
 They put him up at a hotel and take up a 
 collection for him." 
 
 Just at this point in the conversation the 
 sheriff hove in sight, and came across the yard 
 with his lazy, side-wheeler motion. 
 
 "Now, wouldn t you think that man was 
 slower than molasses in winter?" asked the 
 gambler musingly. "He s made out of steel 
 wire and raw-hide. He s quicker on the 
 trigger than any man in the country. He has 
 a mind that works like chain-lightning, and an
 
 38 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 iron nerve, and eyes in the back of his head, but 
 just look at him." 
 
 The sheriff dropped in a disjointed heap upon 
 a friendly joist. 
 
 " I was telling Miss Wilson about Slim Jim," 
 volunteered the gambler. 
 
 "Oh! well, it s a long story. He s a char 
 acter, Slim Jim is. Don t you get stuck on him, 
 though, Miss Wilson. He s tarnation shapely 
 but he s married. Did Tom tell you about 
 his marrying? No? Well, that was the only 
 time anybody got the drop on Jim. 
 
 "You see, it happened just a little while 
 after the run for the Strip, and Jim s never 
 been sorry but once. That s all the time. 
 She was a Yankee, and came down to visit her 
 sister. There wasn t another pretty girl within 
 miles, and the boys went clean daft about her. 
 There were picket lines of cow-ponies hitched 
 to her brother-in-law s fence all day and every 
 day. 
 
 "The girl picked out two young fellows who 
 had good claims, side by side. They were 
 both sooners." 
 
 "What s a sooner?" asked the red-haired 
 girl. 
 
 " Chap who gets in and stakes his claim before 
 the Government signal is given. He has no
 
 In Oklahoma 
 
 39 
 
 legal right to his claim, and any one who can 
 prove him a sooner can turn him out and stake 
 his claim. Well, for a while this girl couldn t 
 decide which of the two fellows she liked the 
 better; but, finally, she made up her mind. 
 Both of the duffers had told her their sooner 
 stories. She got the one she didn t want to 
 marry to tell his story before witnesses. Then 
 she disproved his title, staked his claim, and 
 married the man next door. That was Jim. 
 They ve got a nice half -section, but Jim says 
 that sometimes he feels as sick as he looks, and 
 that he wouldn t advise any man to marry a 
 business woman. If he were a woman he d get 
 a divorce, but a man can t very well do that, 
 even in Oklahoma." 
 
 The girl looked thoughtful. 
 
 " Divorces are easy down here, aren t they?" 
 she asked. " I lunched with the banker s 
 wife, the other day, and she said something 
 about the time when she and John were 
 divorced. She didn t seem sensitive about the 
 thing, but I didn t like to ask questions." 
 
 The gambler and the sheriff both chuckled. 
 
 "Why, bless your heart, she wouldn t have 
 cared," said the sheriff. "She and her sister 
 both got divorces, just before the run. You 
 see, a man and his wife can stake only one
 
 40 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 claim. That s a quarter-section. Now, those 
 two couples wanted two half -sections. So they 
 got divorced, made the run, staked four claims; 
 and after the claims were proved, they married 
 again. Each family had a half -section. See ? " 
 
 The red-haired girl gasped. There was a 
 direct simplicity about Oklahoma methods that 
 startled her. 
 
 "Did many women run?" she asked weakly. 
 
 "Droves of them." 
 
 "Tell me about a run. What s it like?" 
 
 The sheriff blew a cloud of smoke. 
 
 "What s it like, Tom? You tell her," he 
 said, turning to the other man. 
 
 The gambler crossed his knees and clasped 
 them with his white, scholarly hands, that gave 
 the lie to his rough clothes and hard face. 
 
 "Like?" he said reflectively. "It s like a 
 lunatic asylum on a spree. It s like a circus 
 chariot -race and a steeple-chase and a county 
 fair rolled into one. It s like Judgment Day, 
 with very few sheep in the deal. You get all 
 sorts at a run, but three-fourths of them are has- 
 beens. There are men from all quarters of the 
 earth, but they ve nearly all failed somewhere 
 else and are playing for new stakes. Then there 
 are the women who have been drudging for 
 some one else, and are making a break for
 
 In Oklahoma 41 
 
 homes of their own. Some men and women 
 are going into the thing just for fun. Oh, they 
 are assorted qualities and sizes, all right enough ! 
 There are lots of fine men and splendid women 
 in the gang, but I ve found that it s a good rule 
 not to go into ancient history with Oklahoma 
 neighbours. Now, I m long on ancient history. 
 My ancestors were great stuff, and I lived up to 
 them for awhile. It was the effort of doing it 
 that brought on a moral collapse and put me 
 where I am." 
 
 "Did you ever run?" asked the girl. The 
 gambler flushed. 
 
 "Well, hardly. I m a good shot." 
 
 "But you can t get a claim by shooting." 
 
 Tom laughed. 
 
 " Oh ! You mean was I ever in a run ? Yes ; 
 I ran for the Strip. I didn t want the land. 
 What would I do with it, if I had it? But I 
 wanted experience. I got it. That run was 
 great. Just ahead of me, when we broke away, 
 was a fat, old darkey on a raw-boned mule. 
 She had on a red calico dress, and she was 
 riding astride, lamming the mule, and yelling 
 like a calliope. The mule ran like a prairie fire, 
 and was still going when I dropped out. I 
 didn t run far. The plunge at the start was 
 what I wanted. It was like going over Niagara.
 
 42 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 It was the greatest mix-up I was ever in in 
 my life, and that s saying a good deal. I don t 
 know how my pony ever kept his legs." 
 
 "You staked, didn t you?" drawled the 
 sheriff. 
 
 " Oh, yes ; I staked : But a woman staked the 
 same quarter-section, and I didn t care any 
 thing about it, so I wouldn t contest. The 
 woman was a dressmaker, and found she was 
 losing her eyesight ; so she decided to have a go 
 at the. Strip. We rode into the filing station 
 together, and I held her place in line for her 
 while she got a night s sleep. She has a very 
 decent little farm now." 
 
 "Were all the men as nice to the women as 
 you were?" The red-haired girl s voice was 
 soft, and her eyes were approving. He laughed. 
 
 "Well, no; I can t say that the Sir Galahad 
 act was popular. Still, the men did try not to 
 interfere with the women if it could be avoided." 
 
 "There were the Gateses," put in the sheriff 
 dryly. 
 
 Both men looked amused. The gambler 
 took out a fresh cigar. 
 
 "Tell her about them," he suggested, as he 
 felt for a match. 
 
 "Never met Mr. and Mrs. Gates, did you?" 
 inquired the sheriff.
 
 In Oklahoma 43 
 
 "No, I think not," said the girl, wrinkling 
 her forehead in an effort to remember. 
 
 "Well, your brother knows them. That 
 was a case where a man and a woman contested 
 a claim, and no politeness about it, either. 
 
 "They both made the run. Mrs. Gates was 
 Miss Johnson then, a crisp, pugnacious Yankee 
 schoolmarm. She staked her claim. Gates 
 happened to stake the same quarter-section. 
 That started the fight. Now, when a claim is 
 contested, the claimant who has put up a 
 shack and broken ground first stands the best 
 show; so as soon as they had filed, Gates and 
 Miss Johnson went tearing back to the claim to 
 begin operations. She took a workman with 
 her, and they knocked up a shack at the south 
 west corner of the claim. Gates ran his up on 
 the northwest corner. He had to pass the other 
 shack on his way to town. 
 
 " She had some horses, and began ploughing. 
 So did Gates. She hated him like poison. He 
 made the air blue every time he thought of her. 
 The contest dragged along. Those things last 
 forever down here. Every day the two parties 
 got more bitter. There wasn t anything too 
 bad for one to say about the other. When she 
 got up in the morning she looked at the smoke 
 coming out of his chimney, and talked to her-
 
 44 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 self in a way that would have made her Yankee 
 ancestors shiver. While he ate breakfast he 
 looked across at her shack and said things that 
 weren t fit for publication. Hating each other 
 was their chief occupation. Between times 
 they ploughed. 
 
 "One morning Miss Johnson got up and 
 looked over at her enemy s shack. There 
 wasn t any smoke. The next morning the 
 same thing happened. She knew Gates hadn t 
 gone away, because if he had he d have passed 
 her place. The third morning came. No 
 smoke. Miss Johnson s curiosity fairly sizzled. 
 It was too much for her. She put on her boots 
 and went across to the enemy s camp. There 
 wasn t any noise about the place. She stopped 
 at the door and listened. Not a sound. She 
 tried the door-knob. It turned, and the door 
 opened. She pushed the door and looked in. 
 There was only one room to the shack. On 
 the side of the room, opposite the door, was a 
 cot. On the cot was a man. He was tossing 
 and turning. His cheeks were crimson. His 
 eyes had a sort of vacant stare. 
 
 "Miss Johnson stood holding the door and 
 watched the man. He didn t pay any attention 
 to her. By and by she went into the room, 
 walked over to him, and felt his head. He was
 
 In Oklahoma 45 
 
 burning up with fever, and didn t notice her at 
 all. She looked around the room. Everything 
 was in an awful mess. 
 
 "She stood and bit her lip for a minute. 
 That s a way she has. Then she came to a 
 conclusion and trotted over to her shack. 
 Pretty soon she hurried back with a medicine 
 chest, gave the sick man some medicine, rolled 
 up her sleeves, and waded into that room. 
 When it was tidy she put wet cloths on Gates s 
 head, and gave him some more medicine. 
 Night came along, and she rolled herself in a 
 blanket and slept on the floor. The next day 
 she made gruel for the sick man, and kept on 
 with the medicine. She kept that up for four 
 days, going home only long enough to tend to 
 the horses and cow. 
 
 " On the fifth day Gates opened his eyes and 
 saw out of them. She was standing by him, 
 and when he saw her he swore feebly. She set 
 her lips. 
 
 You shan t die on my land, she said. 
 
 " It s my land, and I ll die on it if I d 
 please, snarled Gates. Then he fainted. 
 
 "That was the situation for two weeks. The 
 woman won out. A man s stubbornness ain t 
 any match for a woman s. Miss Johnson 
 wouldn t let Gates die on her land. He tried
 
 46 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 to assert his rights and do it, but he couldn t. 
 She nursed him back to life, but they wouldn t 
 speak to each other. When he was getting 
 well, but couldn t do anything for himself, he 
 used to watch her and grin sometimes. Then 
 he would scowl. 
 
 "At last he was able to get up. She went 
 home. That afternoon he walked in at her 
 door. 
 
 "I reckon you won t give up this claim? 
 he said. 
 
 "No. Will you? 
 
 "I d see you in first, but will you marry 
 
 me? 
 
 " It s a good deal the same thing for me, 
 ain t it? asked Miss Johnson. 
 
 "Still, she married him. That s the way 
 that contest was quashed, and they re as happy 
 as turtle-doves." 
 
 " It s a funny country," mused the red-haired 
 girl. 
 
 "It s all that," agreed the men. 
 
 A dilapidated cart, drawn by a phantom 
 horse, wandered down the street and stopped 
 in front of the lumber office. In it were a 
 dignified Indian, in gay raiment, a shrinking, 
 frightened-faced squaw, wrapped in a blanket, 
 and a scantily clad Indian baby. The old
 
 In Oklahoma 47 
 
 Indian climbed out of the wagon. As he left, 
 the papoose wailed shrilly, and the fond 
 father cuffed it over the head. Then he dis 
 appeared into the office. 
 
 "Old Lone Tree," explained the gambler. 
 "He s the meanest Indian unhung. He ll lie 
 and steal and murder, and beat his wife, and 
 do it all with imperturbable dignity. He s a 
 Government pet, and always comes out on top. 
 You can shoot a white man down here, and not 
 hear much about it; but wipe one of those 
 dirty, vicious Indians off the earth, and you ll 
 set the whole machinery of the Government 
 working. Don t talk to me about the noble 
 red man." 
 
 "Slim Jim gave Lone Tree that scar on his 
 cheek," the sheriff added. 
 
 "The tightest hole Jim was ever in was 
 three years ago, when six Indians held him 
 up fifteen miles out on the Creek road. 
 Even a drunken Injun ought to have 
 known better. Three braves were gathered 
 to their fathers, and three more were laid 
 up for weeks. There was a big fuss about it, 
 but it was finally decided that Jim shot in 
 self-defense." 
 
 The office-door opened. Old Lone Tree 
 stalked into the yard and across to the lumber-
 
 48 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 pile where the red-haired girl sat. He looked 
 her over calmly, while she blushed. 
 
 "How?" he grunted. 
 
 The two men nodded coolly. Lone Tree sat 
 down on the lumber and smoked his pipe, 
 looking superbly reserved and dignified. He 
 was spectacular, but a barrier to conversation. 
 The Indians in Oklahoma are picturesque, but 
 not inspiring. They shake one s faith in 
 Longfellow and Cooper. They are dirty, ill- 
 smelling, thieving, brutal; yet with it all they 
 do, at times, look the part. 
 
 Lone Tree finished his pipe in silence. Then 
 he made another exhaustive survey of Wilson s 
 sister, and nodded. She wasn t sure whether 
 the nod expressed approval, but she offered him 
 a smile at a venture. He accepted it without 
 any sign of appreciation. 
 
 "Day," he grunted solemnly, and went 
 away. 
 
 As he climbed into the wagon the papoose 
 once more gave a frightened cry, and Lone 
 Tree struck the little one a brutal blow with his 
 whip. The squaw moaned like an animal in 
 pain, gathered her baby in her arms, and sat 
 huddled in the bottom of the wagon, while her 
 lord and master, statuesque, serene, drove 
 away into the sunset.
 
 In Oklahoma 49 
 
 "Some day I shall kill an Indian," said 
 Tom Bailey quietly. "I feel it coming on." 
 
 The red-haired girl s education went on apace. 
 She lunched, and dined, and talked Paris and 
 pre-Raphaslitism with charming and cultured 
 folk; she played euchre and wore her smart 
 clothes, and flirted, and was reared quite after 
 the fashion of New York or Bar Harbor, but the 
 stage setting, at least, was novel, and there 
 was a fascination for her in the more primitive 
 side of the life in the rapidly disappearing 
 Oklahoma of which she heard tales when she 
 sat on a lumber-pile with Dick and Tom 
 Bailey and the sheriff. 
 
 "Why Bluff ville?" she asked one day. 
 "There aren t any bluffs." 
 
 The three men looked lazily at each other. 
 Each hoped one of the other would assume the 
 effort of explaining! The sheriff finally came 
 to the front. 
 
 "Didn t you ever hear how the town came 
 to be there? We called the railroad s bluff. 
 Some of the sooners staked it out and nabbed 
 town lots. The railroad company decided to 
 locate its town nine miles east, and not stop 
 here. Then there was a fight. The trains had 
 to be stopped here, and the boys stopped them. 
 They tore up track and broke up bridges. The
 
 50 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 railroad company sent a posse down to guard 
 things. Some of the boys engaged the posse 
 up at the north bridge while the rest of the 
 boys blew up the south bridge. One night 
 they moved a house, and set it squarely on the 
 track. The engineer of the express train 
 didn t see it until he was almost on it ; so he 
 threw his throttle wide and ploughed right 
 through the house. The engine never left the 
 track, but it looked more or less like thirty 
 cents afterward, and the passengers were 
 scared. 
 
 " People wouldn t ride on the trains, and the 
 trainmen wouldn t run them, so the railroad 
 company had to give in. It ought to have 
 known better than to buck up against a crowd 
 of Oklahoma boomers." 
 
 " How long ago was all that ? " 
 
 "Five years. We celebrated the town s 
 fifth birthday last summer, spent five thousand 
 dollars everything wide open, fireworks till 
 you couldn t rest, circus, balloon ascension, 
 show at the Opera House, four deaths from 
 pistol-shots, scores of black eyes, drunks in 
 bunches of twenty-five. It was a great oc 
 casion. Sorry you weren t here." 
 
 "Some day the bottom will fall out of this 
 boom," prophesied the gambler.
 
 In Oklahoma 51 
 
 "That s right," assented Dick. "We draw 
 from seventy-five miles east and one hundred 
 and fifty miles west now, but a railroad will cut 
 in somewhere, and we ll go out like a candle. 
 It s a great town now, though." 
 
 "Good place for a man in my profession." 
 The gambler s tone had a touch of self -disgust 
 in it. 
 
 "Why, why, wh The red-haired girl 
 
 looked embarrassed. 
 
 "Why do I follow my profession?" finished 
 the gambler cheerfully. "Well, why not? 
 I m on the square. My word s my bond, and 
 the boys know it. It s all a gamble, in one 
 way or another, and I m not sure but what the 
 avowed gambler is the only really honest man 
 in the bunch." 
 
 The month s visit came to an end one October 
 day. The red-haired girl kissed her brother 
 tearfully, while all the bystanders turned their 
 backs and diligently studied the landscape. 
 
 Then she shook hands with a large and 
 varied assortment of men, among them Old 
 Lone Tree, who eyed her stolidly, and grunted 
 "Day," but who had ridden twenty miles to 
 make the eloquent remark. 
 
 Tom Bailey was the last man to step up. 
 His face wore the expression that he usually
 
 52 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 reserved for a raise on a pair of deuces. A 
 habit of bluffing calmly stands a man in good 
 stead on some occasions. 
 
 " You ve been very good," said the red-haired 
 girl. 
 
 "Yes, I ve been good. I ll probably make 
 up for it." 
 
 Not a muscle of his face stirred, but that 
 night he rode his pony fifty miles for no ap 
 parent purpose. 
 
 On the train the red-haired girl met the 
 Congressman. 
 
 "It s a wonderful country," he said. 
 
 "It is," she agreed. 
 
 "Such crops," mused the Congressman. 
 
 "Such men," sighed the girl. She finds 
 New York slow.
 
 THE LITTLE GOD AND THE 
 MACHINE
 
 THE LITTLE GOD AND THE MACHINE 
 
 THEN it s all over?" He stood in the 
 centre of the room, looking very big 
 and angry, and holding a diamond 
 ring awkwardly, as though it burned his strong 
 fingers. 
 
 The girl s slim figure stiffened. The dimpled 
 chin went into the air a fraction of an inch 
 further. Evidently two persons were angry, 
 but anger doesn t make Prudence awkward. It 
 only flushes her cheeks, brightens her eyes, 
 tilts her chin to the advantage of its curves. 
 
 " I shall never speak to you again, Mr. 
 Wetherell, and I forbid you to speak to me." 
 
 The voice was icy. The glance was frozen 
 stiff. 
 
 It was absurd, in the midst of an emotional 
 crisis, to be wondering whether a young 
 woman s sponsors in baptism had realised they 
 were perpetrating a joke, yet an unhappy 
 young man found himself deciding, dully, that 
 anything more imprudent than looking as 
 kissable as Prudence Merrington would amount 
 
 55
 
 56 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 to a misdemeanour. His anger made way 
 before the rush of another emotion. 
 
 "But I love you so," he pleaded humbly. 
 His voice was husky, choked. There was an 
 Irish-setter look in his eyes that might have 
 softened a heart of stone. 
 
 "You will remember that I have forbidden 
 you to speak to me, under any circumstances," 
 said five-feet-four of unrelenting scorn. 
 
 "I am not likely to forget it; when I speak 
 to you again, it will be to answer a question 
 from you." 
 
 The yellow portiere fell behind her. The 
 man found his hat and the front door. He 
 swung away up the street, with boiling wrath 
 written in the set of his broad shoulders, in every 
 line of his handsome face. For a few moments 
 he walked on, blindly, rapidly. Then he 
 stopped, hesitated, and turned toward home. 
 
 Half an hour later he was spinning along a 
 country road in a red Panhard. His jaw was 
 still set stubbornly, and he was sending the 
 machine along at a reckless pace. What if he 
 did run over a collection of the natives ; what if 
 enterprising villagers did arrest him for speeding 
 a devil -wagon ; what difference could anything 
 make now? He rather hoped he would be 
 arrested. In that event he would have a
 
 The Little God and the Machine 57 
 
 chance to fight an officer of the law, and he 
 only hoped the myrmidon would be big and 
 husky. There wouldn t be much satisfaction 
 in thrashing a little man, even if it should mean 
 being sent up for thirty days. 
 
 So the motor tore along at high speed, and the 
 sullen-faced young man paid no attention to 
 the unflattering comment of the folk he passed. 
 
 There was a certain comfort in the rapid 
 motion. In earlier days, the chauffeur re 
 flected grimly, a rejected swain always rode a 
 horse into a lather. On the whole, it was better 
 to be a rejected swain in an age of automobiles. 
 Horses were too slow. Still, one could kill a 
 horse. One couldn t kill a motor. One couldn t 
 even make it tired. There might be a satis 
 faction in killing something and he let the 
 machine out another notch with a vicious jerk. 
 
 The sun was near the western hills before he 
 turned toward home, and he had a long ride 
 before him, but the fresh air rushing past his 
 hot face and the exhilaration of the pace, had 
 already told upon his mood and cooled his anger 
 slightly. The whole thing was too bad to be 
 true; and, though the engagement ring was in 
 his pocket, it wasn t possible that things should 
 end so. Yet she had been in earnest. They 
 had quarrelled often before. Who wouldn t
 
 58 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 quarrel with Prudence every morning for the 
 sake of making up every afternoon, and having 
 her heavenly kind and self-reproachful every 
 evening ? But this was no ordinary, promotive 
 quarrel. This was the real thing. She was 
 unjust but she had some reason on her side. 
 He certainly had been more or less of a brute- 
 jealous fool ! 
 
 The automobile took another staccato jump. 
 
 Yes, he had been a cad. He had to admit 
 that but what good could admitting it do? 
 Hadn t he called himself every uncomplimentary 
 name in the language? Hadn t he apologised 
 and blamed himself and promised and pleaded 
 and begged for mercy? and at the end of it 
 all she had forbidden him to speak to her. 
 
 Well, she should be obeyed. Oh, yes, he d 
 obey her ! He wouldn t speak to her unless she 
 asked him to do it and she wouldn t do that. 
 She was proud as Lucifer, and the Merrington 
 stubbornness was a proverb. 
 
 She wouldn t speak, and he couldn t speak, 
 and the weeks would go by and the other 
 fellows would be making love to her, and Billy 
 Kennedy would be getting home from Europe, 
 and finally she d stop caring anything about 
 him for she had cared. He knew that. She 
 wasn t the kind of a girl to well, she had
 
 The Little God and the Machine 59 
 
 shown him she cared and as memory gripped 
 him, he sent his machine whirling down a long 
 hill at a maniacal rate. 
 
 Before him a second hill rose, in slow 
 leisurely fashion, to meet the horizon. Pre 
 sumably, the motor was satiated with hill- 
 climbing. It eyed the long slope it was 
 charging, decided upon open revolt, and stopped 
 abruptly, with an explosive "chug"; then, 
 with a gentle, lingering quiver, it settled into 
 stolid immobility. 
 
 The chauffeur followed masculinity s rules 
 for first aid to the injured and tried " langwidge " 
 upon the erring one. Under the choicest 
 epithets chosen lovingly from a rich vocabulary, 
 the motor remained imperturbably serene. 
 
 Then an irate young man, in whom fresh 
 exasperation had supplanted earlier grievance, 
 and whose emotions had changed in character 
 if not in force, climbed out into a muddy road, 
 went down upon his knees and prodded, rattled, 
 screwed the internal mechanism of his iron 
 steed. After ten minutes of honest toil, he 
 mounted to his seat again and turned the lever 
 hopefully. 
 
 An abiding and reposeful calm ! 
 
 Dick Wetherell s lips moved ; but, luckily for 
 the morals of the young calf who watched the
 
 60 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 struggle across the hedge, his sentiments were 
 inaudible. He took off his coat, rolled up his 
 sleeves and his trousers, and went to work once 
 more. For the moment, a broken heart was of 
 no importance. Broken motor machinery held 
 the stage centre but with Dan Cupid as stage 
 manager that situation couldn t endure. Before 
 long, the heart once more claimed the calcium 
 light. The perspiring mechanic looked up 
 from his machine and pushed his cap back from 
 his brow. His eyes were turned indifferently 
 toward the hill which his motor had refused to 
 climb, and a gleam of interest shot into them. 
 Over the brow of the hill came a runabout, 
 spinning along as though speed laws w r ere made 
 for slaves. 
 
 Here, perhaps, was the good Samaritan; 
 but, as the motor came nearer, Dick saw that 
 a young woman was running it in solitary state, 
 and he kicked his machine viciously, in sheer 
 disgust. What could a fool woman know about 
 the whims and vagaries of a Panhard ? He 
 stared carelessly at the on-coming stranger. 
 Suddenly his eyes opened wide. He stiffened 
 perceptibly and reached for his coat. 
 
 It couldn t be at this hour, alone, twelve 
 miles from town and still going. Of course it 
 was quite impossible but he could swear to
 
 The Little God and the Machine 61 
 
 that red automobile -coat. There weren t two 
 girls in the world who held their heads like 
 that. It must be it was ! 
 
 "Good Lord!" groaned the afflicted one. 
 " And I ve got to stand here looking like an 
 awkward, muddy ass without sense enough to 
 run an auto, while she goes ripping by and cuts 
 me dead." 
 
 He pulled himself together and turned to his 
 machine ; but, out of the tail of his eye, he saw 
 a fair chauffeuse give a start of recognition, 
 draw herself up haughtily, stare straight ahead, 
 and increase the speed of her motor. 
 
 On she came, calm, erect, unseeing. Dick 
 braced himself for the moment when she would 
 whir by, within reach of his outstretched hand, 
 yet the world s width away from him. 
 
 There was a rattle, a bump, a smothered 
 exclamation. Opposite the Panhard, in the 
 muddy road, stood a runabout, immovable as 
 the milestone beside its wheels. On its seat 
 sat a chic chauffeuse, whose cheeks were 
 flaming red, and whose lips were narrowed into 
 a crimson line that trembled slightly. Dick 
 sprang forward involuntarily. A pair of brown 
 eyes, without a gleam of recognition in them, 
 met his blue ones. He hesitated, remembered, 
 and went back to his work.
 
 62 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 The owner of the brown eyes was outwardly 
 serene, but inwardly a prey to volcanic wrath, 
 which was slowly but surely giving way to 
 weak-kneed trepidation. What, in the name 
 of all saints who look after maidens in distress, 
 was she to do ? 
 
 It was all very well to be dignified and 
 serene in a drawing-room. There, woman was 
 on her native heath but in a stalled automo 
 bile, on a country road ! Verily, this was the 
 hour of the man Creature. Awkwardness and 
 superiority had shifted places. The haughty 
 young woman felt distinctly foolish. What was 
 much worse, she had a strong conviction that 
 she looked it. * 
 
 Fate had played her a scurvy trick, and the 
 situation was becoming more ridiculous with 
 every moment. 
 
 To sit helplessly in that absurd machine and 
 stare blankly at vacancy was out of the question. 
 She didn t know any more about the mechanism 
 of a motor than she did about differential 
 calculus, but anything was better than inaction; 
 so she clambered out into the mud, gathered up 
 her long skirts, and peered futilely at the 
 batteries. Then she walked around the ma 
 chine, examining it with what she fondly hoped 
 was the air of an expert, but wishing fervently
 
 The Little God and the Machine 63 
 
 the while that looks could eternally blast and 
 torture dumb wood and metal. 
 
 She poked the tires viciously and examined 
 the lever with deep solicitude. The house 
 gown, over which she had hastily slipped her 
 cloak, when nerves and rage drove her to 
 motoring, was trailing in the mud. Her thin- 
 soled shoes were soaked. She climbed into 
 her seat again and thought long, deep-blue 
 thoughts. 
 
 She couldn t walk home. Not a farm-house 
 was within sight. Probably she would have 
 to start out and find one, but the walking was 
 abominable, and the sun was almost down, 
 and she was deep in country wilds. 
 
 Here, at least, she was safe, so long as the 
 Person beside her stayed with his machine 
 and at that thought she almost made up her 
 mind to walk. It was intolerable to owe even 
 safety to an odious stranger. 
 
 She cast a furtive glance at the Odious One. 
 If he had shown the smallest sign of mirth, she 
 would never have forgiven him; but his broad 
 back was eloquent only of stubborn pride. 
 
 It was a very broad back. She had never 
 realised that Dick was so big and strong. 
 He looked quite equal to anything but he 
 couldn t repair his automobile. She was glad
 
 64 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 of that. It would be unendurable if he should 
 suddenly demonstrate the superiority of the 
 eternal masculine by bringing his machine to 
 terms and rolling off in it. 
 
 The very idea sent the haughty young 
 woman into a panic. Oh, he wouldn t be brute 
 enough to go off and leave her there, with the 
 dusk coming on. Surely he wouldn t do that 
 nobody could but she had been so very 
 severe. Perhaps she had been too severe. It 
 looked a little that way to her now. She was 
 dreadfully afraid of the dark and of cows. 
 There were always cows in country roads. 
 She had forbidden him to speak to her. Now, 
 if she could just ask him never ! She would 
 sit there in the dark until she petrified first. 
 She would rather walk fifty miles, at midnight, 
 through herds of cows, than speak to him. 
 Surely some one would come along with a 
 horse, and she would pay anything to have her 
 motor towed to the village. Yes, some one 
 was sure to come. She glued her gaze to the 
 hilltop and waited. 
 
 The man still pottered away at his motor. 
 He had gone around to the other side of it 
 now, and was facing the distressed damsel. 
 Apparently oblivious to her presence, he studied, 
 hungrily, every line of the dear face. There
 
 The Little God and the Machine 65 
 
 were soft bluish shadows under her eyes, and 
 her eyelids were faintly tinged with pink. 
 It might be the effect of the wind it might be 
 his heart melted within him, but he pressed 
 his lips firmly together. Now, what in the 
 deuce did she intend doing ? 
 
 As for himself, he had given up all hope of 
 doing anything with his machine. There was 
 nothing for it but to walk into town and send 
 out for the motor; but he couldn t leave a 
 woman alone in such a scrape, not even when 
 the woman was heartless and cruel and a 
 stranger to him. 
 
 Of course, he couldn t speak to her. He 
 would only be snubbed for his pains if he 
 should do it ; and, besides, he had promised her 
 he wouldn t speak to her until he could do 
 it in answer to her. Chivalry was all very 
 well, but he had humbled himself in the 
 dust, and she had walked over him. Now it 
 was up to her. Evidently she had decided 
 to wait for a chance passer-by. He would 
 wait too. 
 
 He put away his tools, took his seat in the 
 automobile, tucked the robes around him, and 
 stared as steadily toward the west as Prudence 
 was staring toward the east. His sense of 
 humour, numbed by pain and wrath, began to
 
 66 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 assert itself, and his lips twitched, but the 
 chauffeuse did not look in his direction. 
 
 For five minutes, ten minutes, they sat 
 there. Fifteen mmutes passed and no rescuer 
 appeared. 
 
 A soft drizzle set in, as the watery sun sank 
 behind the hills. Ten minutes later the drizzle 
 became a deluge. 
 
 The Man looked at the drabbled little woman 
 in the runabout. She still sat stubbornly 
 erect, but she looked ridiculously small, and as 
 he watched her she shivered miserably. 
 
 Her veil stuck in gluey dampness to her 
 face. From the point of her Tricorne hat a 
 little stream of water dribbled down forlornly 
 upon her saucy nose. Her coat soaked up the 
 rain greedily. 
 
 Masculine pride gave way, though masculine 
 wrath still stuck to its guns. 
 
 The chauffeur climbed out of his machine, 
 pulled a huge waterproof coat from under the 
 seat, and stalked, like a heavy tragedian, across 
 the miry strip of road between the two auto 
 mobiles. Without a word, he stood a small 
 woman upon her feet, wrapped the mackintosh 
 around her, buttoned it under her dimpled 
 chin, and sat her down hard upon the cushioned 
 seat.
 
 The Little God and the Machine 67 
 
 His face was the face of a man who charges 
 an enemy s guns. 
 
 He was rough, not tender. 
 
 No smallest trace of humility or pleading 
 lingered about him. 
 
 He didn t care whether she liked what he was 
 doing or disliked it. 
 
 If she would be a stubborn little fool, and 
 sit there in the rain all night, at least she should 
 wear that waterproof coat. The blood of 
 prehistoric ancestral wife-beaters was boiling 
 in his veins and, after all, nothing could make 
 matters worse for him than they were already. 
 
 Defiant, glowering, he turned away, but to 
 his amazement the sleeves of his own rain 
 coat went round his neck from behind and held 
 him. 
 
 " D-d-dick," said a wabbly little voice, satu 
 rated with tears, shaken by hysterical mirth 
 " D-d-dick, why d-d-on t you t-t-take a club?" 
 
 She had spoken. 
 
 He answered her. 
 
 Under cover of darkness, a farmer drove four 
 tired horses into the little town. 
 
 He sat alone in his wagon, but behind him 
 he towed two automobiles. One was empty. 
 From the other came sounds of unseemly mirth, 
 punctuated by intervals of rich silence.
 
 IN THE LIGHT OF THE CHRIST 
 MAS CANDLES
 
 IN THE LIGHT OP THE CHRISTMAS 
 CANDLES 
 
 A SLIM, erect woman, in rather shabby 
 black, turned into lower Fifth Avenue 
 from one of the side streets and walked 
 northward, slowly, but with a certain quiet self- 
 confidence. The street-lamps were not yet 
 lighted, but the dull end of a December day 
 was closing in upon the world, and the black 
 figure toned in with the drifting grays, like 
 an impressionistic study in monotonous values. 
 
 Hurrying folk passed the woman without 
 giving her a second glance ; and she on her part 
 showed no interest in the passers-by, though 
 she lingered for a moment on a street-corner to 
 watch a dull-red shaft of afterglow touch the 
 stone carving of a church tower into sudden 
 warmth. 
 
 As she stood looking at the flickering light, 
 a short, fat woman, rocking down the avenue 
 with a vigorous, side-wheeler motion, caught 
 sight of her, stopped, stared incredulously, and 
 threw two expressive hands into the air. 
 
 Man Dieu! It is herself of a certainty !
 
 72 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 Mademoiselle ! You have not forgotten Fran- 
 c.oise?" 
 
 The broad, ruddy face was beaming with 
 unmistakable joy; the black eyes were dancing 
 with excitement. 
 
 Elizabeth Vanderveck smiled swiftly, and 
 the smile changed her face as the sunset light 
 had transfigured the gray tower. 
 
 " Franc, oise !" she said, a trifle breathlessly. 
 " Franchise, you remember me ? " 
 
 She held out her hand and the radiant French 
 woman took it diffidently. 
 
 "But surely. How could one forget?" she 
 said in voluble French. " Was it not Made 
 moiselle whom we adored ? Ah, Mademoiselle ! 
 It is to tear the heart. The son of a brewer 
 is in our house. Me, I weep when I pass the 
 door. The dinners I have cooked there, 
 Mademoiselle and for those who recognised 
 the dinner recherche, the dinner of distinction. 
 That the parvenues should have our house ! It 
 is said below stairs that Madame does not 
 know Bechamel from sauce Meuniere. And 
 you, Mademoiselle? You have made the voy 
 age. You are now in New York to stay, is it 
 not?" 
 
 The exclamatory French woman s keen, 
 friendly eyes had taken in every detail of the
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 73 
 
 figure before her. Even in the gathering dusk 
 they had appraised the value of the cheap, black 
 coat, noted the worn, black gloves, the neat 
 but old-fashioned hat. Then they travelled 
 to the face in which gentle kindliness mingled 
 oddly with stubborn pride. There were lines 
 in the clean-cut, aristocratic face that had not 
 been there eight years earlier, but the lips were 
 curved as proudly as ever, the head had kept 
 its haughty poise. 
 
 " A grande dame always," she said to herself. 
 "That it is to have the blood. Son of a 
 brewer! Pah!" she snorted aloud with a 
 sudden vehemence that made her former 
 mistress start nervously. 
 
 " But he may have made very good beer, 
 Francoise," Miss Vanderveck protested with a 
 certain tranquil amusement. 
 
 The old house on Washington Square, in 
 which she and her father before her had been 
 born, had passed out of the Vanderveck family. 
 She had had years in which to become accus 
 tomed to that fact. Since it was no longer the 
 Vanderveck house, why should she care into 
 what nouveaux riches hands it fell? Poverty 
 makes anarchists, cynics, philosophers. Miss 
 Vanderveck was too well-born for anarchy, too 
 well-bred for cynicism, but the years since her
 
 74 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 father s ruin and death and her own self -exile 
 had taught her something of philosophy. 
 
 "Mademoiselle permits that I accompany 
 her to her door ? It is late for her to make the 
 promenade alone." 
 
 Franchise was bursting with curiosity, but 
 she could ask no questions. 
 
 Miss Vanderveck hesitated for an instant, 
 and a faint flush rose in her cheeks, but it went 
 as quickly as it came, and an odd little smile 
 flickered around her lips. 
 
 "I am used to being out alone," she said 
 simply, "but I should be glad to have you walk 
 home with me. How has the world used you, 
 Frangoise? My lawyer told me that all the 
 servants found places at once." 
 
 "But yes, Mademoiselle; and Monsieur 
 1 avocat gave us the month s wages, by order 
 of Mademoiselle. Places ? With me it was 
 an embarrassment, a pursuit. One remembered 
 your diriners, Mademoiselle, and coveted your 
 cook. It is in all modesty I say it. One is 
 born with the genius. One deserves little 
 credit. I considered the offers. The Belmore 
 family had need of both a cook and a butler. 
 They are not the true aristocrats, but they are 
 not without grandfathers, and they have 
 money. One must make concessions and
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 75 
 
 certainly is was an advantage that they 
 needed, too, a butler. Surely, Mademoiselle 
 remembers Watkins ? 
 
 Miss Vanderveck nodded. "The impos 
 ing Watkins ! No one could forget him, 
 Francoise." 
 
 "Exactly, Mademoiselle! Me, I had be 
 come used to Watkins. He was of an intelli 
 gence, of a sensibility, and of a figure Man 
 Dieu, what a figure, superb for a butler, he 
 has ! So that I would not lose him, I married 
 him. We are with the Belmores, who are now 
 on the Riviera, while we guard the house here. 
 They are not of the highest. I have already 
 said it. But what would you ? It is a com 
 promise." 
 
 The two women had turned off the avenue, 
 and walked westward along a side street, until 
 the desirable residence district was far behind 
 them. Finally, Miss Vanderveck stopped before 
 a new and cheap apartment -house. 
 
 "I live here," she said with a touch of 
 hauteur. The pride in her face had driven out 
 the softness, yet she spoke gently. " I will not 
 ask you to come up, Francoise. It is late. 
 You were kind to see me safely home, and it 
 has been pleasant to meet you; but for the 
 people who knew me in the old days I do not
 
 76 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 exist. You will oblige me by remembering 
 that, Franchise." 
 
 This suggestion was a royal command. 
 
 " But, Mademoiselle, you will surely permit 
 that I, Francoise, come to see that you are 
 well." 
 
 There were genuine tears in the imploring 
 eyes, and Miss Vanderveck relented. "Yes, 
 you may come." 
 
 "And for the Christmas, Mademoiselle? 
 You will be alone, is it not ?" 
 
 The pale, thin face looked a trifle paler, a 
 trifle thinner. Yes, she would be alone. 
 
 " If Mademoiselle would but do me a favour, 
 for the sake of the old service," stammered the 
 French woman. "Watkins and I, we also are 
 alone. It is not good to pass the Noel so with 
 out the fete, the gaiety. Not to prepare a 
 Christmas dinner ! I, Franchise, to fold my 
 hands when the day of dinners is come ! It 
 would be of a sadness, of a waste, Mademoiselle. 
 When one has the genius one owes something 
 to the world. One must find expression. If 
 Mademoiselle would but permit that we should 
 offer her Christmas dinner- 
 Miss Vanderveck s face was forbidding, but 
 Franoise stumbled desperately on. 
 
 "There would then be a true Christmas fete
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 77 
 
 for us, Mademoiselle to be allowed to serve 
 you, to prove that we have not forgotten your 
 goodness, that there is the service of love. 
 From my heart I could plan a dinner. I feel 
 now the inspiration within me." 
 
 She stopped for breath ; but Miss Vanderveck 
 did not speak. If the thing had not been 
 incredible one would have said that the firm 
 lips were trembling and that there was a mist 
 in the proud, brown eyes. 
 
 Franchise took heart of grace. 
 
 " Mademoiselle would think of nothing, know 
 nothing. Me, I would prepare everything. 
 Watkins would serve and we would be of a 
 happiness. For a Christmas present to us, 
 Mademoiselle, you will say yes. Is it not?" 
 
 She stopped, dismayed by her own hardihood. 
 No thunderbolt fell. 
 
 Miss Vanderveck stood looking at her with 
 a beautiful light in her eyes. 
 
 "You are a good woman, Franchise a 
 loyal friend. I am glad to know there are such 
 as you. It seems I have misjudged the world." 
 
 Franchise laughed a gay, little laugh of relief 
 and delight. 
 
 "Eh bien, it is understood?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " You will not give a thought to the Christmas
 
 78 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 dinner? You will not look into the dining- 
 room, the kitchen?" 
 
 "I promise." 
 
 "Oh, Mademoiselle, I am proud, grateful. 
 Watkins, too, will be enchanted. You are an 
 angel, Mademoiselle, It shall be a dinner for 
 an angel with the tastes worldly. Good-night, 
 Mademoiselle." 
 
 She was gone. 
 
 Miss Vanderveck went up the narrow stairway 
 and into her apartment. She took off her coat 
 and hat and gloves in the dim light that filtered 
 through the windows. Then she lay down upon 
 the couch, and for the first time since she disap 
 peared from a world in which no Vanderveck 
 had ever been pitied or patronised, she cried 
 softly. 
 
 Meanwhile the French woman who conde 
 scended to minister to the palates of the 
 Belmare family, when that family was not globe 
 trotting, was hurrying back toward Fifth 
 Avenue as fast as two hundred pounds of flesh 
 and embarrassing shortness of breath would 
 allow. She must see Watkins. She must tell 
 him the news, and in order to avoid explosion, 
 she must tell it soon. News like this was 
 too effervescent to be retained with safety. 
 It must be shared at once.
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 79 
 
 As the fat little woman turned into the 
 avenue, a man came down the steps of a big 
 brick house and paused for a moment to light 
 his cigar. 
 
 Franc, oise, scurrying Watkinsward, was yet 
 not blind to the merits of other masculinity. 
 Her glance took in the tall, immaculately clad 
 figure appreciatively. It was a portly figure 
 a figure coquetting with embonpoint, yet linger 
 ing on the hither side of discretion s boundary- 
 line. 
 
 There are men who exude prosperity at the 
 pores, and Dudley Broughton s prosperity, 
 while not aggressive, was subtly and inex 
 tinguishably self-assertive. He had been born 
 to the material good things and he had not 
 thrown away his birthright. Possibly he had 
 allowed it to assume undue proportion in his 
 scheme of life ; yet the man was no sensualist 
 merely self-absorbed and self-indulgent, after 
 the manner of men for whom life has been 
 made comfortable. 
 
 Francoise, looking at the handsome, indiffer 
 ent face, illumined by the lighted match, gave 
 a dramatic start. This was her day of sensa 
 tions; and, being French, she appreciated it. 
 Eight years had not passed since she had seen 
 Dudley Broughton. In point of fact, she had
 
 8o Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 passed him on the street only a few days before, 
 but then he suggested no romance to her quick 
 brain. Now he was a possibility. There had 
 been a time when he seemed a probability, but 
 that was long before, when the old house on 
 Washington Square held its own, and the 
 servants hall buzzed with gossip about the 
 mistress and her admirers. 
 
 For Franchise even a possibility had its 
 charms. 
 
 Why turn one s back upon Heaven-sent 
 opportunity? If he did not care to know, 
 no harm would be done. If he had heart 
 this Monsieur Broughton he would rejoice. 
 Mademoiselle had commanded that no one 
 should be told. Oh, la, la ! If one did only 
 what was commanded the world would be of 
 a slowness. 
 
 "Monsieur," 
 
 Dudley Broughton took his cigar from his 
 lips, lifted his hat slightly, and stood courteously 
 waiting, without a hint of recognition in his 
 face. 
 
 Franchise spurred her courage. 
 
 "Monsieur would not remember it is not 
 to be expected but in the old days he was 
 gracious enough to praise my sole au vin 
 blanc."
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 8r 
 
 "Frangoise," he said. "I make you my 
 homage. There is no other cook in New York 
 who could equal it." 
 
 A smile flashed into the man s face. " Fran- 
 goise, you were with the Vandervecks. I 
 remember you perfectly. I remember the sole, 
 too. I begged to be presented to you." 
 
 "Yes, Monsieur; and Miss Vanderveck sent 
 for me. Ah, Monsieur, it is because of her that 
 I have spoken to you. I apologise, but when 
 the heart speaks one does the thing impulsive. 
 Me, Monsieur, I am all heart." 
 
 She pressed a chubby hand against her 
 breast. 
 
 Dudley Broughton s placid face had sharpened 
 slightly. 
 
 " What do you know of her?" he asked. 
 
 The shrewd little French woman heard the 
 ring of interest in his voice and mentally ap 
 plauded herself. 
 
 " I have but just left her, Monsieur." 
 
 "Here? In New York?" 
 
 "Of a surety, Monsieur." 
 
 " She is living here ? " 
 
 " Since the first of the month." 
 
 "But where? How?" 
 
 He pulled himself up suddenly. One is not 
 a boy at fifty, and one does not make a confidant
 
 82 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 of a stranger whom one meets on the street- 
 corner. 
 
 But Franchise was uncorked. The story- 
 gurgled out, and the man who listened, knowing 
 Elizabeth Vanderveck well, and belonging to 
 the world upon which she had turned her back, 
 understood, as the good-hearted woman of 
 another class and of different traditions could 
 not understand. 
 
 "Voild," finished Frangoise. "Voild the 
 story. It is of a meanness, that apartment- 
 house, and she had the air poor but always 
 the aristocrat. Already I have meditated upon 
 the dinner, Monsieur. It shall be of the best. 
 Wat kins and I have made the bank account." 
 " If you would allow 
 
 The man s hand went to his pocket, but the 
 French woman s face flushed. 
 
 "Pardon, Monsieur, no. It is I, Franchise, 
 who dffers the dinner. Mademoiselle permits. 
 But it is this for which I ventured to stop 
 Monsieur. I knew him to be an old friend of 
 the family, and I said to myself, To dine alone 
 is not right, on the Noel. Then the dinner 
 more than one should appreciate it. Perhaps 
 Monsieur Broughton would have the kindness 
 not for me, but for the old friendship- 
 She stuck fast, tangled in embarrassment
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 83 
 
 then went on breathlessly; "If you could but 
 add to the pleasure to the surprise if you 
 would but dine with Mademoiselle on Christmas 
 Day. I would have all things ready; it would 
 be like a dinner out of the past. It is not good 
 that one should see no old friend on the Noel, 
 Monsieur!" 
 
 The man was as embarrassed as she but 
 with a difference. 
 
 " I should be glad to eat your dinner, Fran- 
 goise, but Mademoiselle it would be an 
 intrusion. She has never sent me word she 
 would have let me know if she had been willing 
 I should come." 
 
 He was stammering like a boy. 
 
 "The pride, Monsieur only the pride. A 
 friend laughs at the pride. And on Christmas 
 Day it is the season of good will, is it not 
 the season of the soft heart? The Christmas 
 candles would melt the pride, Monsieur. You 
 will come?" 
 
 He hesitated, then squared his shoulders. 
 
 "Yes, Franchise. I will go." 
 
 " A la bonne heure! There shall be sole an 
 vin blanc." 
 
 "You will give me the address, and I may 
 send flowers?" 
 
 "To me, Monsieur. It is to be a surprise."
 
 84 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 She gave him the address. 
 
 " Au revoir, Monsieur. You are of a kindness. 
 It shall be a success, that Christmas dinner." 
 
 She hurried on to Watkins 
 
 Dudley Broughton stopped a passing cab 
 and drove to his club. He could think better 
 at the club. In fact, he found that he could 
 do most things better at the club. 
 
 If it had not been for the excellence of that 
 club, he might, perhaps, have 
 
 His thoughts went back to the days when 
 the Vandervecks lived in the old Vanderveck 
 house and he was exceedingly at home there. 
 He could remember Elizabeth s debut. She 
 was a pretty girl, a trifle cold and proud, even 
 then, but he admired her tranquilly. He 
 was past enthusiasm over debutantes, and 
 already dancing under protest. It was on her 
 father s account that he had drifted into the 
 position of friend of the house. At least, that 
 was what he had thought, but the debutante 
 matured into a lovely woman, and he still 
 admired her tranquilly. She had stood as 
 his standard for womanhood. He had felt that 
 if he should marry, his wife would be like her. 
 Probably he would marry some day some 
 far-off day. One ought to do that sort of thing, 
 and Elizabeth but one was so comfortable at
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 85 
 
 the club. Marriage entailed responsibilities, 
 curtailing of freedom, domestic difficulties, 
 trouble with servants, bad dinners. At the 
 club one had what one wanted, and one paid 
 one s dues. That was all. 
 
 The gossips grew tired of connecting his 
 name with Miss Vanderveck. Elizabeth was 
 cordial, serene. She had admirers, a host of 
 them, and each one went away, in time; but 
 Dudley Broughton still dined at the house 
 regularly on Sundays and dropped in at all 
 hours. He was* a selfish man, not a vain one, 
 and it never occurred to him that Elizabeth 
 loved him. Of course he loved her. He 
 accepted that fact as he accepted the sunsets, 
 but things were very well as they were. 
 
 He was in India when the crash came; and 
 months went by before he heard of the financial 
 failure, with the ugly suggestions of disgrace 
 hanging round it, and of Peyton Vanderveck s 
 sudden death. He wrote to Elizabeth at once, 
 but he had never heard from her. She had 
 been courageous enough to do her own surgery, 
 to walk off the stage before she could be elbowed 
 from it. No one knew anything about her, 
 save the family lawyer, and his lips were sealed. 
 
 Society gossiped, wondered, and then forgot 
 the Vanderveck bankruptcy, in the Chittenden
 
 86 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 divorce. Even the real friends forgot, in 
 time. 
 
 Thinking the story over as he dined, Dudley 
 Broughton realised that he, too, had practically 
 forgotten, though he had been sadly shaken up 
 and hurt when he found that the one woman he 
 admired tranquilly had dropped out of his 
 life and .made no sign to him. He had never 
 realised that she had not understood that she 
 had not believed he would care. 
 
 Now she was in New York. He would See 
 her and something stirred in him that sur 
 prised him mildly. 
 
 He ate his dinner in perfunctory fashion, 
 roamed into the smoking-room, ensconced him 
 self in a big chair, lighted a good cigar, and sat 
 staring at the ceiling. Only once during the 
 evening did he speak. A friend slapped him on 
 the shoulder. 
 
 "My boy s half-back on the Yale team, 
 Broughton," he said proudly. 
 
 Broughton lowered his gaze from the ceiling. 
 
 " Eh, what ? Oh, yes. Nice boy ?" 
 
 "Well, rather. I m going down to the 
 station to meet him now," 
 
 "How many children have you, Courtney?" 
 
 "Four; and they re the finest ever. My 
 small girl makes her debut this winter, and she s a
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 87 
 
 winner. Why the deuce don t you marry, old 
 man?" 
 
 He walked away. 
 
 Broughton relapsed into silence. After a 
 time he put on his coat and hat and went to the 
 theatre. For the first time the club seemed big 
 and cheerless. 
 
 When Elizabeth Vanderveck opened her 
 door in the dusk of Christmas day, suggestions 
 of festivity smote her nostrils. The scent of 
 American Beauty roses mingled with an odour 
 of highly seasoned cookery. Violets and lilies - 
 of -the -valley defied the kitchen to do its worst. 
 
 For a moment the mistress of the place looked 
 puzzled. Then she remembered. Evidently 
 Frangoise and her Watkins had taken possession 
 while she had her long walk. Her lamps were 
 lighted. Her little front room was full of 
 flowers. Surely Franchise could not have re 
 membered her preference for valley lilies, yet 
 there were masses of them on the little tea- 
 table. 
 
 The curtains between the tiny parlour and 
 the tinier dining-room were drawn, and Miss 
 Vanderveck smiled at the mystery in which 
 this odd Christmas celebration of hers was 
 shrouded. Still smiling, she sank wearily into
 
 88 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 a low chair, and, closing her eyes, sat quietly 
 with the perfume of the lilies caressing her 
 senses and old Christmas times drifting through 
 her thoughts, until a subdued clatter of china 
 and glass, behind the curtains, roused her. 
 
 She must dress for her dinner. Depression 
 and untidy hair would be a poor return for the 
 friendliness of Franchise and Watkins. The 
 occasion was festive ; well, festive it should be, 
 if she could make it so. 
 
 She went down the hall and into her bed 
 room, put away her coat and hat and turned 
 to her mirror. The woman she saw there did 
 not suggest gaiety. Her face rose pale and 
 weary above the sombre black of her gown, 
 and her brown hair was brushed smoothly back 
 from her brow. A sprinkling of gray showed 
 in the brown, and Miss Vanderveck eyed it with 
 gloomy disapproval. The disapproval extended 
 itself to include the black gown. What place 
 had black at a Christmas dinner ? 
 
 A gleam of inspiration dawned in Miss 
 Vanderveck s eyes, and with a certain shame 
 faced determination she opened a trunk, that 
 stood in one corner of the room, and recklessly 
 tossed its contents on the floor. Down at the 
 bottom she found the thing of which she had 
 been in search, and as she shook it out the gas-
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 89 
 
 light rioted over the glowing silken folds of rose 
 colour. She had kept no other gown of the 
 kind. What had rose-colour dinner-gowns to 
 do with her life now? But this gown had 
 associations. It had been a favourite with old 
 friends. It well, she had kept it. 
 
 She rose to her feet with the brilliant burden 
 in her arms, and looked from the gown to the 
 mirror, from the mirror to the gown. Eight 
 years had not made her lamentably old. She 
 had a fancy to see what the vanities could do 
 toward wiping out the traces of those dull 
 years. 
 
 Her hair first. She let down the soft, brown 
 mass, and drawing it loosely to the top of her 
 head, fastened it in soft puffs and allowed it 
 to wave flumly about her face. The effect 
 was encouraging, and the faint colour in her 
 cheeks deepened. After all, forty -two was 
 not an appalling age, and why shouldn t one 
 be good to look at even if there was no one 
 to look? 
 
 She slipped into the shimmering pink gown. 
 It was out of date as fashions go, but it had 
 been a picturesque gown in the first place, and 
 it kept its art value. Miss Vanderveck s 
 sloping white shoulders rose bare from out of a 
 foam of fine old lace. They had always been
 
 QO Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 good shoulders. Eight years had not changed 
 them. 
 
 The forlorn figure in rusty black had faded 
 out of the mirror. In its place was a slender 
 woman with a delicate patrician face, who 
 carried her head in regal fashion and wore a 
 superb gown with nonchalant grace. 
 
 "You could no it even now," she said 
 enigmatically, and in the shadowy background 
 of the mirror men s faces came and went. She 
 had ruled right royally in the days when the 
 pink gown was new. 
 
 She turned and trailed her rustling skirts 
 down the narrow hall to the little drawing-room. 
 She was living over again those days when the 
 world went well. 
 
 In the doorway she paused, and from the 
 corner of the dimly lighted room a man came 
 to meet her. She was not surprised. He was 
 a part of the dream, and she held out her hands 
 to him graciously, as she had given them to 
 him in the old days. 
 
 " Dudley," she said happily. There was no 
 surprise in her voice only tranquil acceptance 
 of a great good. 
 
 He held the slim white hands and looked at 
 her with a vague wonder in his eyes. This was 
 not the forlorn woman Franchise had described.
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 91 
 
 This was Elizabeth at her best. He had for-, 
 gotten that she was so lovely. 
 
 " Dinner is served." 
 
 Watkins stood in the dining-room doorway, 
 dignified, imposing, outwardly imperturbable, 
 though curiosity seethed within him. 
 
 Miss Vanderveck looked at him. He, too, 
 was a part of the dream. She took her guest s 
 arm and went with him into the little room 
 where for a month past she had eaten her 
 simple and solitary meals. Silver and cut- 
 glass, fine napery, great bowls of roses flouted 
 the close, crowding walls and the cheap furni 
 ture, and Watkins loomed large, irreproachable, 
 serene, though the incongruity of his stage- 
 setting might well have shattered a less masterly 
 repose of manner. 
 
 The kitchen door was slightly ajar, and 
 through the crack peered an appreciative eye, 
 unseen but seeing. 
 
 Miss Vanderveck sank into her chair and 
 looked across the roses at the man who sat 
 opposite. 
 
 "It is good," she said simply, and his eyes 
 repeated her words. 
 
 "You were unkind, unfair." 
 
 She nodded. "Yes; it seems the pessimists 
 are all wrong. The world has a heart."
 
 92 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 No more explanation. Out of the experience 
 of years they understood, and the woman s 
 pride melted, with the man s selfishness, in the 
 flame of the Christmas candles. 
 
 Francoise was proven prophet. 
 
 They ate their oysters those two who were 
 finding themselves and they did justice to 
 course after course of a wonderful dinner. 
 
 Francoise was more than a prophet. She 
 was a cook. Her dishes were worthy to belong 
 in the dream. 
 
 It was a gay little dinner. Even Watkins 
 lost a shade of his portentous solemnity and 
 consented to see humour in the fact that there 
 was barely room for him to squeeze between 
 sideboard and table, though up to the entree 
 the wound to his dignity rankled sorely. 
 
 Miss Vanderveck s cheeks grew pinker each 
 time she met her old friend s eyes across the 
 roses, and her voice held a tremulous little note, 
 though she talked and laughed lightly. 
 
 The man watching her heard the thrill in her 
 voice and saw some inner thrill stir into ripples 
 the serenity of the steady brown eyes. The 
 restless discontent that had wakened when 
 he knew that she had come back into his life 
 rose and beat against his indifferent egoism, 
 and a touch of eager boyishness crept into his
 
 In the Light of the Christmas Candles 93 
 
 face and manner. How a man could waste the 
 years, he thought, and walk blindly side by side 
 with happiness ! 
 
 Watkins put the coffee upon the table and 
 discreetly withdrew. Franchise had prompted 
 him, and, when he appeared in the kitchen, she 
 cast herself upon his manly breast and wiped 
 away a tear with a dish-towel. 
 
 " I have done my best," she said dramatically. 
 " It is now in the hands of le Bon Dieu. Such a 
 dinner should have made it of an easiness for 
 him." 
 
 In the dining-room there was silence as the 
 door closed. Then Miss Vanderveck lifted a 
 glass to her lips. 
 
 " To the old days ! " she said softly. 
 
 Dudley Broughton shook his head. 
 
 "To the coming days!" he amended. His 
 hand went out across the table and found hers. 
 
 Two servants sat in the little kitchen and 
 waited anxiously. An hour went by. Ten 
 o clock came. 
 
 " E s avin trouble," said Watkins. 
 
 Franchise was more hopeful. 
 
 " It is that they have forgotten. That is the 
 good sign," she murmured. 
 
 The bell rang sharply, and Watkins sprang 
 to the door with an eagerness foreign to his
 
 94 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 habitual calm, but he entered the dining-room 
 with his usual noiseless dignity. Behind him 
 appeared the fat form and shining face of 
 Francoise, prophetess, culinary genius dea ex 
 machina. She had forgotten to close the door. 
 
 Dudley Broughton looked at the couple and 
 smiled. His chair was on Miss Vanderveck s 
 side of the table. 
 
 "Watkins," he said, and there was a huge 
 content in his usually dry voice, " are you and 
 Francoise pledged to the Belmores after their 
 return next month ? " 
 
 "No, sir." 
 
 Francoise had come forward and was beaming 
 at her husband s side. 
 
 "We think," said Mr. Broughton, with a 
 certain lingering emphasis on the "we," and a 
 look at the \voman beside him, "we think we 
 shall need you after we come back from 
 Florida."
 
 A VISITING PEER
 
 A VISITING PEER 
 
 THE Howisons lived in a New York 
 suburb, but that was the worst that 
 could be said of them. 
 
 Their own particular suburb was much like 
 other suburbs of the better sort, and the 
 Howison house was a centuplet, but it was a 
 very jolly little house, for all that. 
 
 " Five minutes from the station, natural 
 shingles, white woodwork, adorable veranda 
 and no stained glass," was Mrs. Howison s 
 description of the place. Howison always 
 mentioned a porcelain tub and a yard big 
 enough for a tennis court. There were minor 
 details, but they have no place in a short story. 
 
 Bridget and Ellen were not minor details, 
 but they, too, are somewhat foreign to the tale, 
 save as promoters, for they left, at an hour s 
 notice, on Saturday morning. Wilkins, the 
 milkman, had something to do with the pre 
 cipitate decampment not in his official capac 
 ity, for he was an unexceptionable milkman ; but 
 he was also a bachelor, and no bachelor should 
 drive a milk-wagon. It gives him too much 
 
 97
 
 98 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 scope for conquest. Mortal man could not 
 reasonably be expected to be adamant, in the 
 matter of backdoor overtures; and Wilkins 
 was not only mortal, but a good-looking and 
 impressionable mortal, with fine Catholic tastes. 
 
 Bridget and Ellen were Catholics, but their 
 tastes were restricted, and when it came to 
 sharing Wilkins affection, they were Prot 
 estants. 
 
 Each made well-chosen and perfectly intel 
 ligible remarks concerning the other s ante 
 cedents, character, and susceptibility, and 
 concerning the milkman s real feelings. Each 
 refused to live under the same roof with the 
 other for another hour. Neither would stay 
 in the house after being accused of wanting to 
 stay so that she might throw herself at the 
 milkman s curly head. Bridget took the trolley 
 to Newark. Ellen boarded an Erie train. 
 
 When Howison came home, at four o clock, 
 he found his wife sitting among kitchen debris, 
 like Marius among the ruins of Carthage. 
 
 "They ve both gone," she said forlornly. 
 " I ve just been looking over the broken glass 
 and china." 
 
 Howison is a lover as well as a commuter. 
 He did the most comforting thing possible under 
 the circumstances. Two years experience with
 
 A Visiting Peer 99 
 
 domestic tragedies had perfected his method, 
 and Mrs. Howison finally admitted that there 
 was balm in the possession of an angel husband. 
 Then they laid the table for two, Howison 
 protesting, the while, that he always preferred a 
 cold supper on July nights, and that for the 
 promotion of sheer gastronomic bliss he would 
 choose cold lamb and tomato salad before any 
 other menu that had ever swum within his ken. 
 
 At five o clock, arrayed in summery fine 
 linen, they sat within the screened cage that is 
 the Jersey version of veranda, trying to forget 
 that they would have to cook their own Sunday- 
 morning breakfast. 
 
 " Now, if we were in town, we could go around 
 the corner to a restaurant, or have breakfast 
 sent in, or " 
 
 "Why, Teddy!" interrupted Mrs. Howison, 
 with tearful reproach in her tone. 
 
 Teddy slid to base. 
 
 "Oh, of course, darling, I wouldn t be 
 happier in town. This is really the ideal thing. 
 A fellow does want a big kitchen, and linen- 
 closets, and a laundry, and room for his party 
 clothes." 
 
 There was a glibness in the recitative that 
 suggested quotation, but his face was earnest 
 and sincere.
 
 TOO Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 " Servants do stir things up a bit out here," 
 he went on ; " but one can t expect anything 
 to be perfect except one s wife." 
 
 He resorted once more to unanswerable 
 argument. 
 
 "Teddy, the neighbours certainly will see 
 us!" Mrs. Teddy protested. 
 
 "Let em," urged the valiant Howison, who 
 was not only in love with his own wife, but 
 shameless enough to be proud of it. " By 
 Jove, who s that?" 
 
 The station hack drew up before the Howison 
 gate. From it descended a formidable length 
 and breadth of rather noisy-checked tweed, 
 which resolved itself into a large man built 
 upon the massive lines of early English archi 
 tecture. He pulled from the dilapidated hack 
 two huge bags, which had apparently 
 been made to match him, and gave the driver 
 a tip, which surprised that free-born son of 
 American independence into lifting his hand 
 toward his hat with a servile intent, which 
 he checked in time to save his self-respect. 
 The "made in England" traveller turned 
 toward the house. 
 
 Mrs. Teddy made a queer little noise in 
 her throat, and clutched her husband s arm 
 despairingly.
 
 A Visiting Peer 101 
 
 " It s Oh, Teddy, it can t be yes, I believe 
 Teddy, it is Lord Cheltenham ! " 
 
 Mr. Howison looked from his wife to the 
 approaching guest and back again. 
 
 "Yep," he admitted weakly. 
 
 "And no cook! and Saturday! and we 
 told him to come at any time ! and he gave us 
 such a gorgeous time at Cheltenham House ! 
 and he s used to servants just heaped up in all 
 the corners." 
 
 Her voice was growing smaller and smaller, 
 as the enormity of the situation sank into her 
 soul. 
 
 "What will we do?" she wailed pianissimo. 
 
 "Buck up," suggested Teddy with a gleam 
 of masculine sanity. 
 
 " Yes, of course. He was so good to us over 
 there. He d be dreadfully cut up if he knew 
 he had come at such an inconvenient time. 
 Don t tell him, Teddy. We ll manage some 
 way but don t begin lying until you have 
 to, Teddy. We must figure out something 
 we can stick to consistently. I m not a bit 
 good at improvising. Isn t it positively sick 
 ening?" 
 
 "Damn the luck!" murmured Mr. Howison 
 firmly. 
 
 "Thank you so much, darling. Why, Lord
 
 102 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 Cheltenham ! This is a delightful surprise. 
 How lovely of you ! " 
 
 She was on the steps now, with both hands 
 impulsively outstretched and her pretty face 
 aglow with glad welcome. Behind her loomed 
 Teddy, cordiality written large upon him. 
 
 "This is what I call friendly, Cheltenham. 
 Let me take those grips. When did you land ? 
 This morning? And you came right down to 
 us? Well, that was exactly the thing to do, 
 and I tell you we appreciate it." 
 
 The Peer s ruddy face was wreathed in 
 smiles. 
 
 " I knew you meant it, when you told me to 
 come any time, without warning. Wouldn t 
 dare take that at its face value with every 
 friend, old man. Mrs. Howison, it s absurd 
 for a young thing like you to pretend to be a 
 matron and housewife. Pretty place you ve 
 got here ! Don t bother with those bags, 
 Howison." 
 
 "There isn t a man-servant on the place," 
 announced his host joyously. "This is the 
 land of democratic simplicity, Cheltenham. 
 You ll have to get used to it. I ll just take 
 these things to your room. You ll want to tub 
 and freshen up a bit after this hot day in town." 
 
 Lord Cheltenham followed him up the stairs.
 
 A Visiting Peer 103 
 
 Five minutes later, Howison sought his 
 wife, and found her sitting on the floor before 
 the open refrigerator. 
 
 She waved a limp chicken at him as he ap 
 peared. 
 
 "We ll have to have our Sunday dinner to 
 night. You can telephone and have things for 
 Sunday brought over this evening if Jones 
 has anything left, at this time Saturday night. 
 If we were living in town now we could " 
 
 "Why, Katherine!" 
 
 Her husband s tone was steeped in reproach, 
 but his eyes grinned. Mrs. Howison s dimples 
 responded to the grin. 
 
 "Yes, I know, but don t make me laugh, or 
 I ll cry. Get Nell on the phone, that s a 
 duck. She simply must help me out of this. 
 What s the use of having a sister in town, if 
 she doesn t understand first aid to the injured ? " 
 
 "Here s Nell, , called Howison, after an 
 interval in which his wife did record-breaking 
 stunts in the line of dinner preparation. She 
 dropped the can-opener and hurried to the 
 telephone. 
 
 " That you, Nell ? Both maids have left. 
 Yes, this morning. Awful? Well, you don t 
 know how awful it really is. Lord Cheltenham s 
 here Yes, honestly came fifteen minutes ago.
 
 104 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 I don t know, a week, probably. Get dinner 
 myself? There s nothing else to do. I shan t 
 tell him the cook s gone. I ll just mention that 
 the waitress has gone home ill, and laugh it off, 
 What? Yes, I ll wait on the table myself, 
 and make a sort of a lark of it, you know. I m 
 going to wear that, new pink frock. Ruin it ? 
 Maybe I will, but it will help some. He won t 
 notice the dinner so much. The skirt does 
 hang like a dream, you know. I ll have to be 
 trailing back and forth to the kitchen and that 
 sash and back drapery will leave a good im 
 pression behind me every time I disappear. 
 What? Why, of course, the kitchen floor is 
 dirty, but one has to make sacrifices in an 
 emergency like this. 
 
 "Now listen. I want you to send me two 
 maids on the early train to-morrow Saturday 
 night? Yes, I know that. What s that? 
 Why, of course, the intelligence offices are 
 closed by this time. That doesn t make any 
 difference. I have to have maids. 
 
 "Get them of the caterer or the Salvation 
 Army, or somebody. I don t care anything 
 about their references or their morals. Just 
 somebody for a day or two, until I can find 
 regular ones. Pay anything for them. 
 
 "You can t ? I could if I were there. Well,
 
 A Visiting Peer 105 
 
 then send me yours. Cool? No, I m not cool; 
 I wish I were. You can get along without 
 them. You haven t a live lord on your hands. 
 Tom and you can go to the hotel, and we ll pay 
 your bill. Won t come ? Oh, yes, they will come 
 if you offer them enough. That s a dear. 
 You fix it with them. I ll do as much for you 
 some day. There won t be any mistake? 
 Take them and put them on the train, Nell. 
 They might escape at the last moment. The 
 six-thirty train. Yes, it is a little early, but 
 these summer mornings are so beautiful 
 
 "And say, Nell, send along anything nice you 
 happen to have in the house. Yes, that would 
 be lovely. We haven t a scrap of cake. 
 What s that ? That fine old Burgundy ? Tell 
 Tom he s a cherub. We ll bring Lord Chelten 
 ham up and have a dinner and roof -garden 
 spree for you all 
 
 "So much obliged. Don t let anything 
 happen. Good-bye." 
 
 "All right, is it?" Howison asked anxiously. 
 
 " I guess so. Nell didn t seem as altruistic 
 as she might have been. She wouldn t have 
 given in for anything less than a Peer. Do go 
 and lie in wait for that Peer, Teddy, and take 
 him off somewhere. Walk him over to the 
 links. If they only had a good club-house and
 
 io6 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 restaurant, wouldn t it be a help ? It s foolish 
 to pick out a suburb where there isn t a sure- 
 enough country club ! " 
 
 As Howison and the Peer started down the 
 walk, Mrs. Howison called her husband back. 
 
 " Be awfully late to dinner, Teddy, and say 
 something about it on the w r ay home. That 
 will give me time to get things ready and dress, 
 and I ll be amiable and forgiving when you 
 apologise." 
 
 "Shade of Sapphira!" murmured Howison 
 but he kissed her. 
 
 Lord Cheltenham saw the golf links thorough 
 ly. His host didn t spare him a single bunker. 
 They even played a hole or two before the 
 shadows grew too long, and after that they 
 joined fellow golfers on the small veranda of the 
 diminutive club-house and imbibed large quan 
 tities of a refreshment that didn t require the 
 services of a chef. Finally Lord Cheltenham 
 began to lose his self-confidence. 
 
 "I say, Howison, do you think all this 
 mixing is quite wise in a pilgrim and a stranger ? 
 They re good, you know, but they re devilish 
 complicated." 
 
 And Howison, having secretly consulted his 
 watch and seen that its hands pointed to 
 eight -ten, let the Peer off.
 
 A Visiting Peer 107 
 
 "We d better be hiking along, I guess," he 
 said. Then, openly looking at his watch, he 
 started violently. 
 
 " By Jove ! It s after eight, and dinner was 
 at seven. We must hustle." 
 
 "Haven t had your dinner yet?" chorused 
 the fellow golfers. "Lucky you have a good- 
 natured wife, Howison," added one of the 
 group. 
 
 "Oh, she ll be all right!" Howison asserted 
 with fine nonchalance, "but the dinner may 
 have gone off a peg or two. Come on, Chelten 
 ham." 
 
 They sprinted homeward. Mrs. Teddy, having 
 seen them afar off through the kitchen window, 
 rushed to the veranda and rose indolently 
 from the hammock to greet them, with gay 
 reproach, when they appeared. 
 
 Lord Cheltenham eyed the pink frock and 
 the face above it and, out of the fulness of much 
 "mixing" and of aesthetic appreciation, heaved 
 a mighty sigh of content. 
 
 "I tell you this is living," he said, with warm 
 approbation. "Simple, natural, charming, no 
 formality and fuss and feathers no dinner dress 
 for the men of the house no row when a 
 fellow s an hour late. My chef would give 
 notice if I d serve him such a trick."
 
 io8 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 "Ours doesn t mind," said Howison. 
 
 " She must be exceptional." 
 
 "She is." Howison s tone was saturated 
 with conviction. 
 
 Some are born cooks, some achieve cookery, 
 and some have cookery thrust upon them. 
 The wife of a suburbanite comes under the last 
 head, but there are different ways of bearing 
 the cross. Mrs. Teddy had made the most of 
 her opportunities. She could cook. 
 
 The dinner was an unqualified success, from 
 the strawberries nestling in their own green 
 leaves on a mound of cracked ice, to the 
 superfine Turkish coffee. The Sauterne cup 
 and the pink gown would have softened the 
 heart of the most savage critic, and Lord 
 Cheltenham was not disposed to criticise. He 
 watched Mrs. Teddy flitting gaily about the 
 room and making merry over the defection of 
 the waitress. He followed with his eyes the 
 last flutter of the floating gauze sash each time 
 it disappeared into the butler s pantry. He 
 noted the fashion in which the pretty waitress 
 looked down at Howison as she waited for 
 him to take the dish she offered, and he thought 
 of the lonely formal dinners at Cheltenham 
 House. 
 
 He grew mellower and mellower, more and
 
 A Visiting Peer 109 
 
 more genial, more and more approving. He 
 told stories ; he cracked jokes ; he announced 
 disloyally that American women and American 
 cooks were far superior to the English articles. 
 
 If there had been one more course he would 
 have sung, but at half -past ten Mrs. Teddy 
 suggested adjournment to the veranda and 
 served coffee there. 
 
 "You are to be congratulated upon not 
 losing your cook as well as your waitress," said 
 the well-fed and enthusiastic Peer. "That 
 would have been a loss. Don t let anything 
 happen to the cook, old man." 
 
 "Heaven forbid," said Howison fervently. 
 
 Mrs. Teddy laughed, but when one laughs as 
 charmingly as Mrs. Teddy, it isn t necessary 
 to have an excuse for doing it. 
 
 They sat upon the veranda, hour after hour, 
 while the men smoked a great deal and talked 
 a little, and the woman talked a great deal and 
 smoked not at all. 
 
 Lord Cheltenham was happy. He had dined 
 to his liking; he admired pretty and viva 
 cious women in general and Mrs. Teddy in 
 particular; he found Howison a good fellow, 
 with an unexceptionable taste in cigars ; he 
 was wide awake and contented. Why go 
 to bed?
 
 no Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 And Mrs. Teddy, with a nightmare vision of 
 innumerable dirty dishes piled higgledy-piggledy 
 into a chaotic kitchen, and of an uncleared 
 dining-room table haunting her, and with the 
 possibility of a servantless to-morrow looming 
 before her, was gay, amusing, insouciante, to 
 the edification of her admiring husband, who 
 puffed at his cigar and mentally voted her a 
 dead -game sport. 
 
 At two o clock a glimmering idea that bed 
 time was approaching filtered through the 
 Englishman s brain. 
 
 "I m afraid I ve been keeping you up," he 
 said, without sign of remorse. "It must be 
 getting on, you know." 
 
 Mrs. Teddy rose, but without suspicious 
 alacrity. 
 
 " Yes, I dare say you are fagged after a long 
 day of knocking about. Thoughtless of us to 
 let you sit up, but it is so jolly to be visiting 
 with you again." 
 
 Her husband feared she was overdoing it. 
 The Peer looked as though he would linger 
 longer if urged. 
 
 "I ll take Cheltenham up, my dear. I 
 suppose the room is all right." 
 
 " Oh, yes, I think you ll find everything quite 
 right." "
 
 A Visiting Peer m 
 
 Mrs. Teddy spoke with a detached air, as 
 though she herself hadn t gone over the room 
 with a microscope before dinner and made 
 sure that everything was in order. 
 
 When Howison joined her in the kitchen, at 
 2:15, he apologised for delay. 
 
 "Thought I d better stay until he was far 
 enough along toward bed so that he d be safe 
 for the night. Wait till I get my coat off and 
 my sleeves rolled up, and I ll help." 
 
 Until four o clock a young woman in a white 
 wrapper and a young man in shirt -sleeves 
 toiled and perspired in comparative silence. 
 Mrs. Teddy had run down. Howison was 
 walking in his sleep. 
 
 "I didn t know there were so many dishes in 
 the world," sighed Mrs. Teddy, as she wearily 
 stacked the last saucer. 
 
 Howison sat down on the table and wiped 
 his face with a dish-towel. 
 
 "Hospitality is a gracious thing," he said in 
 honeyed tones. "If I live to fulfil my one 
 ambition, I ll entertain the whole House of 
 Lords. It s a great thing to have a visit from 
 a peer, Katherine." 
 
 " You may call this a visit I call it a visita 
 tion!" 
 
 Howison conceded her point.
 
 ii2 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 "Suppose we now go and seek a little well- 
 earned repose," he urged. 
 
 " I ve got to set the table and get everything 
 ready for breakfast. There s no telling whether 
 those maids of Nell s will come." 
 
 Teddy threw the dish-cloth defiantly at the 
 face of the kitchen clock. 
 
 " I will never desert Mrs. Micawber. Lead 
 on." 
 
 He looked at the tired-faced, drabbled little 
 woman in the white wrapper, and his attempt 
 at hilarity fell through. 
 
 "It s a beastly shame, sweetheart. I m 
 awfully sorry. Wish the duffer had sunk in 
 the Atlantic on his way over! It s dreadfully 
 hard on you, and I 
 
 Mrs. Teddy turned upon him fiercely. 
 
 "Teddy Howison, don t you dare to be nice 
 to me or I ll howl!" But when they finally 
 trailed wearily up the front stairs, his arm was 
 around her and she was not howling. 
 
 At the head of the stairs they paused, and 
 Mrs. Teddy laid her finger warningly upon her 
 lips. 
 
 " He might think we were burglars and get 
 up," she whispered. 
 
 They glanced at the guest s closed door. 
 
 Two pairs of sleepy eyes opened wide, two
 
 A Visiting Peer 113 
 
 mouths dropped open as though moved by one 
 spring. Mrs. Teddy gave a strangled gurgle 
 of emotion and buried her face upon her 
 husband s shoulder. Howison stood for a 
 moment staring blankly at the four pairs of 
 shoes, arranged in a neat row, outside of Lord 
 Cheltenham s door. 
 
 Then he, too, was overcome by emotion. 
 He dropped down upon the top step of the 
 stairs and swore softly, fluently, while Mrs. 
 Teddy had violent but comparatively noiseless 
 hysterics in his arms. 
 
 Later he retreated to the bath-room and 
 polished the shoes, but his sense of humour had 
 reached the limit of its elasticity, and he could 
 not sympathise with his wife s continued and 
 unseemly mirth. 
 
 When Lord Cheltenham, arrayed in white 
 ducks, irreproachably shod, satisfied with life, 
 enraptured with America, strolled down stairs, 
 at nine-thirty, Sunday morning, his hostess, 
 all in crisp white and with a fresh rose tucked 
 into her belt, was lounging in a big veranda 
 chair, and rose to greet him. There were the 
 faintest of shadows under her eyes, but her 
 vivacity and cordiality were unimpaired. 
 
 "Teddy s late," she said laughingly. "He s 
 a terrible sluggard but here he comes."
 
 H4 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 Howison was amiable, but his general ap 
 pearance suggested that the world was too 
 much with him. 
 
 " Look a trifle seedy, old fellow," commented 
 the Peer. "Now, seven hours sleep ought to 
 be enough for any man," 
 
 "Yes, it ought," agreed his host, eyeing with 
 a certain chastened pride the very superior 
 polish upon his guest s russet shoes. 
 
 A trim maid appeared in the doorway. 
 
 "Breakfast is served, Madam." 
 
 The Peer screwed his monocle into his eye. 
 
 " You have a new waitress ? " 
 
 "We have," said Mrs. Teddy. 
 
 There was a jubilate in her tone.
 
 THE VANISHING BOARDER
 
 THE VANISHING BOARDER 
 
 NOW am I in Arden. When I was at 
 home, I was in a better place." 
 Nancy made the quotation woefully 
 and emphasised it by a vicious kick at a fat 
 toadstool. 
 
 Priscilla nodded understanding. 
 
 "Yes, it is slow, isn t it?" 
 
 "Slow?" Nancy s tone held a world of 
 comment. " Slow ! Why, beside this sort of 
 thing, solitary confinement in a dungeon keep 
 is one mad round of gaiety and dissipation. 
 And yet there are beings who put in lifetimes 
 in the country !" 
 
 "But I thought you liked the country." 
 
 " Of course I like the country in its proper 
 place. The country is all very well, as a 
 stage-setting. The very best times of my 
 life have been beautifully bucolic but what s 
 the use of a stage-setting without any dramatis 
 persona ? What s the country good for without 
 a man?" 
 
 Priscilla assumed an expression of pained 
 protest, though her eyes twinkled. 
 
 117
 
 n8 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 " Shocking, my dear, shocking ! Sighing for 
 men, when you have the murmuring rills and 
 carolling birds and spreading oaks 
 
 "Spreading fiddlesticks!" interrupted Nancy 
 rudely, and then both girls laughed and moved 
 so that the spreading oak would more effectually 
 screen them from the sun. 
 
 "Besides, I m not sighing for men," Nancy 
 went on. "I m only wishing for a man just 
 one ordinary man, even a quality below ordinary 
 one little, little man. Of course, I d rather 
 have a big one, but I d accept even a little one 
 with effusive thanks." 
 
 Priscilla looked at her chum, who was lying 
 stretched out upon the moss, her hands under 
 her head, her white frock cool against the deep 
 green and clinging lovingly to the slender 
 figure. The sunlight sifted through the leaves 
 playing in her warm brown hair and casting 
 soft, flickering shadows over a charming muti 
 nous face, in which dimples and smiles lurked 
 visibly amid the whimsical petulance. 
 
 "I can think of a large group of men of 
 assorted sizes, any one of whom would scramble 
 here, if you d agree to accept him, even without 
 effusiveness." 
 
 Nancy shook her head. 
 
 "I m not offering a permanency, my dear,
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 119 
 
 and what would we do with one of the collection 
 if he came? Aunt Hannah wouldn t allow 
 him on the place, and there s no hotel within 
 miles. I do think Aunt Hannah might at 
 least have selected a young farmer and hand 
 to run the farm ! She s collected a valuable 
 group of antiques now, hasn t she? I ve al 
 ways been given to understand that there were 
 stalwart, handsome sons of Anak on farms. 
 Jeremiah and Hiram are a fine Anaky couple !" 
 
 "Nancy, you were crazy to come. You 
 said you wanted to get away from people and 
 be in a place where it would be green and quiet, 
 and where you could loaf and invite your 
 soul." 
 
 " Well, so I did ; but my soul has sent regrets, 
 and that changes my point of view. What I 
 yearn for is the beach at Coney Island. There 
 are more fellow beings of a kind to 
 the square inch there, than in any other 
 place I can think of. And to think I let 
 you in for this, Pris. You could have gone 
 to Kennebunk for this month, and I 
 persuaded you into coming to Aunt Hannah s 
 with me." 
 
 "Oh! that s all right I quite like it," 
 averred Priscilla loyally. "I d rather be with 
 you here than at Kennebunk without you."
 
 120 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 "And how could I know she was a fossilised 
 dragon and that the lovely farm was a 
 thousand miles from nowhere? Daddy hadn t 
 seen her in forty years, and she wrote an 
 awfully nice old-fashioned letter, and I sort of 
 pictured a lavender silk, old mahogany, spinet, 
 Canton china situation. My literary sense 
 will be the death of me yet. I presented Aunt 
 Hannah with a cherished romance and a 
 gentle, sentimental spinsterhood and here 
 she s a whale-bone and raw-hide Yankee 
 manager, who hates men worse than she hates 
 anything except dust and wastefulness ! As 
 a matter of fact, I believe she thinks men were 
 just a bit of dusty wastefulness on the part of 
 the Almighty." 
 
 "Never mind," said Priscilla soothingly. 
 "We ll squirm through July and escape by 
 the first of August." 
 
 " Miss Reynolds ! Miss Reynolds ! " 
 
 A high, piercing voice, with a fine nasal 
 twang, came shrilly through the quiet sun- 
 steeped air. 
 
 Nancy sat up suddenly. 
 
 "There s the light-footed Maria. What do 
 you suppose she wants ? 
 
 "Oh, Miss Reynolds!" 
 
 "Here, Maria."
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 121 
 
 Nancy was on her feet now, tall, slim, pretty, 
 expectant. 
 
 A spindling, slab-sided girl, in a shapeless 
 brown gingham frock, plunged heavily through 
 the willows and paused panting on the other 
 side of the stream near which the girls were 
 standing. 
 
 "Please, Miss, your aunt s had a telegraph. 
 She s that stirred up she broke the blue-and- 
 white teapot. Her niece, Molly, up at Spring- 
 town, she s goin to marry somebody, or 
 somethin , and your aunt, she s goin right up 
 to stop it. She s puttin on her black alpaca, 
 and Hiram, he s gettin up a horse, and she s 
 goin on that two-fifty train. She wants you 
 to come in right away, so she can tell you what 
 to do over Sunday. She won t be back till 
 Monday afternoon, anyhow." 
 
 Maria stopped for breath. 
 
 "Hooray for Molly!" murmured Nancy, as 
 she and Priscilla made their way gingerly 
 across the stepping-stones. 
 
 "Do you know her?" 
 
 " Never heard of her. You see Aunt Hannah 
 isn t my aunt is no relation at all. Father s 
 brother married her adopted sister. They do 
 say Aunt Hannah would have married father, 
 if he hadn t been a sprinter. There d be
 
 122 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 nothing for it but flight, if she once made up 
 her mind." 
 
 The two girls hurried across the meadow, 
 through the orchard, and up to the rambling 
 white house, before whose box-stoop stood 
 two huge sentinel elms. On the stoop, framed 
 by the straight trunks of the giant trees, was 
 a gaunt, angular figure in a black frock and 
 bonnet of a year long dead. 
 
 A horse, that in some vague way resembled 
 the woman, and was harnessed to a light 
 spring- wagon, waited at the side of the house, 
 and an elderly, hollow-chested, loose-jointed 
 man, in blue jean and a torn straw-hat, held 
 the reins. 
 
 "Girls, I ve had bad news!" 
 
 Miss Martin s voice was crisp her tone was 
 grim. 
 
 "I m going away for three days, and you ll 
 have to get along somehow. I ve told Maria 
 what to have for meals, and written it down, 
 so you ll see she does as I told her. The paper 
 is in the first right-hand pigeon-hole of the 
 desk in the sitting-room. 
 
 "I ve put away the best china. That girl 
 would be sure to break things, if I wasn t 
 around with my eye on her. Be careful about 
 the lamps, and don t forget to bolt the doors.
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 123 
 
 Don t you give Hiram any victuals, Maria 
 Elkins. He s engaged to board at the farm 
 house with Jeremiah s folks, and I don t 
 low to feed him. 
 
 "I m sorry I have to go off, but there isn t 
 any time to lose. I guess I ll see whether a 
 niece of mine s going to marry an Irish papist ! 
 
 "Won t listen to her folks? Well, she ll 
 listen to me ! So 11 he ! 
 
 "I ll be back Monday afternoon at five. 
 Good-bye. 
 
 "Now, Hiram, you make that mare go as if 
 she weren t ploughing by the day !" 
 
 The wagon rattled down the drive. 
 
 " Maria, don t you forget to fold the counter 
 panes, and don t talk to peddlers." 
 
 The parting admonitions were wafted back 
 upon the summer breeze. 
 
 Nancy sat down limply upon the stoop and 
 mopped her brow. 
 
 "Wish I could telegraph Molly," she said 
 fervently. "Think of having an Irish papist 
 to run away with ! I d welcome a Hottentot 
 Swedenborgian ! 
 
 " It s rather jolly being left alone," suggested 
 Priscilla. 
 
 " Well, rather. Next to having an agreeable 
 man on the place, not having Aunt Hannah is
 
 124 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 the most consolatory thing I can think of. 
 Maria, what s that that smells so good?" 
 
 " Baking berry pies and doughnuts and 
 bread and coffee-cake. There s floating-island 
 made, too and baked beans, and Miss Martin, 
 she lowed she d have a ham cooked to-morrow. 
 There s fried chicken for supper." 
 
 " I will say for Aunt Hannah that she doesn t 
 starve us, " Nancy admitted generously. " Come 
 on, Pris, let s go up to the falls. I left a book 
 up there this morning." 
 
 The two girls followed the winding garrulous 
 brook past the willow-fringed meadows, into 
 the woods, where it swirled noisily around 
 great moss-covered boulders, and foamed over 
 miniature rapids, dropping occasionally into 
 silence in deep brown-hearted pools in the 
 shelter of the rocks or fallen logs, or in the 
 curves of shelving banks. Rank fern and 
 damp, sweet-smelling herbs grew thickly along 
 the path, the sunlight fell green-golden through 
 the leaves, and warmed the velvety mosses into 
 sudden flashes of vivid colour. The splash 
 and gurgle and ripple of the running water were 
 light-hearted wood voices. 
 
 Nancy stopped for a moment to draw a long 
 breath of content. 
 
 "After all," she admitted, spreading out her
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 125 
 
 hands in a little inclusive gesture, "this isn t 
 bad. There are moments when I can conceive 
 of an Adamless Eden, but I could never con 
 sider giving up the serpent. Now, a man 
 would probably see in the brook only a trout 
 stream. He d fish and fish, and be absolutely 
 unappreciative of the aesthetic side of nature. 
 A man " 
 
 Her harangue broke off short with a snap. 
 She clutched her comrade s arm. 
 
 "There is one!" 
 
 "A tramp!" gasped Priscilla tremulously. 
 
 "Tramp, indeed! Those are city-built 
 knickers, Priscilla Pilsbury. When I get back 
 to the house, I shall pour a libation of elder 
 berry wine to all the gods." 
 
 "Let s go back now." 
 
 Priscilla was distinctly uneasy, but Nancy 
 was cast in more heroic mould. 
 
 " Go back now ! Perish the thought ! Going 
 forward is just beginning to be interesting. 
 He s been fishing. Tramps don t carry fishing- 
 tackle and read books bound in limp leather. 
 I wonder if his face matches his back. Dread 
 fully long back isn t it? stretched out on 
 the bank that way. Come on, Honey. It s 
 time for us to be discovered." 
 
 She went swiftly forward, her face as guile-
 
 126 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 less as a baby s, serene unconsciousness of the 
 stranger s presence writ large upon her. 
 
 The young man heard the crackle of twigs, 
 lazily lifted his chin from his hands and his 
 eyes from his book, and, for a second lay there, 
 staring in blank surprise at the apparition 
 moving toward him. Then he scrambled hastily 
 to his feet, took his pipe from his mouth and 
 his cap from his head, and confronted Nancy. 
 
 Her startled -fawn pose was a triumph. She 
 was surprised, tremendously surprised. Any 
 one could have seen that, but she rallied with 
 gentle dignity. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," stammered the Man- 
 Body. "I m afraid I frightened you." 
 
 Nancy blushed. She always blushes when 
 she is interested in a role. It doesn t mean 
 anything, but it is most effective. 
 
 "Oh! it s quite all right," she said sweetly. 
 " Of course, it did startle me. We are so used 
 to having these woods all to ourselves that we 
 had forgotten there were other folk in the 
 world." 
 
 "Then I m trespassing. It s my normal 
 state nowadays, but there s no way of knowing, 
 and the stream was an alluring proposition for 
 a fisherman. I m awfully sorry. You don t 
 feel faint or anything, do you?"
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 127 
 
 Nancy didn t feel faint. 
 
 Priscilla had come up, and was eyeing the 
 other young woman with an expression twixt 
 severity and apprehension. She is never quite 
 sure what Nancy will do next. 
 
 The stranger took the initiative. He was 
 extremely good to look at. Even Priscilla 
 admitted that. The corduroys were worn 
 and shabby, the soft felt hat was battered, but 
 the man was evidently a gentleman, and the 
 frank boyishness and good nature in the 
 handsome sun-browned face were disarming. 
 
 "I wonder if you d mind telling me," the 
 eyes were still fixed upon Nancy s blushes and 
 a faint touch of dull red had crept into his own 
 tanned cheeks. "You see, I m a stranger 
 here. I ve been tramping, fishing, and sketch 
 ing and loafing for three weeks, and I seemed 
 to have missed my road to-day. I wonder if 
 you d mind telling me how far I am from 
 Millville?" 
 
 "Twenty miles," said Nancy. 
 
 " Oh, I say, I have made a mess of it ! I was 
 to put up there and take a bit of a rest on Sun 
 day. Might I trouble you to tell me what is 
 the nearest town?" 
 
 "Martin Centre is our post-office." 
 
 Priscilla noted a gleam of inspiration in
 
 128 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 her chum s face, and her apprehension 
 deepened. 
 
 "Is it far from here ? " 
 
 Nancy considered. 
 
 "About ten miles." 
 
 She had generously presented four miles to 
 the road between the farm and the village, but 
 Priscilla held her peace. 
 
 "Really! Well, that s rather a pull for a 
 tired man. Is there a hotel at Martin Centre ? " 
 
 Nancy shook her head. 
 
 "It s a shame to bother you, I m imposing 
 on your kindness, but do you know whether 
 there s any sort of a farmhouse in the neigh 
 bourhood where they might put me up over 
 night, or over Sunday? I m dead tired, and 
 I d like to fish this brook, if I could get per 
 mission." 
 
 High resolve set its seal upon Nancy s 
 politely interested face. 
 
 "We take summer boarders," she said. 
 " Our room is vacant just now, and if you think 
 you can be comfortable 
 
 Priscilla s mouth shut with a snap, and some 
 inward spasm shook her. 
 
 "Nancy, don t you think she began 
 
 feebly, but Nancy brushed the coming objection 
 aside.
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 129 
 
 "We will show you the way to the house, 
 and you can look at the room," she said in a 
 businesslike manner. 
 
 The incredulous delight that had surprised 
 the young man s mouth and eyes faded dis 
 creetly, and he pulled himself together. 
 
 " My name is Wetherell," he said courteously. 
 "When I m not a tramp, I am a New York 
 lawyer. It s awfully good of you to be willing 
 to take me in." 
 
 Nancy s dignity was imposing, though not 
 glacial. 
 
 "This is my cousin, Miss Pilsbury. My 
 name is Reynolds. Our aunt is usually 
 with us to superintend things, but she 
 was called away for Sunday. It is too 
 bad she will not be at home to attend to your 
 comfort." 
 
 A vision of Aunt Hannah in the role of 
 ministering angel plunged Priscilla into a 
 violent fit of coughing, but Nancy s serenity 
 would have put a mid-May morning to shame. 
 
 The three turned back along the wood path, 
 Priscilla leading the way. Her heart was in 
 her throat. Only a sublime confidence in 
 Nancy s generalship kept her from absolute 
 panic. This prank was really too mad. Behind 
 her Nancy and the tramp chatted gaily. Mr.
 
 130 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 Wetherell, of New York, was convinced of the 
 efficiency of his guardian angel ; Nancy is never 
 so radiant as when she is doing something 
 reprehensible. 
 
 In the orchard, Priscilla found a chance for 
 a word in the sinner s ear. 
 
 " It s dreadful ! she murmured. " Honestly, 
 Nancy, it s too bad. Do get rid of him ! 
 Maria will tell, and your aunt will be crazy and 
 anyway, it s shockingly improper!" 
 
 "Yes, isn t it?" chuckled Nancy appre 
 ciatively. "I wouldn t have missed it for 
 worlds ! Don t worry about Maria. She adores 
 me. I m the one love of Maria s life up to 
 date. She ll be mute as a fish, and he ll go 
 Monday morning, and Aunt Hannah doesn t 
 come until Monday afternoon. To think that 
 I called country life slow ! 
 
 The Tramp was installed in the parlour on 
 a horse-hair chair, with a much embarrassed 
 Miss Pilsbury opposite him on the slippery sofa, 
 and Nancy disappeared kitchenward. 
 
 After a long ten minutes she reappeared, 
 fairly radiating good humour, and gave Pris 
 cilla an encouraging nod. 
 
 "The maid will show you the room, Mr. 
 Wetherell, and if you think it will be com 
 fortable "
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 131 
 
 "A foregone conclusion," interrupted the 
 Tramp. 
 
 "You may take possession," Nancy went on. 
 "Ask Maria for anything you find wanting. I 
 believe the room is quite in order. We have 
 supper at six-thirty." 
 
 Maria, looking like a hypnotised idiot, ap 
 peared at the hall door, Mr. Wetherell followed 
 her upstairs, and Nancy, subsiding upon the 
 sofa, hugged Priscilla ecstatically. 
 
 "And I only asked for a little man! He s 
 six feet, if he s an inch, and such a duck. Did 
 you notice his eyes, Pris? and such a jolly 
 mouth and such an appreciative soul ! Oh, 
 this is a good world." 
 
 "Aunt Hannah will find out." 
 
 "It will be worth it I intend to tell her 
 myself. Maria would be hung, drawn and 
 quartered before she d tell. She thinks it s 
 like a book." 
 
 " You re ruining her morals." 
 
 " Bother ! It will do her all the good in the 
 world. She s had a very dull-gray time. A 
 splash of purple will brighten up her landscape, 
 and, anyway, my dear, you wouldn t turn a 
 weary traveller away from your door. Hos 
 pitality is a sacred duty I pointed that out to 
 Maria. She s going to bake biscuit."
 
 132 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 The supper was an unqualified success. 
 Nancy hadn t resurrected the best china even 
 her recklessness had its limitations but the 
 fried chicken and biscuit and honey were good 
 enough to give an air even to stone china, and 
 Nancy, in a pink-and-white organdie frock, 
 poured tea in a fashion that made any other 
 luxuries absolutely superfluous. The Boarder 
 succumbed without a struggle, and Priscilla, 
 who knew the symptoms, resigned herself to a 
 lonely Sabbath. 
 
 "I ll not be dragged around with you," she 
 announced later to Nancy. "This is your 
 party, and you can manage it. I m going to 
 read Cotton Mather s sermons. They re on 
 the what-not, and I ve read everything else in 
 the house." 
 
 She finally consented, under strong suasion, 
 to sit on the stoop for a little while, before 
 taking to Mather, but she beat an early retreat 
 and read in the lighted parlour, where a 
 murmur of conversation punctuated with 
 laughter floated in to her from the moonlight 
 world outside. 
 
 At half-past nine Nancy came in. 
 
 "Mr. Wetherell is going to stay out and 
 smoke for awhile. He ll bolt the front door 
 when he comes in. Pris, you look like a sulky
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 133 
 
 cherub. Stop it and come to bed. I m tired, 
 but very happy. I m afraid the truly good 
 must find life awfully dull. Now, I know this 
 isn t fair to Aunt Hannah, but she has no right 
 to be such a cantankerous crank that she 
 drives people to desperation. I ll tell her after 
 it s over, and clear you and Maria. She can t 
 more than flay me alive, and after all, there s 
 no real harm in this affair. With you here, 
 it s proper enough, even if it isn t according 
 to Dame Grundy, and anybody can see at a 
 glance that he s a gentleman and a charmer. 
 He says your profile is pure Greek, Pris." 
 
 Priscilla rather fancies her profile, herself. 
 She relented slightly, and by the time the two 
 had climbed the stairs together, harmony 
 reigned. The Boarder, smoking out under the 
 elm-trees and thinking long thoughts about 
 golden-brown hair and gray eyes and dimples, 
 smiled sympathetically as muffled bursts of 
 laughter from behind the curtains drawn 
 across a lighted window disturbed the hush 
 of the night. 
 
 It was a merry world. Even a New York 
 lawyer could recognise the fact. 
 
 Priscilla s anticipation of a solitary Sunday 
 was justified by the event. At the breakfast- 
 table, Nancy assumed that the boarder would
 
 134 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 wander forth alone in quest of the wily trout, 
 and sweetly reminded him that dinner would 
 be ready at one. 
 
 Mr. Wetherell promptly developed deep- 
 rooted objections to fishing on the Sabbath, 
 and, of course, no young woman of fine feeling 
 could urge a man to set aside moral scruples. 
 
 Nancy is a young woman of fine feelings. 
 
 Happening to mention casually that she 
 intended going to the falls after the 
 book, whose quest was abandoned on Satur 
 day, she was surprised, but charmed, to find 
 the lawyer s morals imposed no veto upon 
 Sunday strolls. 
 
 She begged Priscilla to join the expedition; 
 but her chum greeted the proposition with the 
 silent scorn it merited, and retreated to the 
 hammock and the society of the Reverend 
 Mather. 
 
 Nancy stopped to speak to her en route for 
 the falls, and found her distinctly aggrieved. 
 
 "Do you like me in this hat?" asked the 
 offending one blithely. It was a most delect 
 able hat, with its wild-rose wreath and its 
 flapping, loose-woven brim, through which 
 the sunlight sifted; but Priscilla refused to 
 consider it. 
 
 "I thought you were going after a book?"
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 135 
 
 she said with a stern glance at the volume 
 tucked under Nancy s arm. 
 
 "So I am, but it s Henry James. What 
 could I do with Henry James and another man 
 on a summer morning like this? I m taking 
 Browning. You really can t miss it on Brown 
 ing. There are critics, Pris, who deny that 
 Browning is a true poet, but nobody can deny 
 that he s a promoter." 
 
 "Evidently you don t share Mr. Wetherell s 
 views on the subject of Sunday angling." 
 
 Nancy looked at her chum reflectively. 
 
 "Priscilla, my love, a godlike calm goes 
 better with a Greek profile than savage sar 
 casm. If I had that profile I d live up 
 to it." 
 
 She joined the waiting Boarder, and Priscilla 
 grinned over the Puritan divine s most vivid 
 picture of damnation. It is hard to be con 
 sistently wroth with Nancy. 
 
 From indications at the noonday meal, 
 Priscilla judged that Browning and Nancy had 
 done their worst. She spent the afternoon in 
 the hammock, with her back turned upon a 
 couple who read poetry under a tree in the 
 orchard. 
 
 Supper was, so to speak, a love-feast. Even 
 Maria recognised that fact, and delivered a
 
 136 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 heavy wink to Priscilla from behind the rapt 
 Boarder s shapely head. 
 
 The front stoop was "paradise now" for 
 the evening, but Priscilla fought June bugs 
 beside an ill-smelling lamp in the parlour. 
 
 When Nancy came in, she looked thoughtful 
 and was uncommunicative. Priscilla recog 
 nised the stage, and braided disapproval into 
 every twist of her hair, as she prepared for 
 bed amid a vast silence. 
 
 "He s going to-morrow at noon," volun 
 teered Nancy, as she blew out the light. 
 
 No comment from the figure upon the ex 
 treme inside edge of the bed, with face turned 
 toward the wall. 
 
 Nancy sighed. 
 
 " I never was a favourite. My father never 
 smiled," she quoted with doleful fervour. 
 
 Priscilla imitated the unappreciative " father," 
 and conversation languished. 
 
 When the Boarder appeared in the dining- 
 room on Monday morning, he carried his 
 bulging knapsack with him. Priscilla was 
 civilly taciturn. Nancy was gently pensive, 
 smiling delightfully, but with obvious effort. 
 
 Mr. Wetherell deposited the knapsack in a 
 vacant chair. 
 
 " I thought I might as well pack up and not
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 137 
 
 waste any of the morning," he said with such 
 unrestrained gloom that for an instant the 
 pensiveness slipped its moorings and Nancy s 
 smile lapsed into a frank gaiety, which she 
 promptly suppressed. 
 
 " You are going to help me get those water- 
 lilies?" she asked. 
 
 "Of course." 
 
 "The pond is quite a mile away." 
 
 The distance evidently did not weaken his 
 resolve. 
 
 "But it s a beautiful walk. You ll enjoy 
 it." 
 
 Priscilla smiled grimly into her oatmeal- 
 bowl. She doubted the prophecy, but she 
 was convinced that Nancy, at least, would 
 enjoy the walk. 
 
 The Boarder gazed across uneaten porridge 
 and bacon and eggs, at the pensive young 
 Person in the blue linen frock. 
 
 "You aren t eating your breakfast," the 
 young Person said reproachfully. 
 
 He admitted the fact, but made no apparent 
 effort toward reform. 
 
 When breakfast ended, the trio wandered 
 out upon the front stoop, Priscilla revolving 
 plans for a lonely morning, Nancy talking 
 lightly about the weather, the Boarder mute.
 
 138 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 From the road came the thud of horse s hoofs 
 and a clatter of wheels guiltless of rubber tires. 
 Nancy eyed the approaching cloud of dust 
 listlessly. 
 
 "We do need rain," she murmured, then 
 suddenly every muscle of her face and body 
 stiffened into consternation. 
 
 Through a rift in the dust she had caught a 
 glimpse of a familiar erect figure in black. She 
 seized the Boarder s arm wildly and dragged 
 him inside the door. 
 
 Amazed, bewildered, he stared at her terrified 
 face and allowed her to push him toward the 
 dining-room. 
 
 "Miss Reynolds! Nancy! what is it?" he 
 exclaimed. 
 
 "Aunt Hannah!" 
 
 Horror saturated the two words. 
 
 Priscilla, who had followed the retreating 
 party, allowed a pardonable " I-told-you-so " 
 gleam to lurk for one moment in her eyes, 
 then incontinently surrendered to sympathy. 
 
 "Out the back door," she gasped. 
 
 Nancy nodded. 
 
 "You stop her out in front. Sandbag her, 
 if you can t do it any other way ! " 
 
 Opening and shutting his mouth futilely, in 
 vain effort to demand explanation, the dazed
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 139 
 
 Boarder took the knapsack, which Nancy 
 thrust into his hands, and was hurried on into 
 the kitchen, where Maria stood over the 
 steaming tubs. 
 
 " Maria, Aunt Hannah s coming. She s most 
 here!" 
 
 The handmaiden s lower jaw dropped like a 
 plummet. 
 
 "Oh, Lord!" she groaned. 
 
 "Take him out through the grape-arbour 
 and across the berry-patch. She can t see you 
 there. Come back just as soon as he s in the 
 woods." 
 
 " B-b-b-ut," stammered the Boarder. 
 
 "Oh, go please go if you don t want me 
 to cry; run! Maria ll explain. Oh, do go!" 
 
 Maria clutched him with a strong, soapy 
 hand. 
 
 He went, unceremoniously, uncomprehend- 
 ingly, but recognising in a vague way the 
 urgency of quick action. 
 
 "But I may write to you? I must write to 
 you!" came back over his shoulder, as Maria 
 hustled him toward the sheltering arbour. 
 
 "Yes, do write, but run, now. Oh, please 
 run!" 
 
 He ran. 
 
 Nancy interrupted the tale of Molly s short-
 
 140 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 comings, to which Priscilla was listening with 
 an absorbing interest, whose subtle flattery 
 had warmed the narrator into eloquence, 
 and detained her on the front stoop. 
 
 "Molly s eloped!" announced Priscilla. 
 
 "No!" Nancy s face expressed mingled 
 horror and incredulity. 
 
 Aunt Hannah untied her bonnet-strings 
 viciously. 
 
 "Clear gone, when I got there. She s 
 crazy, plump crazy ! She comes out of my 
 will to-morrow. So does her mother She 
 might a stopped the girl, if she d a had a grain 
 of sense. No born fools and Irish papists are 
 going to get anything out of this farm ! 
 
 "How d you get along?" 
 
 "Nicely." Nancy s face was crimson. 
 
 "Where s Maria?" 
 
 "In the backyard." 
 
 "Well, I ll go change my dress." 
 
 She vanished into the bedroom opening off 
 the parlour. The two girls went out into the 
 open air to draw long breaths. 
 
 "Nancy, you said you were going to tell 
 her." 
 
 Priscilla was as stern as an accusing angel. 
 
 Nancy fanned herself feebly with a micro 
 scopic kerchief.
 
 The Vanishing Boarder 141 
 
 "I will, dear, honestly I will. I ve danced, 
 so I ll pay the piper but it would be super 
 human to pay spot cash on demand like that. 
 I need a season of fasting and prayer before I 
 take my life in my hands and this was so 
 so sudden !" 
 
 She twinkled, but relapsed into contrition. 
 
 "I m sorry, Pris, really, I m sorry. It was 
 horrid of me. I m a wretch. I wish I hadn t 
 but wasn t it a heavenly interlude? How 
 mad, and sad, and bad it was, but, oh, how 
 it was sweet ! He does so appreciate Browning, 
 Pris. I wonder what sort of a letter he writes ? 
 
 Maria tiptoed around a corner of the house 
 like a stealthy hippopotamus. 
 
 " S-sh ! " she hissed. " He s gone to Millville. 
 He gave me five dollars. S-sh!" 
 
 With the gesture of a stage conspirator, she 
 disappeared. 
 
 "As I prophesied in prehistoric times," said 
 Nancy, "a touch of purple does brighten 
 Maria s landscape wonderfully."
 
 GOWNS AND A GOBOLINK
 
 GOWNS AND A GOBOLINK 
 
 YOU are quite sure it is becoming?" 
 Nancy eyed herself critically in the 
 long pier - glass between the front 
 windows. 
 
 "Positive," asserted Bobby, with profound 
 conviction. 
 
 Nancy turned around and looked across 
 her shoulder at the back of the trailing gray 
 gown. 
 
 "You don t think Bobby, you truly don t 
 think it makes me look fat ? " 
 
 There was tragic appeal in her tones. 
 
 Bobby smiled. 
 
 "Just about as fat as a willow wand," he 
 suggested. Then he added, hastily and con 
 scientiously " but shapelier." 
 
 Nancy seemed tremendously relieved. 
 
 "You know, Bobby, I ve been called plump 
 three times this winter. The first two times 
 I didn t mind it, because women did it thin 
 women. You know how that sort of woman 
 says, Why, dear, you are getting positively 
 plump. A long hesitation before the plump, 
 
 MS
 
 146 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 Bobby. That means, I can t forgive you for 
 not having as many angles as I have. 
 
 " But the third time it was a man who 
 called me plump. That made me shiver, 
 because he thought he was being complimentary. 
 I ve dieted ever since. It s a dreadful thing 
 to have a long line of fat ancestors and live in 
 their shadow. The sword of Damocles was 
 cheering compared to it. 
 
 "You don t think that perhaps a big chou 
 and ends of pale-yellow chiffon the nice 
 spring crocusy yellow would improve me?" 
 
 She was pathetically appealing. Bobby s 
 smile developed into a laugh. 
 
 "You know that I don t think anything 
 from any one of the four seasons could improve 
 you," he said with emphasis. 
 
 "So bad as that?" sighed Nancy. "Then I 
 may as well stop struggling." 
 
 She tucked herself into the corner of the 
 huge Davenport, carefully pre-empting the 
 pale-yellow cushions. 
 
 "Take the bright pillows and sit quite at 
 the other end of the Davenport, Bobby. 
 Then you ll not spoil the colour scheme, 
 and can get enough perspective on it to 
 really enjoy it. You see, I m proud of this 
 gown."
 
 Gowns and a Gobolink 147 
 
 "So I imagined," murmured the man who 
 came often. 
 
 "It s so unexpected." 
 
 "Unexpected?" echoed Bobby. 
 
 "Yes and I have eight others just as un 
 expected. It s beatific, Bobby. You shall 
 see them at the rate of one a week. You 
 couldn t stand the rapture oftener than that. 
 
 "I have four new hats, too, and an opera 
 cloak, and gloves, and shoes, and slippers, and 
 a spring coat, and and things." Her voice 
 had a dreamy suggestion of hasheesh ecstasy. 
 
 " But how did it happen, Nancy ? Any one 
 dead?" 
 
 "No; that s the beauty of it. We didn t 
 kill a soul. It was the tidiest, most tactful 
 bit of work my guardian angel ever put through 
 and yet so thorough, so beautifully thorough. 
 If that angel were subsidised, I d raise his 
 salary." 
 
 "I don t understand," confessed Bobby 
 hopelessly. 
 
 "Of course you don t. You don t know the 
 Man." 
 
 Bobby sat up suddenly, a vitalised interro 
 gation point surrounding a suppressed excla 
 mation point. 
 
 The girl among the pale-yellow pillows
 
 148 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 smiled at him sweetly. She has a special 
 smile for those moments of Bobby s, a guile 
 less, innocent, happy, creamy smile, that 
 niters softly through the explosive silence and 
 has a particularly exasperating effect upon the 
 bad-tempered young man. 
 
 "You remember the railroad wreck," she 
 said at last. Bobby s face softened. He 
 nodded. 
 
 "I haven t really told you about it since I 
 came back. I haven t had a chance. First, 
 you were away, and then there was always 
 some one here, and 
 
 " It was good of you to telegraph." Bobby s 
 voice was very low. " I d have been desperate 
 if I had seen the papers first." 
 
 "Well, you see, the Man asked me to whom 
 he could send telegrams, and Daddy and 
 Mother made such a meagre list, I put you in 
 for the moral effect." She looked at him and 
 relented. 
 
 "Then I well, I just happened to think 
 that I might never have seen you again, and I 
 wished I had been nicer that afternoon, and I 
 thought I d like to telegraph to you no, 
 Bobby, you can t begin to see the good points 
 of this frock at close range. What Daddy 
 calls the toot and cymbal is the thing."
 
 Gowns and a Gobolink 149 
 
 Bobby came back to the subject of the new 
 gowns, but his face had cleared. 
 
 " What did the wreck have to do with a gray 
 gown?" 
 
 Nancy spread her hands in a comprehensive 
 gesture. 
 
 " Everything everything." 
 
 "Tell me about it." 
 
 "There was a Man began Nancy. 
 
 "There is always a man," interrupted Bobby 
 rudely. 
 
 "Exactly. Didn t I say that my guardian 
 angel deserved a raise of salary? If I should 
 die before you, Bobby, I wish you would see 
 that that simple but comprehensive phrase is 
 graven on my tomb There was always a 
 Man. There you have history, comment, 
 and appreciation crystallised. It s an ideal 
 epitaph. This story doesn t exactly begin with 
 the Man, though. You know I started 
 to Priscilla s wedding. My wardrobe was 
 awfully shabby, Bobby. It was between 
 seasons, and I had worn things hard, and 
 Daddy had been bothered about business, so 
 I wouldn t for worlds have asked him for any 
 thing new. 
 
 " I didn t even have a fresh frock for the 
 wedding, but I tucked the old things into my
 
 150 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 disgracefully battered trunk and told myself 
 I didn t care. 
 
 "I was the only woman in the Pullman car 
 all afternoon; but there were men several 
 men. One of them was very good to look at, 
 Bobby. He sat across the aisle from me. I 
 sighed every time I glanced at him. It s 
 dreadfully hampering to be well-bred, Bobby. 
 The Vermont blood in me has interfered with 
 a great deal of simple pleasure. Now I know 
 girls girls who are much better than I, girls 
 of whom every one approves who never take 
 a trip without having some delightful adventure. 
 They always meet strange knights who do the 
 most charming things for them and turn out to 
 be friends of the girls friends, and rich or titled, 
 and susceptible, and prodigal of candy and 
 violets and theatre -boxes. I ve travelled untold 
 miles, and I never met a man in my life, unless 
 he was dragged up to me by some one of un 
 impeachable reputation, and formally intro 
 duced. It isn t that I am good. It s that 
 I m either stupid or unfortunate. I freeze 
 solid when I mount a car platform, and even a 
 Pullman car steam-heat doesn t thaw me. 
 
 " So I sighed when I looked at the Man across 
 the aisle. He seemed so full of possibilities. 
 Yet I knew I should never meet him.
 
 Gowns and a Gobolink 151 
 
 "There s where I misjudged that guardian 
 angel, Bobby. He s an angel of resources. 
 He understands my prejudices and limitations. 
 He has the force and invention to cope with 
 them. 
 
 "I didn t go out to the dining-car early I 
 wasn t hungry, and a late dinner makes the 
 evening shorter. I hate evening on a train. 
 The Man wasn t hungry either. Everybody 
 else in the car was. I sat and stared out of 
 the window. It was a black night, but the 
 trees were blacker than the night, and huddled 
 together like frightened gobolinks as we flew 
 by. I was positively grateful to every light 
 that flashed out of a farmhouse window. 
 Slavery to convention had lowered my spirits. 
 I felt depressed by my own propriety. Con 
 fidentially, Bobby, there s nothing that 
 depresses me like being truly good under 
 temptation. Some people get a glow out 
 of it. They don t deserve any praise. I 
 always know I m going to be sorry, and 
 yet I m good in spite of it. That s what I 
 call noble. 
 
 "Nobility sometimes has its reward. I ve 
 been known to doubt that ; but now I know it 
 is true. 
 
 " I was watching a little light on a hill ahead
 
 152 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 of us. Suddenly the light turned a somersault 
 and exploded like a Roman candle. 
 
 " The explosion wa^ horribly noisy. It wasn t 
 any respecter of person or propriety. It stood 
 me on my head and batted me against hard 
 woodwork and threw me down in a dislocated 
 heap. 
 
 "When I settled down once more I opened 
 my eyes. Everything was dark. Moreover, 
 everything was, apparently, upside down. I 
 felt around, and decided I was sitting on a 
 window with my back against the plush seat. 
 Something heavy lay across my lap. It was 
 soft, and had on a rough-frieze suit. Suddenly 
 it sat up, looking like one of the gobolinks, and 
 rubbed its head. 
 
 "Well, I ll be it said. 
 
 It looks as though you d have a chance to 
 find out whether you ll be, I suggested. The 
 Gobolink gasped. 
 
 "Oh, by Jove. I beg your pardon. It 
 moved a foot or two away, quite to the other 
 side of the window. 
 
 " Are you hurt ? it asked. 
 
 "No; I m worse than hurt. I m offended, 
 I said. You know I don t have hysterics, 
 Bobby; but I was threatened. In the first 
 place, I was scared; in the second place, I was
 
 Gowns and a Gobolink 153 
 
 shaken up; and in the third place, there was 
 the good-looking man sitting on a window with 
 me at the bottom of a Stygian pit. Talk of 
 having a man thrown at one s head ! My 
 friends had tried doing it; but this was the 
 real thing. At last I had undeniably met a 
 strange man on a train. 
 
 "He wasn t badly hurt, but had hit his 
 head an awful whack, and been stunned for 
 a minute. He seemed a trifle dazed for a few 
 minutes longer. Then he rose to the situation. 
 1 We re in a ditch, he said. I told him the 
 idea had occurred to me. He asked me if I was 
 afraid to stay alone for a few minutes, and I 
 lied stoutly. I wanted him to sit right there 
 and hold my hand tightly not as a matter of 
 sentiment, Bobby; merely by way of human 
 encouragement but I let him go. I couldn t 
 hear a sound. All the other cars and passengers 
 might have been ground to powder. Still, 
 there was no reason why, if I happened to be 
 rescued, I should look like a fright, so I straight 
 ened my hair and got my red-flannel powder- 
 rag out of my chatelaine-bag. There was 
 something very comforting about that powder- 
 rag, Bobby. It was so every-day common 
 place. It reassured me. It was absurd to 
 think of dying while one could sit comfortably
 
 154 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 on a window and use a red-flannel powder- 
 rag. 
 
 "Still, I was glad when the Gobolink peered 
 over the side of the car scat. He was tremen 
 dously cheerful, said we were all right and in 
 no danger at all, but that I d have to climb 
 over two seats to get to the passageway, and 
 then lie down and squirm through the passage. 
 He pulled me up, and I did credit to my 
 gymnasium teacher. The passageway wasn t 
 so easy. You know how wide those little 
 passages around the stateroom and smoking- 
 room are. Well, just turn them on their sides, 
 so that their width is their height, and then try 
 to go through them. There s only one way. 
 I shall always look at a turtle with respect. 
 It isn t so easy as it seems w r hen one watches 
 him. I sent the Gobolink through first. Not 
 even fear and haste could reconcile me to doing 
 a human turtle-act before any one. 
 
 " I was sorry it was too dark for real appre 
 ciation of his method. He s a dignified man 
 with rather gray hair, and a face like a Roman 
 senator. I d enjoy seeing him do turtle. 
 After he got through, I lay down flat and 
 squirmed through myself. That passage seemed 
 a mile long, Bobby. I m so sorry for all the 
 things that have to go hitching along through
 
 Gowns and a Gobolink 155 
 
 life on their stomachs. But, then, I suppose 
 they are built for it, and don t find it as incon 
 venient as I did. 
 
 "When I got through, we climbed up out of 
 the ditch. There were crowds of people around. 
 Two cars were standing on the track. Three 
 more were toppled over. The engine was in 
 the ditch. The baggage-car and mail-car were 
 perfect wrecks. No one was killed. Only 
 seven people were hurt, and none of the seven 
 was in serious condition. Really, Bobby, it 
 was beautifully arranged. Some guardian 
 angels would have bungled it. I might have 
 felt responsible, if any one had been badly hurt ; 
 but there I was, there was the good-looking 
 man, there were the proprieties intact, there 
 were prejudices brushed aside. The measures 
 had been radical, but effectual." 
 
 "But the gray gown?" insisted Bobby. 
 
 "I m coming to the gray gown. You 
 wouldn t have me put my climax in the middle 
 of my story, would you? Men usually do 
 that. Then the rest of the story is boresome. 
 I ve often longed to teach the philosophy of 
 rational development to the men I know. 
 
 "Given a summer season, given seashore or 
 mountain stage -setting, given a man and a 
 maid: how shall the man and the maid evolve
 
 156 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 a plot that will be progressively dramatic, but 
 not reach its climax until late September? 
 There s a problem for the class. The average 
 man drops the climax into the middle of 
 August. Then a good thing is spoiled, and 
 what shall the man and the maid do with the 
 tag-ends of the season ? 
 
 "Haste is fatal to all good work, Bobby. 
 Where was I?" 
 
 "On the edge of the ditch," prompted 
 Bobby. 
 
 "Yes, that s it and I like being on the 
 edge of a ditch. There s the possibility of 
 going either way, and there s a fair certainty 
 of excitement, past, present, or future. 
 
 " The Gobolink had blossomed into the good- 
 looking man, because there were lanterns and 
 torches. His cheek was cut, but that wasn t a 
 disfigurement." 
 
 "Probably his cheek could stand cutting," 
 growled Bobby; but Nancy overlooked it. 
 
 "He put me down on a big rock and went 
 off for a while. Then he came back, and told 
 me all about things. He said there was a farm 
 house not far away, and that he would take 
 me over there. The wrecking train wouldn t 
 be along for some time, arid we couldn t go on 
 our way for several hours. In the meantime
 
 Gowns and a Gobolink 157 
 
 he wanted something to eat, and I must have 
 something. 
 
 " He tucked me under his arm and trailed 
 me off up the hill, in the wake of a boy, who 
 seemed to have been engaged as guide. He 
 was a very magerful man, Bobby; and after a 
 railroad wreck, I believe I like magerfulness. 
 I was docile. I was lamblike. You wouldn t 
 have known me. 
 
 "The woman of the house was a dear. She 
 took me in and mothered me and purred over 
 me, and was disappointed because I didn t 
 bear .a scratch. It cheered her, though, to 
 have a chance at the man s cheek, and she 
 patched it up beautifully. Her man had gone 
 to the wreck, but she had thought somebody 
 might be brought to the house, so she stayed 
 at home. Nobody else wandered up there. 
 She guessed they must have gone to one of the 
 other farmhouses, and she distinctly resented 
 it, but she treated us royally. We had eggs 
 and bacon, Bobby, and two kinds of pie, and 
 something like fifty-seven different varieties of 
 marmalade and pickles. After supper the 
 Man went down to the wreck, but he came back 
 soon said he wasn t needed. 
 
 "The hostess went into the kitchen to 
 wash up. Give me the country for real
 
 158 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 friendliness, Bobby. I could have loved that 
 woman. Just think how little excitement she 
 must have in her life, and what a godsend we 
 must have been and yet she wouldn t spoil 
 a tete-a-tete for all the world. 
 
 "I hope I m good, Bobby; but I m not so 
 good as that. 
 
 "We had a beautiful time, the Man and I, 
 in that best room. The green crocheted mats 
 and the wax flowers were positively inspiring 
 and then I was glad to be alive. That 
 gave me an unselfish desire to make 
 things interesting for other people, and I 
 did my best with the limited opportunity 
 offered. I was in love with Providence 
 but I didn t yet realise the scope of my 
 blessings. I was regarding the Man as 
 plain man. Even in that light he was admir 
 able. 
 
 "He was so sympathetic about my luggage. 
 We went down to the wreck and he had men 
 hunt for my trunk, but there wasn t anything 
 left of it, apparently. I sat on a log and wailed 
 aloud. All my good clothes at one fell swoop 
 and Daddy hard up ! 
 
 "It was too much. Of course the clothes 
 were rather shabby, but as I looked back at 
 them they seemed altogether lovely. And how
 
 Gowns and a Gobolink 159 
 
 could I be bridesmaid for Priscilla, in a muddy 
 travelling-gown ? 
 
 " The Man came and sat on the log with me, 
 and I told him all about it. He s the kind of 
 man to whom one tells things. He understood 
 just how I felt, which was wonderful, consider 
 ing the fact that he had never worn a pink 
 chiffon evening-gown and grown attached to 
 it. He asked how many gowns I d lost, which 
 was impertinent; but I didn t think so at the 
 time. I accepted it as perfectly natural interest 
 in an overwhelming calamity. I told him 
 about the gowns. I dwelt upon their good 
 points. It was like talking over the virtues 
 of a dead friend. The good points grew as I 
 thought of them. The dressmaker who made 
 those gowns wouldn t have recognised the 
 radiant and beautiful creations as I presented 
 them, but I didn t mean to exaggerate. The 
 blessings had brightened as they took their 
 flight. I lingered over the opera cloak until 
 the Man asked me if I hadn t ever had my 
 picture taken in it, and said he considered that 
 Fate had been bitterly unkind to him, because 
 he d never been allowed to tuck me into that 
 cloak. When I came to my white Virot hat 
 I cried. Yes, I did, Bobby. It was such a 
 duck of a hat, and I was so tired and shaken
 
 160 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 up, and I felt as if I d never be able to buy 
 another hat above Grand Street. The tears 
 just trickled miserably down my nose, and I 
 dabbed at them with my kerchief and sniffled. 
 Yes, I m afraid I sniffled. I always do when 
 I cry. That s the reason I don t cry often. It 
 isn t pluck. It s vanity. But that white hat ! 
 I simply choked over it; and yet, I was smiling 
 like an imbecile, too, over my foolishness. 
 
 " The Man looked savage. 
 
 "Don t do that! he said. Don t, I tell 
 you. I ve never been spoken to so, Bobby. 
 It paralysed me into tearlessness. I shouldn t 
 have expected him to be unsympathetic. 
 
 " He looked sheepish, but still savage. 
 
 "If you do that again, I ll I ll well, 
 I ll make you angry and scandalise the crowd, 
 he said. 
 
 " After all, I don t believe he s unsympathetic. 
 But I didn t cry any more. 
 
 "When our train came we sat together. It 
 was late, but I had to get off at 12:30. The 
 Man handed me over to Priscilla and her 
 brother. He gave me his card, and I asked 
 him to call on Daddy and be properly thanked. 
 He hesitated a minute, and then said he had 
 some influence with the road, and would see 
 that my claim for damages \vas attended to at
 
 Gowns and a Gobolink 161 
 
 once, without legal formalities, if I would fix a 
 valuation. I couldn t do it. The clothes 
 seemed beautiful in retrospect, but I knew they 
 were almost worn out. The train was starting. 
 Never mind, he said; I ve a sister, and I 
 guess I have a fairly complete inventory. We ll 
 make allowance for sundries. 
 
 "He climbed on the rear platform and was 
 gone. 
 
 "I borrowed one of Priscilla s trousseau 
 gowns to wear to the wedding, and stayed a 
 week in borrowed clothes. 
 
 "The day before I come away I heard from 
 Daddy. He said he had had a letter from 
 the railroad officials, inclosing a cheque to 
 cover the amount of my loss in the wreck. He 
 had also had a call from the attorney of the 
 road, who explained that he had taken the 
 liberty of attending to my claim because he 
 had been on the train at the time of the accident, 
 and had had the pleasure of being of some 
 slight service to me. 
 
 "The cheque was for $1,500. Daddy was 
 shocked, but said the only thing for it was to 
 take it all as a business matter and make no 
 protest. He considered, however, that I had 
 been dishonest in setting my valuation. He 
 was desperately disapproving. I couldn t make
 
 162 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 him understand that I didn t deliberately over 
 rate those frocks, and couldn t be responsible 
 for a railroad man s idea of sundries. 
 
 "I ve had an orgy at my dressmaker s and 
 milliner s. The Gobolink is coming to dine 
 with Daddy to-morrow. 
 
 "General solicitor of the road, Bobby! and 
 he might have been travelling salesman for a 
 hardware firm. Oh, this is a good world. 
 
 "Bobby, you don t look happy. I wasn t 
 killed in the wreck, you know. It s not a sad 
 story, at all. 
 
 "I ll tell you what I ll do for you. I ll- 
 ril Bobby, when you are so tired of me that 
 you want to put the continent between us, I ll 
 get you a pass."
 
 A DISTURBER OF THE PEACE
 
 A DISTURBER OF THE PEACE 
 
 JACK RAINSFORD was primarily respon 
 sible for Nancy s sociological experi 
 ment. If he had allowed her to be a 
 sister to him, the young woman would have 
 kept the somewhat uneven soprano of her way 
 without feeling the need of excursions outside 
 of her own peculiar province of sociological 
 research. 
 
 Jack is a nice boy, but he is lamentably 
 wanting in appreciation of the fraternal rela 
 tion. He had distinct and well-defined ideas 
 concerning the thing he wanted, and a sister 
 was not the thing. 
 
 Consequently, when Nancy magnanimously 
 offered to regard him as a brother, he declined 
 promptly and decisively. He also said things 
 in regard to feminine strategic methods 
 which were more truthful than polite, 
 and which wounded Nancy deeply. To be 
 misunderstood is always painful. Possibly 
 there is only one thing more painful. That is 
 to be understood. 
 
 The frank and unresigned Mr. Rainsford 
 165
 
 166 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 turned his back upon the false fleeting one and 
 went his way. 
 
 "Youth, youth !" apostrophised Nancy from 
 her vantage point of twenty-two years but 
 her smile was a trifle wobbly at the corners. 
 She has the saving grace of being honest with 
 herself, and of recognising the truth, even when 
 it drops from the lips of youth. Moreover, she 
 liked Jack. 
 
 "He s quite right," she confided to the blue- 
 and-white teapot. "I m a horrid little cat 
 and I m going to reform." 
 
 She sat up very straight and punched a 
 down cushion emphatically. 
 
 " I hate a flirt," even the dragon on the tea 
 pot appeared to smile. 
 
 "I m going to do something to make people 
 happy chronically happy, I mean." The fine 
 glow of purpose was interrupted by a reminis 
 cent twinkle. 
 
 " I ve done a good deal toward making people 
 happy in spots." 
 
 That evening Miss Reynolds was not at 
 home to callers. Arrayed in a most becoming 
 pink boudoir gown, she sat in her own room 
 and pondered. 
 
 At last she scrambled out of the easy-chair 
 and went to her desk. Her mind was made up.
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 167 
 
 Miss Caldwell, Isabel Worthington s cousin, 
 was one of the head workers of the Essex Street 
 Settlement. Only a week before she had 
 talked to the members of the Current Events 
 Club about the possibilities of East Side work, 
 the need of intelligent workers. Nancy had 
 once conducted a dance club at the church 
 parish house with distinguished success. She 
 would enlarge her arena and would go in for 
 sociology seriously. 
 
 Since Jack Rainsford refused to have her 
 for a sister, she would be a little sister to the 
 East Side. 
 
 A letter to Miss Caldwell, and an interview 
 with that estimable and enthusiastic woman, 
 clinched the matter. Mr. Reynolds objected, 
 and Mrs. Reynolds had visions of myriad 
 microbes, but Nancy has a way with her even 
 when dealing with parents. 
 
 The prospective sociologist bought two new 
 tailor suits, with instep-length skirts out of 
 consideration for her mother s scruples against 
 microbe collection, as she explained when the 
 bill came in. She also invested a considerable 
 lump sum in silk stockings of a superior charm. 
 
 "Really, Nancy," protested her mother 
 feebly. 
 
 "We ll look upon them as a contribution to
 
 i68 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 the Fresh-Air Fund, Mumsey. They ll be 
 like a day in the country to the observing poor." 
 
 But, in spite of a frivolous attitude toward 
 costuming for the role, the young woman was 
 in earnest, and honestly ready to spend and be 
 spent in the cause of the poor. 
 
 "She has a beautiful spirit," said Miss Cald- 
 well to Doctor Braddock, her co-worker, after 
 their decisive interview with the aspirant for 
 a settlement niche. 
 
 "She has a beautiful face," commented the 
 Doctor, with sucli conviction that Miss Cald- 
 well looked up at him sharply. 
 
 The new worker dawned upon the settlement 
 on the first of April. There were up-town 
 friends unsympathetic enough to intimate that 
 there was a peculiar appropriateness in the 
 day chosen, but Nancy ignored the comment. 
 
 She plunged into the work with a zeal re 
 freshing to behold, and the precinct went down 
 before her like grain before the mower s scythe. 
 The babies who were brought to day nursery 
 crowed when she took them from the little 
 mothers. The kindergarten tots giggled joy 
 ously at the very sight of her. The boys 
 club suspended hostilities and became as a 
 flock of lambs when she loomed upon the hori 
 zon. The mothers meeting took her, figura-
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 169 
 
 tively speaking, to its collective bosom, the 
 first time she poured tea for it. 
 
 "She fits in anywhere," said the delighted 
 Miss Caldwell. 
 
 And Nancy? She was radiant. Appreciation 
 is the breath of her being, and though she had 
 enjoyed a very generous share of that com 
 modity, never before had it come to her in such 
 solid lumps. 
 
 Her heart swelled within her. She loved 
 the East Side individually, collectively, and in 
 family groups. Possibly she loved not wisely, 
 but too well. Her treatment of the small 
 children was not always according to Froebel, 
 and her principles concerning the pauperising 
 the poor would have given the directors a 
 shock, had they been made public. 
 
 She was not always just, but she was gener 
 ous. The East Side imposed upon her and 
 adored her. A visit from her meant more to 
 the sick than all the dispensary s medicine, 
 and no tenement was grimy enough, no patient 
 disreputable enough to appall her. 
 
 She laughed and talked and smiled her way 
 where sociology of the noblest and most 
 psychological type found the door slammed in 
 its face. 
 
 Several weeks went by and the first fine
 
 170 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 careless rapture of Nancy s enthusiasm showed 
 no sign of decline. 
 
 In the meantime the settlement work grew 
 and flourished in marvellous fashion various 
 phenomena of the development interested the 
 directors and workers exceedingly, and furnished 
 the theme for much psychological and socio 
 logical theorising and discussion among the 
 devoted band. 
 
 The boys club swelled to unheard of pro 
 portions. Doctor Braddock was inclined to 
 credit the gymnasium with the progress in this 
 line, but many of his co-workers insisted that 
 the introduction of self-government principles, 
 parliamentary rules, and committee work had 
 caught the boys interest. Nancy, w r ho was 
 particularly knowing in matters of parlia 
 mentary rules, thanks to class presidency at 
 college and club presidency since, and who took 
 a special interest in instructing the boys in 
 these matters and overseeing the committee 
 work, was convinced that these new ideas and 
 methods were the drawing card, and urged 
 Doctor Braddock to personal supervision of 
 the subjects, but he was a busy man and assured 
 her that she was doing fairly well. 
 
 As an outcome of the boys club came a 
 demand for clubs for the older men. Here,
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 171 
 
 too, parliamentary rules were in order, and 
 Miss Reynolds was called into consultation 
 upon everything from the opening of a window 
 to the drafting of resolutions of condolence for 
 a widower. 
 
 Miss Reynolds was also mistress of ceremonies 
 and dancing-teacher for the social clubs, and 
 the street -corners and saloon-doors were left 
 lonely on club nights. 
 
 "We re gathering them in, we re gathering 
 them in," said Doctor Braddock jubilantly. 
 " In time this settlement will clear up this 
 whole neighbourhood. We are getting a hold 
 upon public opinion in the district. People 
 are beginning to understand our motives and 
 appreciate the opportunities we offer." 
 
 But the crowning triumph of the settlement 
 was the reforming of Billy Harrigan. 
 
 Billy was the leader of the Goerck Street 
 gang, the bogie-man of the district. Small 
 boys spoke his name with bated breath and 
 fearful admiration. The tale of his toughness 
 resounded throughout the whole East Side, 
 and moved even Gas-House Charlie to jealousy. 
 
 With his hat on one side, his red tie flaming, 
 his diamond stud blazing, and his lower jaw 
 at an aggressive angle, he held up the bar in 
 Smooth Mike s saloon and was pointed out to
 
 172 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 visitors as a local celebrity; or he strolled 
 down the Bowery leaving a wake of murmured 
 admiration behind him as he passed, and 
 setting feminine hearts a flutter with his lordly 
 glance. 
 
 The battles he waged and the deeds he did 
 demand an epic strain, but for a brief season 
 there was an interregnum in his busy life, 
 and the bird of peace brooded over him. 
 
 From the very start the settlement had 
 felt his baleful influence. He had ridiculed it 
 early and late, had jeered boys and men out of 
 allegiance to it, had laid traps for the tripping 
 of converts, had played practical jokes upon 
 every one connected with the place. His very 
 name was anathema to the settlement group; 
 and when, one evening in late April, he ap 
 peared in the settlement library, with a high 
 patent-leather polish upon face and hair, and a 
 particularly flamboyant necktie, there was 
 confusion in the ranks and conviction of im 
 pending disaster. The boys and girls were 
 manifestly agitated, the young women of the 
 settlement were alarmed. Doctor Braddock 
 was away. Miss Caldwell was reading a paper 
 at an up-town club. 
 
 Nancy, arranging music upon the piano in 
 the big club-room, preparatory to an informal
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 173 
 
 concert, was confronted by Eliza Lowenstein, 
 whose short braids quivered with excitement. 
 
 "Please, ma am, Billy Harrigan, he s here!" 
 
 Nancy dropped the music. 
 
 "No!" 
 
 "Yes, ma am. He s fixed up awful stylish, 
 n there s lumps in his pants pockets maybe 
 they might be pistols. Ikey says he s always 
 got pistols by him. Onc t he 
 
 The narrative was interrupted by the arrival 
 of the resplendent Mr. Harrigan. 
 
 Nancy s spirits rose. He seemed to be a 
 mere man, and she had no reason to be afraid 
 of men. She had always found them ame 
 nable to reason. She proceeded to reason 
 with Mr. Harrigan, after her own fashion. 
 First she smiled at him. He appeared to 
 find the operation impressive. Then she 
 held out her hand. 
 
 "I m so glad you ve come," she said fer 
 vently. "I ve wanted to know you." 
 
 The man who would not be proud to afford 
 Nancy the privilege of knowing him is yet 
 unborn. Billy Harrigan was tough, but no 
 stoic. He felt his vertebrae softening, but he 
 squared his shoulders. 
 
 "Well, I ain t no mamma s boy. Ye can 
 take that straight !" he said defiantly.
 
 174 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 " But I m not making a collection of mamma 
 boys," Nancy assured him. "You see there 
 are so many things I need to know about people 
 and things down here, and nobody could tell 
 me everything as well as you could. I ve 
 always thought that if I only knew you, and if 
 you d help me 
 
 She smiled again, such a soft deprecatory, 
 pleading little smile that Billy instinctively 
 guarded with his left. He felt that the smile 
 would land. 
 
 It did. 
 
 Later in the evening, Doctor Braddock, 
 coming from a political meeting, stopped at 
 the club-room door and looked in. 
 
 The renowned leader of the Goerck Street 
 gang was handing around plates of ice-cream, 
 in a mild and chastened manner that would 
 have done credit to a curate. 
 
 Miss Reynolds was superintending the per 
 formance. 
 
 " Great Scot ! " murmured the Doctor. " Great 
 Scot ! but he was wise enough to leave the 
 situation to Nancy. 
 
 Billy Harrigan was nothing if not thorough. 
 Having changed his spots, he went in for 
 settlement joys, with an ardour that was 
 positively inspiring.
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 175 
 
 Early and late he haunted the library, the 
 club-room, the hall. 
 
 He joined everything for which masculinity 
 was eligible. 
 
 He sang at the concerts, he danced at the 
 dances, he debated, he boxed, he attended 
 lantern-slide exhibitions, he displayed an un 
 natural passion for afternoon tea. 
 
 Smooth Mike s knew him no more. The 
 Bowery promenade lost its brightest ornament. 
 
 Rumours floated into the settlement con 
 cerning certain affrays in which the reformed 
 one still indulged, but investigation usually 
 showed that the trouble was the direct result 
 by difference of opinion in regard to the merits 
 of the settlement. Within a short time it was 
 thoroughly understood, throughout the quarter, 
 that Bill would wipe up the street with any 
 body who said the settlement wasn t the real 
 thing, and criticism of the institution lan 
 guished. 
 
 Then it was that James Donovan tripped on 
 a torn stair carpet, landed on his right shoulder, 
 and broke his arm in two places. The settle 
 ment was without a "handy man," and 
 lamentations loud and deep arose. 
 
 Nancy, young and inexperienced, did not 
 appreciate the extent of the catastrophe, but
 
 176 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 the other workers remembered the time before 
 the smooth running and irreproachable James 
 appeared above the settlement horizon. 
 
 It was necessary to have a man about the 
 house, and a man of versatile talents was 
 needed. He must be sober, industrious, ami 
 able, polite. He must be able to run anything, 
 from the furnace to a reception for the bishop, 
 to do any odd job, from holding a baby to 
 ejecting drunken club-members. The com 
 bination was apparently a rare one. 
 
 Incumbents rose and fell the falling being 
 inevitably attended by the crash of disaster 
 until upon a red-letter day, the incomparable 
 James, out of sheer devotion to the settlement 
 cause and "The Settlement Ladies," undertook 
 to be the tutelary genius of the place. Since 
 then the household had known something 
 approaching serenity, and the domestic wheels 
 had run smoothly. 
 
 "We ll never find another James," sighed 
 Miss Caldwell. 
 
 "Everything will go wrong now," grieved 
 the workers. 
 
 But the settlement had yet to know Billy 
 Harrigan. 
 
 Even before the unfortunate James was 
 neatly bandaged, Billy was asking for his job.
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 177 
 
 Incredulity, amazement, delight played over 
 Miss Cald well s expressive face. A brand from 
 the burning and a handy-man in one ! It was 
 too good to be true. 
 
 " But are you sure you understand what will 
 be expected of you?" she asked. "There s a 
 great deal of work. Would you be willing to 
 turn your hand to anything that happens to 
 come up?" 
 
 "Sure!" affirmed Billy stoutly. 
 
 "And you will stay here in the evening?" 
 
 " Ye can t lose me." 
 
 "The wages aren t high," 
 
 "Fergit it," urged Billy. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Harrigan, we ll be very glad to 
 have you with us. When can you come?" 
 
 "I m here but say, me name s Billy." 
 
 When Nancy came in from a round of visits, 
 the new man opened the door for her. 
 
 "Why, Mr. Harrigan!" 
 
 "Call me Billy. I m the new main guy. 
 James went off in the hurry-up wagon." 
 
 His hat was on his head, there was a cigar 
 in his mouth, but satisfaction and amiability 
 radiated from him. 
 
 No one missed James. The new .man filled 
 the place. His good nature was unfailing, his 
 strength was amazing, his resourcefulness never
 
 178 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 ceased to surprise the household. He was 
 equal to any and every emergency, and a mere 
 word from him quieted the most unruly spirits 
 among the men and boys. 
 
 His vocabulary and his manners were pic 
 turesque, but, as Miss Caldwell said, that was 
 a thing which time and association would 
 adjust. 
 
 Incidently, she asked the workers to assist 
 and to bend the Harrigan twig as rapidly as 
 would be consistent with consideration for 
 an independent and sensitive nature. From 
 Nancy s influence, in particular, Miss Caldwell 
 expected much. 
 
 " He seems to have confidence in you, my 
 dear, and you have a great deal of tact. Don t 
 find fault with him, but just let him see that it 
 would please us to have him a little bit different 
 in certain ways. I have a serious sense of respon 
 sibility in regard to that young man. We ve 
 done wonders with him already, and I feel that 
 we have an opportunity to make a man of him 
 but don t lecture him or preach at him. 
 We must just show him the beautiful side of 
 life, and make him understand that that is the 
 true life." 
 
 Nancy listened with interest and dutifully 
 carried out instructions. Billy gradually be-
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 179 
 
 came softer of voice, lighter of foot, more 
 respectful of manner. He smoked only in 
 moments of relaxation and threw away his 
 chewing tobacco. The red necktie abdicated 
 in favour of dark blue Nancy was so fond of 
 dark blue and pink shirts gave way to white 
 ones. Of course, white soiled easily, but the 
 East Side has no prejudice against adjustable 
 cuffs, and Nancy thought a white shirt and blue 
 tie the most becoming combination a man 
 could wear: Against giving up his hat while 
 in the house the handy man set his face 
 stubbornly for a long time. If, by chance he 
 happened to be without his derby and the door 
 bell rang, he hunted up his hat and set it upon 
 his head at an angle of forty-five degrees 
 before going to the door. 
 
 Independence, self-assertion made that derby 
 their stronghold. Without his hat, the erst 
 while gang-leader was a Samson without his 
 locks. 
 
 At last, the hat capitulated, was relegated to 
 outdoor wear, and Billy Harrigan was shorn of 
 his aggressiveness. A child could play with 
 him but Billy preferred playing with Nancy, 
 and for the sake of the cause that young woman 
 smiled upon him and gave him much of her 
 attention. Occasionally, when she had to go
 
 180 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 out in the evening, Miss Caldwell sent Billy with 
 her. With him for escort, any corner of the 
 slums was safe ground. 
 
 One night he took her to a Delancey tene 
 ment to see a sick woman, and she decided 
 that she must spend the night. Billy left her, 
 carrying a message from her to Miss Caldwell; 
 but when, tired and nervous after her first 
 face-to-face meeting with death, she came 
 down the stairs in the gray morning light, the 
 handy man was sitting on the door-step. 
 
 "Think I was going to leave you alone in 
 this joint ? Not on your life ! " 
 
 "But you haven t been here all night?" 
 
 "Sure thing !" 
 
 " And my message ? " 
 
 " Sent a kid with it. How s Mrs. Simmons ? " 
 
 "Dead." Nancy s voice had a quiver in it. 
 
 Billy looked at her sharply. Then he tucked 
 her under his arm. 
 
 " You come along home. I suppose you 
 wouldn t hit a flask, but it d be the thing for 
 you." 
 
 Nancy didn t resent his familiarity. She 
 was grateful for it, and she cried quietly from 
 sheer nervousness, as the handy-man led her 
 home. 
 
 It was only Billy.
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 181 
 
 Late that afternoon, Doctor Braddock going 
 to the library for a book, saw Nancy dusting a 
 top shelf, while Billy held the ladder and 
 handed the books to her. 
 
 The Doctor stood unseen and studied the 
 handy-man s upturned face. Then he looked 
 at Nancy, and an idea had visible birth in his 
 brain. His lips puckered as though for a 
 whistle, and he shook his head doubtfully as 
 he turned away. The Doctor is a man himself, 
 and he had suddenly had an illuminating side 
 light thrown upon his sociological theories. 
 
 Nancy had not seen the Doctor, and she had 
 noticed nothing unusual in Billy s face. She 
 had treated Billy much as she had treated the 
 kindergarten children, and had taken his 
 homage as she had taken theirs. That a man s 
 desire could cross a gulf like that between the 
 handy man and her had never even faintly 
 occurred to her. 
 
 She had smiled upon Billy teased him, 
 flattered him, praised him, from sociological 
 motives. Possibly natural incapacity for treat 
 ing a man in any other fashion had something 
 to do with her method, but she had not con 
 sciously flirted with this East -Side lion. She 
 liked Billy, liked him immensely, and she had 
 made that plain to him. His logic being
 
 182 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 weak and his feelings strong, he argued mis 
 takenly from the flattering premise. 
 
 Any lingering doubt had been brushed away 
 that morning. Hadn t she taken his arm and 
 cried against his coat-sleeve, and hadn t he 
 patted her hand encouragingly every now and 
 then, without rebuke ? Poor Billy ! the eternal 
 feminine was far beyond his sounding. 
 
 "Hold it tight." 
 
 Nancy was ready to come down the ladder. 
 
 "Come ahead." 
 
 She gathered her skirts abo\it her and looked 
 down at him. 
 
 " It will crumple up, Billy. I know it will 
 crumple up. The spring s broken." 
 
 "Aw, come on! I m holdin it." 
 
 "It s wobbling, Billy. It s wobbling dread 
 fully. Yes, I m coming. Oh ! 
 
 She came in a heap, bringing the ladder 
 with her, but Billy caught her and held her 
 breathless, frightened, in his arms. 
 
 Even a handy-man is human. The arms 
 tightened, Billy bent his head and kissed the 
 face so near his own. 
 
 The next instant, the width of the room 
 separated Miss Nancy Reynolds, of West 7 2nd 
 Street, and Mr. William Harrigan, ex-terror of 
 the East Ride.
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 183 
 
 "How dare you! How dare you!" raged 
 the girl with the crimson cheeks and tumbled 
 hair. 
 
 Then, dropping from wrath to pathos: 
 
 "Oh, Billy, how could you!" she sobbed. 
 
 Billy stood awkward but unrepentant beside 
 the fallen ladder. 
 
 "How could I a done anything else?" He 
 asked pertinently. "It s all right," he added, 
 taking a step toward her. " I m on the square. 
 You re the only girl I ever gave a damn for, 
 and I want you for my steady. I want you to 
 marry me. Don t you see?" 
 
 Nancy saw clearly, very clearly, and the 
 up-town man with a distaste for sisters was 
 avenged. 
 
 "Will ye? Will ye?" 
 
 He was leaning toward her now. 
 
 " Oh, you haven t understood ! I never 
 dreamed of you feeling this way. I never 
 meant to make you care 
 
 "Never meant to?" There was a note in 
 Billy s voice that had faded out of the voice 
 of the handy-man. 
 
 " D ye mean you ve been foolin me all the 
 time?" 
 
 " I never thought about your your loving 
 me."
 
 184 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 "What d ye think was the game? D ye 
 suppose I was stuck on housework? D ye 
 think I was washin windows fer love of soap 
 suds ?" 
 
 " But it never occurred to me that you d 
 
 "Ye thought I was a dough-man, likely 
 thought ye could laugh at me and say sweet 
 things to me and make eyes at me, and I d 
 never notice thought I was clear out of your 
 class, didn t ye?" 
 
 The old, rough, dominant note that had 
 belonged to the voice of Bill Harrigan, gang- 
 leader, was growing stronger and stronger. 
 
 "An ye don t want any truck with me, eh? 
 You re all through ? Sort of a Chinese Sunday- 
 School proposition, an me for the Chink?" 
 
 "Billy, don t please don t! I do like you. 
 You ve been so good to me and I ve depended 
 on you, but I couldn t think about you 
 except as a good friend. I never thought 
 of your falling in love with me. Truly 
 I didn t, Billy. Please be friends please be 
 friends." 
 
 "Aw, hell!" commented Billy. 
 
 She heard the front door slam behind him. 
 
 The settlement had lost a handy-man. 
 
 The loss of the settlement was the gain of 
 the gang, and the night when the Harrigan
 
 A Disturber of the Peace 185 
 
 returned to his own, will long be remembered 
 on the East Side. 
 
 Billy made his way to Smooth Mike s, and 
 accumulated what in the vernacular is called 
 a load. Then he sent out a rallying call, and 
 loyal followers, overlooking his temporary fall 
 from grace into the paths of sobriety and 
 sociology, gathered round his standard. 
 
 After a protracted period for rest and re 
 freshment, the Goerck Street gang, under their 
 old leader, started out to make up for lost 
 time. 
 
 As a starter, they cleaned out Durfy s Hall, 
 where the Cherry Street boys were having a 
 dance; and this preliminary whirl proved so 
 spectacular that it not only began, but closed 
 the programme. 
 
 Eight of the gang landed in jail, five went to 
 the hospital, the rest dispersed without leaving 
 addresses. Billy Harrigan was among the 
 hospital contingent, with a bullet through his 
 shoulder and a knife slash in his arm, but his 
 vocal organs were not affected, and when 
 Doctor Braddock hurried to see the one-time 
 handy-man, Billy expressed his opinion of 
 toffs in general and of sociologists in particular, 
 with a force and fluency that did credit to his 
 early training.
 
 186 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 Out of the harvest of eloquence, the Doctor 
 gleaned certain straws of suggestion which 
 gave him a clue to the situation. 
 
 His surprise was not so great as was Miss 
 Caldwell s when their star assistant, pale as to 
 lips and heavy as to eyes, presented herself in 
 the office that evening and announced her 
 determination to give up settlement work. 
 
 " I m not fit for it," was the girl s only answer 
 to all argument. 
 
 "And she was so successful, so brilliantly 
 successful!" Miss Caldwell said in a puzzled 
 tone after Nancy had gone to her room. 
 
 "But possibly a trifle too stimulating," 
 commented Doctor Braddock, with a smile 
 which his fellow-workers did not understand.
 
 THE LITTLEST SISTER
 
 THE LITTLEST SISTER 
 
 THE crowd had melted away. Madame 
 dozed behind the cashier s desk. Two 
 or three waiters chattered in low 
 tones in the rear of the room. A huge black 
 cat wandered in and out among the table-legs, 
 occasionally pausing to rub languidly against 
 one of them. 
 
 At a table near the window two men lingered 
 over their wine and cigars, with their elbows 
 on the table, and in their faces the serenity 
 that marks the after-dinner hour of the man 
 who has confidence in his digestion. 
 
 "It is the only good wine in the cellars," 
 said the little French doctor, lifting his glass 
 and eying the Burgundy in it with cheerful 
 approval. 
 
 "In ten years I have tried them all. I 
 still live. Mon Dieu! That is to the credit 
 of my parents, who presented me with my 
 constitution. But this Burgundy keep the 
 number in your heart, mon gar $ on." 
 
 The artist did not listen. He was in a 
 sentimental mood. That was his tribute to 
 
 189
 
 igo Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 the Burgundy. Still, wine need not be potent 
 to stir the artist to sentimentality. He oozes 
 it at the pores. His father presented him with 
 temperament instead of constitution. 
 
 The doctor, too, had temperament being 
 a Frenchman. That was why an acquaintance 
 begun on a Washington Park bench had led to 
 friendship. But, in the doctor s case, years 
 had tempered sentiment with cynicism. His 
 moods were never maudlin. 
 
 The artist raised his glass. "Woman!" he 
 said softly. 
 
 The doctor drank with him. " But it is 
 a foolish toast," he commented as he wiped 
 his lips. "A woman, the woman that is 
 rational, but Woman ! no, man gar f on. There 
 is no woman. There are women generalisa 
 tions don t apply to the sex. There are good 
 women, there are bad women but the ways 
 of being good and of being bad, there is no 
 end to them. A woman s heart writes her 
 creed. Who shall say what is good, what is 
 bad? Not I. My wife? yes; but my wife 
 does not fear responsibility. She damns with 
 a verve, with a liberality. But it is superb. 
 Me I say, for what does le bon Dieu employ 
 the blessed St. Pierre and a recording angel? 
 It is not for me to guard the golden gates.
 
 The Littlest Sister 191 
 
 "There was the little sister. My wife says 
 she is damned. I I see that she is happy. 
 C est tout to be happy. Afterward? I do 
 not know. It is my wife who has the infor 
 mation." 
 
 The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders and 
 went back to the Burgundy. His wife is 
 strenuous and voluble. Luckily, she is married 
 to a philosopher. 
 
 "The little sister," echoed the artist, catching 
 hungrily at a suggestion of romance, "who 
 was the little sister, mon ami? 
 
 " I have not told you ? No ? But I thought 
 I had told you all my stories all. A la bonne 
 heure! I will tell you the story of Claire, la 
 plus petite sceur the littlest sister, you would 
 say, is it not ? 
 
 "She was beautiful but of a beauty, mon 
 gar $ on!" 
 
 The artist rested his chin comfortably upon 
 his hands. The story began well. He wor 
 shipped beauty, and this was the second bottle 
 of Burgundy. 
 
 "Beautiful as an angel," went on the doctor, 
 with Gallic enthusiasm, "but not an angel. 
 No human, quite human. Slender and white 
 and fair. She had hair all netted with sun 
 beams but it was under her veil at first. It
 
 192 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 was with her great blue eyes and her lips, and 
 the curve of her chin, and her voice that Jean 
 fell in love. He did not need the hair. But 
 a woman s hair, mon gar f on! For me, a 
 woman s hair 
 
 The artist moved restlessly. 
 
 "Why a veil?" he asked. 
 
 The doctor looked surprised. 
 
 "Ah, I have not told you? She was a nun. 
 But, yes, one of Us petites sceurs blanches. It 
 is a most holy order, the most severe in the 
 world, they say. They dress all in white, the 
 little sisters, and they never leave the con 
 vent after they go in through the door. 
 They sleep in their coffins. They eat no 
 meat. They are sworn never to look upon 
 the face of a man. They flog themselves 
 and do penance. They pray, pray, pray ! 
 It is gay, is it not? It is said I repeat 
 it, but I do not believe it is said that 
 also the little sisters never speak. Mon Dieu, 
 it is too much! For the rest, yes; but a 
 houseful of silent women? No. When one 
 speaks of miracles, moi, je m en passe, one 
 must be reasonable. 
 
 "There was a convent of the order in St. 
 Quentin. You do not know St. Quentin, mon 
 ami? Oh, it is pity!"
 
 The Littlest Sister 193 
 
 The doctor took up his glass solemnly and 
 rose to his feet. 
 
 "France!" he said. It was warmer, more 
 reverent than the artist s "Woman !" 
 
 They drank the toast standing, then the 
 doctor took up his story. 
 
 "It was a thing to be proud of, so holy a 
 flock. We were proud. Yes. And the women 
 gossiped. The men ? They may have listened. 
 There was only Sceur Angela, who came and 
 went between the town and the convent. 
 She was not silent, Soeur Angela. The fastings 
 had not made her thin. Sanctity had not 
 made her beautiful. She was old and fat. It 
 must have been a large coffin in which Sceur 
 Angela slept. She talked in the market-place. 
 It was only for the marketing that she left the 
 convent. And every one asked questions. 
 It was so the gossip found food. The Mother 
 Superior had been a duchess a most worldly 
 duchess. She had lived while she lived, that 
 holy lady. Then she turned dfuotte. It is so 
 with French women. It is to strike a balance. 
 She had been very beautiful. There had been 
 tales. Oh, we had heard even in St. Quentin ! 
 But now she was a saint and cold Sceur 
 Angela shivered when she spoke of that cold. 
 
 "And there was Claire, la plus petite s&ur.
 
 194 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 All the town loved Claire as they feared the 
 duchess, though no one had seen either. One 
 day a baby had been left at the convent door. 
 The sisters took it in. That was Claire. She 
 grew up there behind the walls, and she was 
 happy the only young, happy thing in the 
 place. The sisters adored her. Even the 
 Reverend Mother thawed for her, and Sceur 
 Angela wept when the spoke of her. It was a 
 good soul, but Sceur Angela was not beautiful 
 when she wept. 
 
 "It is an angel, she would sob, but of a 
 sweetness, of a beauty like a flower in the wind, 
 and with a voice ! A voice of gold ! And for 
 a smile but it is to see open the gates of 
 paradise. 
 
 "So we loved the littlest sister, and we 
 young men dreamed. I was young then, 
 mon ami. It was sacrilege to dream, but when 
 one is young ah, mon Dieu, when one is 
 young ! 
 
 "It was in 1870 that it happened. France 
 was in a frenzy then. So long ago. Yes. 
 But France is in a frenzy now, when she re 
 members. We in St. Quentin heard the echo 
 of A Berlin! Then we heard rumours. 
 We heard facts. We questioned, doubted, 
 raved. The Prussians were coming. It was
 
 The Littlest Sister 195 
 
 true. We believed at last. Eh bien, let them 
 come ! We were Frenchmen. We would show 
 the Prussian pigs how a Frenchman could 
 defend his home. Ah, les beaux jours \ St. 
 Quentin was a walled town. Ammunition was 
 stored, fortifications were strengthened. There 
 were crowds in the streets. There were speeches 
 in the caf<?s but such speeches, mon gargon! 
 It was fire ! It was thunder ! Then, one day 
 there were shells in the streets. It was the 
 town that burned, not the speeches. 
 
 "A demand for surrender. We laughed. 
 The Prussians shelled the town. The women 
 and children were ordered to the casemates. 
 Then, when they were safe, some one said, 
 But the little sisters ? We had forgotten 
 them. They were not of the world. This 
 was a worldly crisis. We had forgotten, and 
 we were ashamed. 
 
 "Jean Baudolf was sent to bring them. 
 He was a butcher, young Jean, and handsome 
 an eye, a leg ! We had no chance, we others 
 with the girls. It was Jean here, Jean there 
 and we liked him for all that. Such a devil 
 of a fellow, so gay, so goodhearted, so reckless. 
 He was popular, that rascal Jean. 
 
 "He ran up the hill, whistling. I can hear 
 him now. There was danger. He whistled
 
 196 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 more gaily for that. He knocked at the convent 
 gate. The wicket opened. Even Sceur Angela 
 smiled at Jean. 
 
 "The Prusians shell the city, ma s&ur, he 
 said. 
 
 "Yes my brother. 
 
 " You are to come to the casemates. 
 
 "It is impossible, my brother. 
 
 " But you are in danger. 
 
 " It is as God wills, my brother. 
 
 "The wicket snapped shut. Jean was left 
 plants la. He swore at the blank, white wall. 
 Then he came down the hill and told us. Mon 
 Dieu, what excitement, what sputtering ! The 
 women said nothing could be done. The men 
 said something should be done. Frenchmen 
 to see thirty women killed, even if the women 
 wished it so ! Never ! 
 
 "Monsieur le Maire was having his shoulder 
 tied up. It is not easy for a five-foot man, 
 with a round belly, to look warlike, mon cher. 
 Our mayor did it. Ah, but he was magnificent, 
 that mayor ! 
 
 "We had never known him before. He 
 could drink. He could speak, but it was in 
 danger that he was superb. I take off my 
 hat to his memory. He is dead of a fit. 
 There had been a banquet. Ah, un brave,
 
 The Littlest Sister 197 
 
 un brave, in peace or in war, le maire de St. 
 Quentin. 
 
 " It was he who spoke. sacre nom de mon 
 onclef he roared. We will bring them whether 
 they will or not. 
 
 "He went up the hill. We followed, we 
 others. He knocked at the wicket. It opened. 
 It shut. Monsieur le Maire grew purple in the 
 face. He lifted a fat leg. Bang ! The door 
 groaned. Bang ! The second kick broke the 
 lock. We tumbled into the courtyard. There 
 was service in the chapel. The music droned 
 on. There was a roar, a crash, a sound of 
 splintering wood and glass. A shell had fallen 
 in the dormitory. The chant wavered. It 
 broke. Then it went on again. Oh, ces 
 femmes, ces femmes ! How brave they can be 
 in a foolish cause ! 
 
 "We ran to the chapel door. We took off 
 our hats and stood there. The little sisters 
 fluttered like a flock of doves. They drew 
 their veils across their faces and huddled behind 
 the Mother Superior. She came down the aisle 
 toward us. I wanted to run. Prussians, yes. 
 A man may face Prussians, but this was 
 different. 
 
 " Messieurs, she said, this is sacrilege. 
 
 " Oh, mon ami : That voice ! I shiver now.
 
 198 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 It was of ice of ice, but of fire, too. We 
 trembled, we faltered. Monsieur le Maire stood 
 fast. Ah, un brave! un brave! 
 
 "Ma mt>re, he said, you must come with 
 us. We have entreated. Now we com 
 mand. 
 
 "And only five feet tall, that mayor, man 
 garqon: A little round man, at whom we had 
 always smiled. 
 
 "You must come, he said. 
 
 "Must, she repeated. Ugh! It was to 
 freeze the marrow in one s bones. She towered, 
 mon ami. She trembled with rage. 
 
 "Go, she said, lifting her hand. Go, 
 before the judgment of heaven falls upon your 
 impious heads. It was awful. It made my 
 hair to rise slowly, slowly. 
 
 " Come, said Monsieur le Maire. He swelled 
 with determination. Come, before the Prussian 
 shells fall upon your foolish head ! 
 
 " He grabbed her, mon garfon. But yes ! 
 He grabbed the Reverend Mother around the 
 middle. She was heavy, but he was strong. 
 He lifted her. He carried her, kicking and 
 struggling. No thunderbolt fell. We plucked 
 up heart. Each man seized a woman. Mon 
 Dieu, how they wriggled, how they screamed ! 
 We carried them across the courtyard through
 
 The Littlest Sister 199 
 
 the door, into the streets. Some were quiet, 
 after the first. 
 
 " To feel a man s arms round her, a man s 
 breath on her cheek, that might make ghosts 
 rise and stir in many a nun s heart. N est-ce 
 pas, man ami? What they felt, those nuns, it 
 would be interesting to know. 
 
 "But the Reverend Mother! What she 
 felt was rage. She could have killed. It was 
 but lacquer, the saint liness. Scratch it. The 
 duchess showed through. 
 
 " If we must go, let us go with dignity, she 
 said to the mayor, who purled and panted, but 
 held her fast. We will go. Do not touch us ! 
 Cowards, who insult women ! It was to 
 blush, mon ami, but we had been right, and 
 we had had our way. We were gay, even when 
 the ice crackled in the speech of the duchess. 
 
 "We set the nuns on their feet. They 
 scurried to the Reverend Mother. They went 
 down the hill before us. It was like a garden 
 of lilies swayed by the breeze, save for Sceur 
 Angela. She was a sturdy flower, Sceur Angela. 
 It would be a hurricane that could sway her. 
 The blacksmith had carried her. He was a 
 Hercules, that young blacksmith, but when she 
 walked again he wiped the sweat from his 
 brow. He fished a flask from his pocket.
 
 200 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 "And Jean? His arms were not tired. He 
 had no flask. Yet his eyes were the eyes of a 
 man who drinks till the fire is in his veins. 
 
 " It was the little Claire whom he had carried. 
 She was a feather-weight. She had not 
 struggled. She lay quite still. Her veil had 
 blown back. She looked up into Jean s eyes. 
 All blushes, yes. She shut her eyes. She 
 opened them. They answered his. Pouf ! It 
 is like that sometimes, mon gar $ on. A girl, a 
 lad, a moment. It is done. The years cannot 
 change it. So ! 
 
 " Me I studied the dot; but once there was a 
 little milliner. I was but twenty zut ! it is 
 not my story that I tell, but Jean s. He 
 sighed when he put her down. She sighed. 
 She drew her rumpled veil, but she gave him 
 her eyes first. She clung close to the Reverend 
 Mother. She was frightened by the thing she 
 felt. She has told me since, and she blushed 
 when she told. 
 
 " In the casemates every one was waiting. 
 There was respect. There was consideration. 
 The sisters sat in a shadowy corner, with their 
 heads bowed, their hands before their faces. 
 There was a murmur of prayer. When food 
 was offered, they refused ; but the second day 
 the Reverend Mother listened to reason and
 
 The Littlest Sister 201 
 
 hunger. Eat, my children/ she said. They 
 ate bread and water. At first the hands were 
 pressed tightly over the eyes. Then the slim 
 fingers slipped apart, slowly, slowly. Wounded 
 men were brought in. There was care, there 
 was grief, and finally the Reverend Mother 
 spoke : 
 
 "It is not our will that brings us here, my 
 children. God will forgive our broken vows. 
 There is work to be done. We will do it. 
 
 " So they came out from the corner, and 
 they nursed the wounded. Ah, that duchess ! 
 What a woman she must have been before 
 she turned saint. I had a scratch. She 
 bound it. I understood that she must have 
 much to repent. 
 
 " But one day it was Jean who was carried 
 in, very white, very still, a hole in his shoulder, 
 the blood flowing fast. And the littlest sister 
 knew before the men who carried him had 
 crossed the doorstep. I saw her. Her 
 face went white but white like her veil and 
 there was a live thing in her eyes. It was 
 fear. She went quickly, with bandages in her 
 hands. She leaned over him. He opened his 
 eyes. 
 
 Am I then already dead and in paradise ? 
 he said.
 
 2O2 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 "Ah, that Jean but he had the tongue, the 
 eyes, and this time he had the heart. 
 
 "Eh bicn, the story is told, mon garfon. 
 What end could there be? The Prussians 
 marched into the town. We were brave. 
 They, too, were brave, and they were strong. 
 They marched out again. It was not only 
 the Prussians who had besieged. It was not 
 only St. Quentin that had surrendered. 
 
 "The life of the town flowed back into its 
 old channels, but there were gaps, there were 
 changes. 
 
 "The Reverend Mother gathered her flock 
 around her and led them back to the convent, 
 but there were only twenty-nine who went. 
 
 "The littlest sister would not go. She was 
 pale. She was sad. She wept; but she shook 
 her head. The Reverend Mother commanded. 
 She entreated. She persuaded. It was quite 
 useless. 
 
 111 Je I aime, the littlest sister said. 
 
 " I love him. That was all. That was 
 enough. It was answer to every argument. 
 The thing was quite simple. Women are like 
 that, mon ami. 
 
 "And the duchess understood though she 
 had been dead so long. 
 
 " She took the littlest sister s hands and
 
 The Littlest Sister 203 
 
 looked down at her. I saw the good-bye. 
 Cold? The coldness was like the saintliness, 
 mon clier lacquer, only lacquer. She loved 
 the little sister. She would have kept her safe 
 from world pain, but she understood. 
 
 "Ah, what a woman if she had not been a 
 saint ! 
 
 " She saw the ghosts of her own love, of her 
 own youth, in the little sister s face. Yes, I 
 think she saw that. It was in her eyes. It 
 was on her lips, and the duchess sighed; but 
 the Mother Superior that was another woman. 
 She drew her veil. She went up the rugged 
 path to the convent. The door in the wall 
 opened. It shut. What happiness some men 
 miss in order that we may have saints. Eh, 
 mon cher? 
 
 "The littlest sister, too, had chosen. She 
 stayed in the wicked world and married Jean 
 the butcher. Happy as a bird, mon gargon. 
 Damned ? I do not know. It is my wife who 
 says it."
 
 WOMEN ARE MADE LIKE THAT
 
 WOMEN ARE MADE LIKE THAT 
 
 THE cab rattled through the narrow 
 streets of the Latin Quarter, and 
 Bruce Morgan stared out at the dingy 
 buildings and the motley crowd on the pave 
 ments. In an idle, unemphatic way, he was 
 hating it all. The gospel of dirt as preached by 
 unappreciated genius had never attracted him. 
 Save as an unavoidable adjunct of the noble 
 game of football, he strenuously objected to 
 dirt in any form, mental, moral, or physical. 
 He was not remarkably good, but he was clean, 
 and that is the next best thing, if not a synonym. 
 
 During his two years in Paris he had occupied 
 bachelor apartments in that quarter of broad 
 spaces and flooding sunshine which the dwellers 
 on the Rive Gauche call banal, and in which those 
 good Americans who go to Paris before they 
 die, but who are studying nothing in particular, 
 save the gentle art of enjoying life emulate 
 the lilies of the field. 
 
 There he had found a bath-tub to his liking, 
 so there he raised his Ebenezer and installed 
 his Lares and Penates. To be more accurate, 
 
 207
 
 208 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 he paid the rent, and Watkins, the valet, at 
 tended to the Lares and Penates. 
 
 Life went very well then, and the well- 
 groomed and cheerful young American played 
 among the lilies of the American Quarter 
 contentedly. He didn t even make frequent 
 excursions into unkempt Bohemia until after 
 he met Elizabeth. After that he learned the 
 Latin Quarter. Not that he grew fonder of it. 
 On the contrary. But he grew more fond of 
 Elizabeth, and when he wanted anything, a 
 mere matter of local colour could not dis 
 courage him. 
 
 As for Elizabeth, she was what the wondering 
 bourgeoisie who leaven the Latin Quarter call 
 "une artiste curag/e"; but she had lived in a 
 cluttered studio on the Rue Vavin, and had 
 eaten her meals at a cremerie for three years. 
 Her artistic fervour was not waning, but the 
 magic light that never was on Bohemia was 
 dimmed a trifle to her vision. A freshly 
 washed, immaculately clad, good-looking young 
 man, about whom clung an odour of jockey- 
 club rather than turpentine, who rode in cabs 
 and scattered violets and roses, and appeared 
 to have no secret sorrows nor thwarted am 
 bitions, appealed to her as inartistic but 
 distinctly comforting.
 
 Women Are Made Like That 209 
 
 So he came to the studio often. One day a 
 miracle happened, and after that he came 
 oftener. 
 
 Elizabeth Russell had a reputation in the 
 Quarter for dignity of a rather glacial variety. 
 Her beauty won her adorers, and her coldness 
 drove them to despair which was all according 
 to orthodox poetic tradition. Her French 
 lovers appreciated the romantic fitness and 
 possibilities of the situation. They wrote 
 poems to "La belle dame sans merci." 
 
 The American and English victims of Eliza 
 beth s beaux yeux, being hampered by Anglo- 
 Saxon secret iveness, did not write poetry. 
 They only tramped innumerable miles and 
 came home to swear savagely at the concierge 
 and kick the cat. 
 
 When severity wrought such havoc, what 
 would have been the casualties had one guessed 
 that this self-sufficient young woman had 
 moments when, without warning, her dignity 
 crumpled up like a pricked balloon, and she 
 became, for the length of a woman s mood, the 
 most appealing, irresponsible of creatures? 
 
 Bruce Morgan had seen the metamorphosis, 
 and had promptly done what any normal and 
 love-ridden man would have done, but what a 
 moment earlier would have seemed absurdly
 
 210 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 impossible. His arms went round her, his lips 
 touched her waving brown hair, and he held 
 her close, while, in true woman fashion, she hid 
 her face against his coat collar and cried softly. 
 He had a bewildered conviction that his world 
 was toppling about him; but he was quite 
 willing it should topple, so long as the break-up 
 threw the inaccessible into his arms. She 
 didn t stay there long. The moment was too 
 good to last. Before he had fairly caught his 
 breath, she was standing across the table from 
 him, a bit pink as to eyelids and cheeks, a trifle 
 rumpled as to hair, but smiling, self-contained, 
 slightly defiant. And he, being a wise young 
 man in his generation, said no word of the 
 sudden surrender, pressed his advantage no 
 further, but spoke of home letters and the 
 weather. Few men would have understood. 
 He was gentler with her after that, more 
 patient with her egoism, more in sympathy 
 with her work. Personally, he had never 
 thought much of her talent. He knew some 
 thing of art, though he had never joined the 
 noble army of aspiring young artists. His 
 income was large, and he preferred buying good 
 pictures to painting poor ones which may 
 be Philistinism in the eyes of the Latin Quarter 
 and Montmartre, but has its elements of sanity
 
 Women Are Made Like That 211 
 
 and altruism. He knew quite well that before 
 a word of praise from one of his lady s masters 
 his warmest love-words would pale into insig 
 nificance, and that if his eternal absence could 
 improve her values, she would set him adrift 
 with cheerful unconcern. Still, he was dis 
 tinctly optimistic about his love-affair. He 
 did not believe in the artistic future of the girl 
 he loved. He had seen enthusiasm wane 
 before failure, and heart -hunger creep into the 
 place of ambition. Then, too, he had the 
 memory of the metamorphosis to encourage 
 him, so he waited patiently. 
 
 The waiting had lasted for months before 
 the January evening when his cab scurried 
 along toward the Rue Vavin. 
 
 He entered the narrow hallway, climbed the 
 dark stairs, and tapped on the studio door, 
 which was slightly ajar. Through the crack 
 in the door he could see that the studio was 
 dark, save for the glow from a little open stove. 
 Evidently Elizabeth had gone out for dinner. 
 He tucked a card under the door and was 
 turning away, when he heard a muffled sound 
 from the studio. He wheeled sharply and stood 
 listening. The sound was repeated, and the 
 man s lips tightened. Some one was sobbing 
 in the darkened room. For a moment he
 
 212 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 hesitated. Then he pushed the door open and 
 entered. After the darkness of the hall, the 
 fire glow was confusing, and the intruder stood 
 peering through the shadows. A dry sob, 
 from the direction of the divan, drew his eyes 
 toward that corner of the room, and he made 
 out a forlorn little figure curled up among the 
 pillows. His hands clinched at his sides, but 
 his voice was very quiet : "Little girl, what is it ?" 
 
 The tone was a caress. Elizabeth sat up 
 suddenly, and looked at him with wet, fright 
 ened eyes. The white quivering face sent a 
 great flood of tenderness surging through him. 
 
 "Oh, it is you! You frightened me," she 
 said with a pitiful attempt at a smile. Then 
 she dropped down among the pillows again and 
 hid her face. In an instant he was on his 
 knees beside the couch. 
 
 " My little girl ! my poor little girl. Cry it 
 all out here." He drew her into his arms and 
 kissed her wet cheeks and murmured fond, 
 foolish love-words, comforting her, as one 
 would comfort a child whose heart was sore; 
 and Elizabeth, the severe, clung to him, 
 sobbing, until his strength and tenderness 
 quieted her, and the sobs died into stifled 
 sighs. 
 
 At last, when even the sighs were hushed,
 
 Women Are Made Like That 213 
 
 she looked up at him, in a half -startled fashion, 
 and he put her back among the pillows, but his 
 arm was still under her head, and his right 
 hand stroked her hair. 
 
 "Tell me all about it, sweetheart," he said, 
 gently. 
 
 She told him. The Latin Quarter is full of 
 such stories of young enthusiasm, vaulting 
 ambition, self-confidence, home disapproval, 
 and failure. Her mother had believed in her 
 talent ; her New York teachers had encouraged 
 her. Then the mother died, and a matter-of- 
 fact step-father pooh-poohed artistic aspira 
 tion. She thought herself persecuted for art s 
 sake, and defied authority. A little money 
 left her by her mother would take her to 
 Paris and keep her there for two or three years. 
 There was a decisive and stormy break with 
 the step-father, conscientious enough, but in 
 tolerant of what he thought idiotic folly. Then 
 Paris, and the intoxication of realised longing, 
 of life in the artists quarter, and study in the 
 French schools. 
 
 At first it was all she had hoped. She had 
 money enough for all her needs. The second 
 year went by less buoyantly. She did not 
 make the progress for which she had hoped. 
 She was not the important figure in the atelier
 
 214 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 that she had been in the New York class. No 
 one paid much attention to her, and the masters 
 were brutally frank. They admitted that she 
 had a certain facility in line, but her colour, 
 her values atrocious ! " Wooden," was L s 
 favourite comment as he stopped beside her 
 easel. Still she worked, worked, worked. In 
 the spring her health gave out. She went to 
 the country and lost two months. Then she 
 came back and went to work, more furiously 
 than before, but she did not get back the old 
 strength. 
 
 "Paint poison!" said the English doctor 
 whom she consulted. " Stop living in an air 
 tight, turpentine-saturated hole. Stop work. 
 Don t worry. Eat three square meals a day. 
 Rest and you ll come out all right. It is a 
 woman-killer, that studio life !" 
 
 She tried for the salon that year. Her 
 portrait wasn t worth consideration. "Wooden," 
 
 reiterated L , when he spoke to her about 
 
 it ; but she worked* on. Then the money began 
 to give out, and she realised that what she 
 was to do must be done quickly. There could 
 be no going home. She must work harder, 
 and cut down expenses. She did both, and 
 her technique improved. Naturally, her health 
 did not. It was during that spring that she
 
 Women Are Made Like That 215 
 
 met Bruce Morgan, but he never knew how 
 hard life was for her. The haughty poise of 
 the head and the firm lips were not tale-bearers, 
 and though the man had seen her nerves give 
 way once, he had never guessed the cause. 
 
 Now January had come, and the game was 
 about played out. 
 
 "I m tired so wretchedly tired," she said, 
 drearily. The man s arm tightened its hold. 
 
 "I m a failure, a flat failure. I ve worked, 
 but it isn t in me. I see now, but I believed I 
 was right. I ve left the school. I didn t have 
 
 the money to go on. L talked to me 
 
 to-day. He meant to be kind. He told me 
 I would better give up and go home that I was 
 killing myself for an ambition that would never 
 be fulfilled, that I was wasting money and 
 health and time." 
 
 There was a sharp catch in the tired voice. 
 
 "I can t go home. I can t." The dreary, 
 monotonous voice quickened into pain and 
 rebellion. 
 
 When the pitiful little tale was ended, he 
 stooped until his cheek touched hers. 
 
 "Will you marry me, little girl? I ve loved 
 you all the time." 
 
 She shrank away quickly, and his arm 
 loosened its hold.
 
 2i6 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 "It is pity," she said, blushing crimson in 
 the dusk. 
 
 "It is love, sweetheart." 
 
 " I ought not to have told you, but I was so 
 miserable, and you came, and there was no one 
 else, and 
 
 "Hush, dear, hush. You should have told 
 me before. I should have known it without 
 telling. I m a brute." 
 
 "And you really wanted to marry me, before 
 to-night?" 
 
 "More than I wanted anything else in the 
 world." 
 
 "But I don t believe I love you enough." 
 
 "Let me teach you," She closed her eyes 
 and lay quite still for a few moments ; then she 
 looked at him. 
 
 " I can t promise you now. I think 
 it is only because I am a woman and 
 unhappy that I am so glad to be here in 
 your arms." 
 
 " Bless her heart, she sha n t be bothered 
 about deciding anything now. She isn t even 
 competent to decide upon her o\vn dinner, so 
 I ll take that responsibility off her hands." 
 He lifted her to her feet and smiled at her 
 gayly. 
 
 "Wash off the tears, put on your hat and
 
 Women Are Made Like That 217 
 
 coat, and we ll go to the Tour d y Argent" She 
 looked at him wonderingly. 
 
 "I ll have another try for the salon" she 
 said, thoughtfully. Already her work was 
 crowding him aside. 
 
 "Paint me," he suggested. 
 
 She looked him over judicially. 
 
 "Wouldn t you hate it?" 
 
 "I d like it. There s no law to prevent 
 the sitter from looking at the painter, is there ? " 
 
 " It would save my having a model, and 
 you have a splendid head, and but it would 
 be a horrid bore for you." 
 
 "Not a bit of it. I ve promised to have a 
 portrait for my mother, anyway." 
 
 " I believe I can do it." A flush was stealing 
 into the pale cheeks, and the head was taking 
 its old self-confident poise. 
 
 "Then that s settled. Now for dinner. I ll 
 wait in the cab." 
 
 Then he went out into the night, carelessly 
 whistling "P tite Ninon." 
 
 The girl, bathing her eyes in the studio, 
 smiled at the gay little air, and hummed it as 
 she put on her hat and coat. 
 
 The portrait was begun the following week, 
 and Elizabeth worked steadily through the 
 short, gray days. Never did a painter have
 
 * 1 8 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 a model more tireless, and if the sitter chafed 
 against the artist s absorption in her work, he 
 showed no sign of his irritation. He was being 
 painted in his hunting pink; and as he sat 
 carelessly on the solid arm of a great settle, 
 with his hunting-crop across his knees and his 
 scarlet coat flaming against the high oaken 
 back of the seat, he was uncommonly good to 
 look at. But he knew quite well that, so far 
 as his ladye -love s vision was concerned, he 
 was only a matter of colour and line and 
 values. Another man might have been dis 
 couraged. He only grew more doggedly de 
 termined, and gradually he felt that he was 
 making way. The picture was the thing, but 
 there were days when the artist worked rest 
 lessly, when her eyes looked at him as the eyes 
 of a maid look at a man, instead of resolving 
 him into madder and Prussian blue, when she 
 blushed if he spoke suddenly, and her voice 
 had a little thrill in it, as if some song were 
 singing itself in her heart. 
 
 He had much to do on those days in keeping 
 himself from walking across the room, kicking 
 the easel aside, picking the slender little woman 
 up in his arms, and holding her there until she 
 would promise to marry him before sundown; 
 but he kept his word to her, and waited.
 
 Women Are Made Like That 219 
 
 He had never promised not to make love to 
 her; and he used the hours as a lover can. 
 When she looked from her canvas to her sitter, 
 she met his soul in his eyes, but she understood 
 so little that she never realised she was painting 
 the man s love, not the man. He talked of a 
 host of things, sometimes gaily, sometimes 
 seriously, but always it was of love he talked, 
 for his love warmed even the idlest words into 
 a caress. He told her of his home, his people, 
 his plans, and his dreams, taking her into his 
 life as he had taken her into his heart. There 
 were days when he tossed self-restraint aside 
 and made masterful love to her, calling her, 
 with his lips, the names by which his heart 
 knew her. But he asked her for nothing; and 
 he did not move from his seat on the old settle, 
 nor touch even a lock of the rippling brown 
 hair, or a curve of the white wrist from which 
 the cuff rolled back. 
 
 How he learned to know every line of that 
 dainty head and figure as he sat and watched 
 them day after day ! Her upper lip had a 
 fashion of trembling when he was most auda 
 cious, and the colour that flooded throat and 
 cheeks was a thing to conjure with. He won 
 dered at himself, sometimes, because he could 
 sit there, across the room, and watch the colour
 
 22O Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 come and go, and hold himself from kissing the 
 tremulous upper lip. 
 
 After the sittings there was tea, while the 
 shadows gathered, and the candles threw 
 weird flickering lights through the gloom; and 
 there were jolly unchaperoned dinners, over 
 which Dame Grundy might shake her head in 
 vain. The man s conscience pricked him at 
 times. Perhaps, after all, he was not taking 
 good care of her, but who was there to criticise 
 her going or coming ? And in two months she 
 would be his wife. 
 
 The portrait went well. Elizabeth felt sure 
 of that, and yet she had learned self -distrust, 
 and dared not believe in her own judgment. 
 Morgan had never even seen the canvas. That 
 was one of his ladye s whims, and he bowed 
 to it, as to all others the more willingly, 
 perhaps, because he did not believe in her 
 success, and feared his praise of failure would 
 not ring true. 
 
 At last the sittings ended. One afternoon 
 Elizabeth threw down her brush. 
 
 "I ve put all I have into it," she said. "It 
 will have to stand so." Instinctively she held 
 out her hands to him. Her upper lip was 
 trembling, and he stooped and kissed it. 
 
 "You have been the best friend a girl ever
 
 Women Are Made Like That 221 
 
 had," she faltered. "Will you go away for a 
 little while now, and let me think ? Some way 
 or other I I don t seem to think clearly when 
 you are here." 
 
 He laughed gladly, confidently. 
 
 "Don t try to think, little one. Feel!" 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 "No, I mean it. I m not sure about any 
 thing. Don t come again this week. Next 
 Monday I shall be here. Come then please 
 dear." A light flamed in his eyes. He bent 
 his head and kissed the hands he held. 
 
 "Till Monday, then dearest." 
 
 When he went away, on Monday, he left his 
 promised wife behind him, and she herself did 
 not understand why she threw herself down 
 on the couch and cried stormily. 
 
 The portrait had gone to the salon judges, 
 and the artist seemed, in some strange way, 
 to have lost all interest in its fate. She 
 expected nothing of it, hardly thought 
 of it, in her love -warmed days. One morn 
 ing she received a despatch. It was from 
 Bruce. 
 
 " Hope I am first to tell you your picture 
 has a place on the line." 
 
 She rose and walked unsteadily toward the 
 open window, stood for a moment staring out
 
 222 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 into the sunshine, then quietly fainted upon 
 the floor. 
 
 It was later that the full extent of her 
 victory dawned upon her. L - came to her 
 with the artists verdict. 
 
 "I was a fool," he said, frankly, "and you 
 are a genius. It is the picture of the year. I 
 would not have believed it possible." 
 
 The critics chanted a chorus of praise. She 
 walked through the triumphant days as 
 if in a dream. The success was too swift, 
 too complete to seem real, and the pale 
 face wore a wondering, troubled expression, 
 instead of the gladness for which those who 
 knew her looked. 
 
 "Some day I shall waken," she said, incred 
 ulously, to her lover. He looked at her wist 
 fully. In his heart he was glad of her triumph, 
 but he was uneasy, restless. He did not under 
 stand his sweetheart s mood, and he felt, 
 vaguely, that his happiness \vas threatened by 
 these laurels that had fallen among his roses 
 and violets. She had never been ardent, this 
 little love of his, but she had trembled and 
 glowed under his ardour. Now, she seemed 
 as remote and unimpassioned as if their lips 
 had never met. 
 
 One night he went away puzzled, unhappy.
 
 Women Are Made Like That 223 
 
 The next morning Watkins brought a letter 
 with the coffee. 
 
 "Dear," she wrote, "I ve wakened, but the 
 dream was true, and all the rest was dream. 
 I hate to hurt you, but I would hurt you more 
 if I married you. Art was always first, but I 
 thought I had failed. I haven t. The thing 
 I have slaved for, prayed for, starved for, has 
 come come just when I thought it lost for 
 ever, and it seems to me I shall go mad with 
 the joy of it. I realise now that love could 
 never have taken its place, though love might 
 have helped me bear its loss. 
 
 "Try to understand. Some other woman 
 will make you happy. I could not. There 
 would always be a rival far dearer to me than 
 you could ever be. 
 
 " Don t come. Don t write. It would only 
 make things harder. Forgive me, and let me 
 stay where I belong. "ELIZABETH." 
 
 Of course he wrote, of course he went; but 
 it was all useless. There is no adamant like a 
 slender girl egoist. He did not rage nor waste 
 reproaches. That was not his way but, as 
 he said good-bye, she saw, with the artist s 
 eye for detail, that his face looked white and
 
 224 Nancy s Country Christmas 
 
 old, and that new lines had appeared around 
 his lips since she had painted his portrait. 
 
 The next day two great artists stood before 
 the famous salon portrait. 
 
 "It is a miracle," said one, thoughtfully; "an 
 unknown little art student, and a picture like 
 that!" 
 
 His companion laughed cynically. 
 
 "No miracle. I call it luck. It isn t given 
 to every painter of portraits to see a naked 
 soul. This little woman saw one and it startled 
 her into genius. How he adored her and she 
 painted it! Women are made like that!"
 
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