Christmas | Page 2

with those variations of intonation which mean an
effort to be delicate, "is--is there any likelihood that the factory will
open up this Fall?"
"No, there ain't," Ebenezer said, like something shutting.
"Nor--nor this Winter?" Simeon pursued.
"No, sir," said Ebenezer, like something opening again to shut with a
bang.
"Well, if you're sure--" said Simeon.
Ebenezer cut him short. "I'm dead sure," he said. "I've turned over my
orders to my brother's house in the City. He can handle 'em all and not
have to pay his men a cent more wages." And this was as if something
had been locked.
"Well," said Simeon, "then, Abel, I move we go ahead."
Abel Ames, proprietor of the Granger County Merchandise Emporium
("The A. T. Stewart's of the Middle West," he advertised it), sighed

heavily--a vast, triple sigh, that seemed to sigh both in and out, as a
schoolboy whistles.
"Well," he said, "I hate to do it. But I'll be billblowed if I want to think
of paying for a third or so of this town's Christmas presents and
carrying 'em right through the Winter. I done that last year, and Fourth
of July I had all I could do to keep from wishing most of the crowd
Merry Christmas, 'count of their still owing me. I'm a merchant and a
citizen, but I ain't no patent adjustable Christmas tree."
"Me neither," Simeon said. "Last year it was me give a silk cloak and a
Five Dollar umbrella and a fur bore and a bushel of knick-knicks to the
folks in this town. My name wa'n't on the cards, but it's me that's paid
for 'em--up to now. I'm sick of it. The storekeepers of this town may
make a good thing out of Christmas, but they'd ought to get some of the
credit instead of giving it all, by Josh."
"What you going to do?" inquired Ebenezer, dryly.
"Well, of course last year was an exceptional year," said Abel,
"owing--"
He hesitated to say "owing to the failure of the Ebenezer Rule Factory
Company," and so stammered with the utmost delicacy, and skipped a
measure.
"And we thought," Simeon finished, "that if the factory wasn't going to
open up this Winter, we'd work things so's to have little or no
Christmas in town this year--being so much of the present giving falls
on us to carry on our books."
"It ain't only the factory wages, of course," Abel interposed, "it's the
folks's savings being et up in--"
"--the failure," he would have added, but skipped a mere beat instead.
"--and we want to try to give 'em a chance to pay us up for last
Christmas before they come on to themselves with another

celebration," he added reasonably.
Ebenezer Rule laughed--a descending scale of laughter that seemed to
have no organs wherewith to function in the open, and so never got
beyond the gutturals.
"How you going to fix it?" he inquired again.
"Why," said Simeon, "everybody in town's talking that they ain't going
to give anybody anything for Christmas. Some means it and some don't.
Some'll do it and some'll back out. But the churches has decided to
omit Christmas exercises altogether this year. Some thought to have
speaking pieces, but everybody concluded if they had exercises without
oranges and candy the children'd go home disappointed, so they've left
the whole thing slide--"
"It don't seem just right for 'em not to celebrate the birth of our Lord
just because they can't afford the candy," Abel Ames observed mildly,
but Simeon hurried on:--
"--slide, and my idea and Abel's is to get the town meeting to vote a
petition to the same effect asking the town not to try to do anything
with their Christmas this year. We heard the factory wasn't going to
open, and we thought if we could tell 'em that for sure, it would settle
it--and save him and me and all the rest of 'em. Would--would you be
willing for us to tell the town meeting that? It's to-night--we're on the
way there."
"Sure," said Ebenezer Rule, "tell 'em. And you might point out to 'em,"
he added, with his spasm of gutturals, "that failures is often salutary
measures. Public benefactions. Fixes folks so's they can't spend their
money fool."
He walked with them across the lawn, going between them and guiding
them among the empty aster beds.
"They think I et up their savings in the failure," he went on, "when all I
done is to bring 'em face to face with the fact that for years they've been

overspending themselves. It takes Christmas to show that up. This
whole Christmas business is about wore out, anyhow. Ain't it?"
"That's what," Simeon said, "it's a spendin' sham, from edge to edge."
Abel Ames was silent.