On Christmas Day In The Evening | Page 7

you didn't know enough to deal with the situation. Don't you remember?"
The old man, with a gently humorous look, glanced down at his own thin, bent shoulders, then at the stalwart ones which towered above him.
"You speak metaphorically, my dear lad," he said quaintly, with a kindly twinkle in his faded blue eyes. He laid his left hand on the firm young arm whose hand held his shrunken right. "But I do remember--yes, yes--I remember plainly enough. And though it seems to me now as if the strength were all with the young and vigorous in body, it may be that I should be glad of the years that have brought me experience."
"And tolerance," added William Sewall, pressing the hand, his eyes held fast by Elder Blake's.
"And love," yet added the other. "Love. That's the great thing--that's the great thing. I do love this community--these dear people. They are good people at heart--only misled as to what is worth standing out for. I would see them at peace. Maybe I can speak to them. God knows--I will try."

VI
"The Fernald family alone will fill the church," observed the bachelor son of the house, Ralph. He leaned out from his place at the tail of the procession to look ahead down the line, where the dark figures showed clearly against the snow. By either hand he held a child--his sister Carolyn's oldest, his brother Edson's youngest. "So it won't matter much if nobody else comes out. We're all here--'some in rags, and some in tags, and some in velvet gowns'."
"I can discern the velvet gowns," conceded Edson, from his place just in front, where his substantial figure supported his mother's frail one. "But I fail to make out any rags. Take us by and large, we seem to put up rather a prosperous front. I never noticed it quite so decidedly as this year."
"There's nothing at all ostentatious about the girls' dressing, dear," said his mother's voice in his ear. "And I noticed they all put on their simplest clothes for to-night--as they should."
"Oh, yes," Edson chuckled. "That's precisely why they look so prosperous. That elegant simplicity--gad!--you should see the bills that come in for it. Jess isn't an extravagant dresser, as women go--not by a long shot--but!" He whistled a bar or two of ragtime. "I can see myself now, as a lad, sitting on that fence over there--" he indicated a line of rails, half buried in snow, which outlined the borders of an old apple orchard-- "counting the quarters in my trousers pockets, earned by hard labour in the strawberry patch. I thought it quite a sum, but it wouldn't have bought----"
"A box of the cigars you smoke now," interjected Ralph unexpectedly, from behind. "Hullo--there's the church! Jolly, but the old building looks bright, doesn't it? I didn't know oil lamps could put up such an illumination. --And see the folks going in!"
"See them coming--from all directions." Nan, farther down the line, clutched Sam Burnett's arm. "Oh, I knew they'd come out--I knew they would!"
"Of course they'll come out." This was Mrs. Oliver. "Locks and bars couldn't keep a country community at home, when there is anything going on. But as to the feeling--that is a different matter. --Oliver, do take my muff. I want to take off my veil. There will be no chance once I am inside the door. Nan is walking twice as fast now as when we started. She will have us all up the aisle before----"
"Where's Billy Sewall bolting to?" Guy sent back this stage-whisper from the front of the procession, to Margaret, his wife, who was walking with Father Fernald, her hand on his gallant arm. In John Fernald's day a man always offered his arm to the lady he escorted.
"He caught sight of Mr. Blake, across the road. They're going in together," Margaret replied. "I think Mr. Blake is to have a part in the service."
"Old Ebenezer Blake? You don't say!" Father Fernald ejaculated in astonishment. He had not been told of Sewall's visit to the aged minister. "Well--well--that is thoughtful of William Sewall. I don't suppose Elder Blake has taken part in a service in fifteen years--twenty, maybe. He used to be a great preacher, too, in his day. I used to listen to him, when I was a young man, and think he could put things in about as interesting a way as any preacher I ever heard. Good man, too, he was--and is. But nobody's thought of asking him to make a prayer in public since--I don't know when. --Well, well--look at the people going in! I guess we'd better be getting right along to our seats, or there won't be any left."

VII
The organ was playing--very softly. Carolyn was a skilful manipulator of keyboards, and she had discovered that