The Torch and Other Tales | Page 6

thought to see the man again. Yet he'd come back and, more wonderful still, afore he'd been home a week, he made bold to step in one night and shake their hands and say 'twas a very nice thing to be home in his own den a free man! They felt mazed to see him among 'em, so cheerful and full of talk as if he'd been away for a holiday. And Joseph wondered a lot and felt it on the tip of his tongue to name the past and express friendly hopes for the future. But he didn't, and it weren't till he saw 'Santa Claus' down to the gate on his way home, that the little chap spoke.
"Say nought and try to forget," he said. "You done your duty and that's all the best and worst of us can do. Be my friend, for I've got but few."
Then he was gone, and Joseph woke to a surer trust in humanity and felt our common nature crying to him to believe it; while his own policeman's nature warned him to do no such thing. He talked far into the night with his wife; but she was all for believing.
"Us be Christians," said Minnie, "and well we know how the Lord works. He's come to right thinking by chastisement, and his heart's softened and never will I believe a man as loves the little ones like him be so very bad. He's paid for what he done and, if he wants to forget and forgive, 'tis everybody's place to do the same."
"That sounds all right," granted Joseph. "And who be I to say he's not a repentant man? But--you didn't see his face, with ten devils staring out of his eyes, when I took him."
"Us'll watch and pray for him," answered Minnie. "My heart tells me the poor man won't fall again."
And they left it at that and Minnie prayed and Joseph watched; and the woman triumphed over her husband a good bit as time went on, for Teddy Pegram never looked back so far as could be seen, until, little by little, even Joseph felt that his spell in the jug had changed Teddy to a member of society a good bit out of the common.
His friends reckoned that, when another autumn came, the strain would be too much and the old poacher might be found to fall; but, as Ned Chown pointed out, it weren't very likely as Pegram would fall again in the same place.
"If he was minded to fall, he'd sling his hook and go and fall somewhere else, where he weren't known," he said, and indeed Teddy had made the same remark himself. He stuck to lawful sport and went his quiet way, until that happened which looked as though he might soon be minded to flit.
In the fall he sold his cottage to Ned Chown, who owned a few little dwellings already and was a great believer in the virtue of house property; but Pegram only let the inn-keeper have it on one condition and that was that he should be allowed to go on living in it while he chose to do so. He explained to Joseph Ford that he never meant to leave Little Silver; but that he was very poor and a thought pressed for money, and glad to have the value of the house in his pocket again.
So another year passed over 'em all, and the end of the strange business of 'Santa Claus' came on another Christmas Eve, when he dropped in to see the Fords and express his friendship and good wishes. They'd quite slipped back into the old, kindly understanding, and Joseph felt long since convinced that his stern dealing had been the salvation of the man--a fact Teddy himself often declared, without shame. They cared for him a lot by now, and Minnie never tired of singing his praises, and the child never felt a day well spent if his friend didn't come into it.
Joey was in bed and asleep before Pegram called in his character of 'Santa Claus'; but he'd not forgot his gift and produced a fine box of sweets, to be put on top of the child's stocking along with a Christmas card. He looked in on sleeping Joey also and smiled to see the child in the land of dreams with his dog asleep beside him. And then he gave Minnie a gift also--a piece of very fine cloth to make herself a gown. And he promised to come and eat his Christmas dinner along with them, which Joseph insisted he should do. Ford was on night duty at the time and he left the house with the old poacher and saw him to his own home, while good words passed between