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On Christmas Day In The Evening
by
Margaret flushed brightly. The Reverend William Sewall was her brother. He might be the very manly and dignified young rector of a fashionable city church, but no man who answers to the name of Billy in his own family can be a really formidable personage, and he and his sister Margaret were undeniably great chums.
“Of course Billy would,” cried Margaret. “You know perfectly well he would, Guy, dear. He doesn’t care a straw about millionaires’ dinners–he’d rather have an evening with his newsboys’ club, any time. He has his own service Christmas morning, of course, but in the evening–He could come up on the afternoon train–he’d love to. Why, Billy’s a bachelor–he’s nothing in the world to keep him. I’ll telephone him, first thing in the morning.”
From this point on there was no lack of enthusiasm. If Billy Sewall was coming to North Estabrook, as Sam Burnett remarked, it was time to get interested–and busy. They discussed everything, excitement mounting–the music, the trimming of the church–then, more prosaically, the cleaning and warming and lighting of it. Finally, the making known to North Estabrook the news of the coming event–for nothing less than an event it was sure to be to North Estabrook.
“Put a notice in the post office,” advised Guy, comfortably crossing his legs and grinning at his father, “and tell Aunt Eliza and Miss Jane Pollock, and the thing is done. Sam, I think I see you spending the next two days at the top of ladders, hanging greens. I have a dim and hazy vision of you on your knees before that stove that always used to smoke when the wind was east–the one in the left corner–praying to it to quit fussing and draw. A nice, restful Christmas vacation you’ll have!”
Sam Burnett looked at his wife. “She’s captain,” said he. “If she wants to play with the old meeting-house, play she shall–so long as she doesn’t ask me to preach the sermon.”
“You old dear!” murmured Nan, jumping up to stand behind his chair, her two pretty arms encircling his stout neck from the rear. “You could preach a better sermon than lots of ministers, if you are only an upright old bank cashier.”
“Doubtless, Nancy, doubtless,” murmured Sam, pleasantly. “But as it will take the wisdom of a Solomon, the tact of a Paul, and the eloquence of the Almighty Himself to preach a sermon on the present occasion that will divert the Tomlinsons and the Frasers, the Hills and the Pollocks from glaring at each other across the pews, I don’t think I’ll apply for the job. Let Billy Sewall tackle it. There’s one thing about it–if they get to fighting in the aisles Billy’ll leap down from the pulpit, roll up his sleeves, and pull the combatants apart. A virile religion is Billy’s, and I rather think he’s the man for the hour.”
II
“Hi, there, Ol–why not get something doing with that hammer? Don’t you see the edge of that pulpit stair-carpeting is all frazzled? The preacher’ll catch his toes in it, and then where’ll his ecclesiastical dignity be?”
The slave-driver was Guy, shouting down from the top of a tall step-ladder, where he was busy screwing into place the freshly cleaned oil-lamps whose radiance was to be depended upon to illumine the ancient interior of the North Estabrook church. He addressed his eldest brother, Oliver, who, in his newness to the situation and his consequent lack of sympathy with the occasion, was proving but an indifferent worker. This may have been partly due to the influence of Oliver’s wife, Marian, who, sitting–in Russian sables–in one of the middle pews, was doing what she could to depress the labourers. The number of these, by the way, had been reinforced by the arrival of the entire Fernald clan, to spend Christmas.
“Your motive is undoubtedly a good one,” Mrs. Oliver conceded. She spoke to Nan, busy near her, and she gazed critically about the shabby old walls, now rapidly assuming a quite different aspect as the great ropes of laurel leaves swung into place under the direction of Sam Burnett. That young man now had Edson Fernald and Charles Wetmore–Carolyn’s husband–to assist him, and he was making the most of his opportunity to order about two gentlemen who had shown considerable reluctance to remove their coats, but who were now–to his satisfaction–perspiring so freely that they had some time since reached the point of casting aside still other articles of apparel. “But I shall be much surprised,” Mrs. Oliver continued, “if you attain your object. Nobody can be more obstinate in their prejudice than the people of such a little place as this. You may get them out–though I doubt even that–but you are quite as likely as not to set them by the ears and simply make matters worse.”