The wind went shrieking through the bare attic above and singing among the boxes and barrels in the cellar below. The big show window in front groaned in a deep bass; the little window in the rear accompanied it in a high treble. The lamp, with its vague, flickering flame, cast a gloomy glare over the store, and lighted up the faces of the little group of men, seated on box, counter, keg and chair, huddled about the great center of heat.

The Chronic Loafer raised himself from his favorite pile of calicoes and turned up his coat collar.

“Shet that stove door an’ put on the draught,” he cried. “What’s the uset o’ freezin’!”

“Cold Chrisermas to morrer,” said the Storekeeper, as he banged the door shut and turned on the draught in obedience to the demand.

“Turn up the lamp,” growled the Miller. “It’s ez dark an’ gloomy ez a barn here.”

“They ain’t no uset o’ wastin’ ile,” the Storekeeper[127] muttered as he complied with the second request.

The great egg stove roared right merrily as the flames darted up out of its heart, until its large body grew red-hot and sent forth genial rays of heat and light—the veritable sun of the narrow village universe.

“Listen to the wind! Ain’t it howlin’?” said the Loafer.

“Col’est Chrisermas Eve in years,” the Tinsmith responded.

The Loafer pushed himself off the counter onto an empty crate that stood below him. He leaned forward and almost embraced the stove in his effort to toast his hands.

“This, I’ve heard tell,” he said, “is the one night in all the year ’hen the cattle talks jest like men.”

“Some sais it’s Holly E’en,” ventured the Miller.

“No, it ain’t. It’s Chrisermas,” the Loafer replied emphatically. He leaned back, placed his thumbs in the arm-holes of his waistcoat and glared about the circle in defiance.

The brief silence that followed was broken by the School Teacher.

“Superstition! Mere superstition!”

“That’s what I sais,” cried the Storekeeper. He was leaning over the counter munching a candy lion. “What ’ud a mule talk about ’hen he only had a chancet oncet a year?”

[128]

A thin, meaning smile crept over the Loafer’s face and he bent forward, thrusting his long chin in the direction of the venturesome merchant.

“In my time,” he drawled, “I’ve met some mules pullin’ plows that hed they ben able to talk ’ud ’a’ sayd sensibler things then some ez is engaged in easier an’ more money-makin’ ockypations.”

The Store was usually loath to accord recognition to the Loafer, but this was the season of good-will to all, and it lifted up its voice in one mighty guffaw. Even the Teacher joined in, and the G. A. R. Man slapped his knee and cried, “Good shot!”

The victim hid his burning face in the recesses of the sugar barrel, and under pretense of hunting for the scoop finished the candy toy.

“My father-in-law was a superstitious man and always believed in them fool things,” said the pedagogue. “I never give them any credit myself, for they say that education is as great an enemy to superstition as light is to darkness. In other words, learnin’ illumines a man’s mind and drives out all them black, unholy beliefs that are bred in ignorance.”

He paused to give effect to his words, but the Loafer seized the opportunity, thus unintentionally offered, to remark, “Then it ’ud seem like most men’s brains is like cellars. They is allus some hole or corner in a cellar that ye can’t light lest ye put[129] a special lantern in it, an’ ye hev trouble keepin’ that burnin’.”

“But the brain’s perfectly round,” interposed the Miller, shaking his head sagely.

The Teacher sighed. “It’s no use talking to you men in figures——”

“Go on. Let’s hev figgers,” cried the Storekeeper, eagerly.

The pedagogue leaned back on two legs of his chair and pillowed his head on a cheese box that stood on the counter. After having carefully extinguished the flame in his cigar, blown out the smoke and placed the stump in his pocket, he began:

“While I give no credit to the current superstitions, I cherish a peculiar affection for this old belief that the cattle talk on Christmas Eve. I feel that to it I owe part of my happiness in life, and I’ve had a good deal of it, too, in spite of the hardships I had to endure as a boy. You know my parents died when I was but seventeen year old and left me practically penniless and a charge on the township. So I was bound over to Abraham Buttenberger, who had a fine farm up near West Eden. But for one thing life with him would have gone hard with me, for he was a crotchety old fellow, a bit stingy, and inclined to get the greatest possible amount of work out of a husky lad that was gettin’ no pay but his keep. The one thing I mentioned was Abraham’s dotter[130] Kate. I have seen many weemen in my day, and I can honestly say that I have looked on few such pictures as she was when I first knew her. She was sixteen then——”

“I don’t know ’bout that,” the Loafer interrupted. “Did you uns ever see my Missus ’hen she was sixteen an’——”

“She was sixteen then,” repeated the Teacher, ignoring the remark; “she was sixteen and extremely good lookin’. But most of you have seen her since and it’s no use for me to dwell on that point. As the years went by I got to set a heap of store by Kate and she set a heap of store by me. But we kept it to ourselves till we was twenty. Then we agreed to be married. Our agreement didn’t do any good, for Abraham set his foot down on the scheme. He wasn’t goin’ to have no hirelin’ of his a-merryin’ his dotter. I explained to him how his days was drawin’ to an end; how a time was a-comin’ when the place wouldn’t do him any more good and no more harm ’ud come to him whether his farm-hand was runnin’ it or not; how his dotter would need lookin’ after and all that. His answer was to drive me away with a horse-whip.

“That was in November. For seven weeks I never laid eyes on the girl, for the old man watched her like a hawk. But he tired of that, and one night let her go to literary society meetin’ at Kishikoquillas school. I saw her there and[131] wanted her to elope right on the spot. She said no. It was too sudden. Besides, she wanted her things, for she knew her father would keep them just for spite if she run away without them. So we fixed it up that next............