'As Gold in the Furnace' Part 6

Time crept slowly, as it is apt to do with boys at school. To the St.

Cuthbert boys it seemed as if the year had leaden wings, but at length the week before Christmas arrived. All were now in expectation of coming events. If antic.i.p.ation is half the joy, then most of the boys were taking their Christmas pleasures in advance.

Already the Christmas feeling was in the atmosphere. In various out-of-the-way places were stored bunches of holly and cedar and laurel. At all times of the day when boys where free from lessons, some one or other would be carrying strange wooden devices from place to place. Now one would be seen carrying to some out-of-the-way shed or unused cla.s.sroom, wooden stars or double triangles. Another would partially and often unsuccessfully secrete a knot of clothesline.

There never was such a demand for fine wire or binding twine.

All of which meant the mediate preparation for decorating the chapel, study-hall, refectory, and even to some extent, the gymnasium. It was a pretty fiction among the boys that all the preparations had to be done in secret. It was fiction only, for the real fact was that, in both divisions, everybody was interested and everybody knew exactly what everybody else was doing.

None entered into the work of remotely preparing for Christmas more heartily than Roy Henning and his friends, Bracebridge, Shealey, and Beecham. There is a certain skill required in decorating. To some this proficiency never comes. It is perhaps an innate quality. It had never come to Roy Henning: He was no decorator. He could neither make a wreath of evergreens, nor cover a device with green stuff creditably.

Owing to this defect of at least a certain kind of artistic temperament, Henning was the subject of a good amount of banter from his friends. He took all their teasing good-naturedly, and admitted his utter inability to make or cover designs.

"I have been thinking--ouch!" said Henning. The last word was spontaneous. It came from sudden pain, caused by the sharp point of a holly leaf penetrating his finger, which member he immediately applied to his mouth.

"By my halidom," remarked Shealey, "'tis strange!"

"Don't do it again," laughed Bracebridge, "but learn from experience what an awful and immediate retribution follows upon such a crime.

Hast lost much blood in this encounter?"

"I think each of you fellows has a screw loose," retorted Roy, still sucking his wounded finger. "I am sure Shealey is _non compos mentis_."

"Sane enough to keep holly thorns out of our fingers," retorted Shealey.

"But, fellows, I really have an idea," said Henning.

"Halt! Attention! Stand at ease! Dismiss company!" shouted Beecham with mock gravity, and then with a military salute, he said:

"Now, colonel, I am all attention. What is it?"

"It's this, boys. It wants but five days to Christmas. Between now and the great day all our Christmas boxes will have arrived."

"There's nothing very new in that idea," answered Jack Beecham.

"History, just at this time of the year, has the pleasantest way in the world of repeating itself."

"You'll be accused of having brains, Jack," said Henning, "if you keep on that way. If it is not too great a waste of gray matter, or too violent a cerebration for you, just try to listen to me for a moment."

Jack Beecham fell against the wall, and fanned himself with his handkerchief.

"Poor fellow! Isn't it too bad! and so near the holidays, too," he said. "Does any one know when the first symptoms appeared?" Jack turned to Shealey and Bracebridge. "Hadn't we better call an ambulance at once?"

"You'll need one if you don't stop your nonsense and listen to me,"

said Roy, and he doubled up his great fist. His friends knew Roy's blows, although given only in jest, and having no desire for sore bones for Christmas, they were immediately all attention. Henning laughingly relaxed his muscles and allowed his hands to fall to his sides.

"I thought I could bring you fellows to reason," he remarked.

"We are all attention. Say on, say on," they shouted.

"My idea is this, then. When we get our Christmas boxes, we shall each have much more than we need. Now you know the Little Sisters of the Poor maintain a large number of men and women in their inst.i.tution.

Without any settled income, don't you think it must often be a difficult matter for them to secure enough for the old people to eat and drink?"

"Never thought anything about it. Guess it's true, though; but how does that affect us?"

"Just this way," said Roy. "Let us ask every boy to give something out of his abundance to provide a feast for the old people."

"Capital idea!" shouted Bracebridge. "I do not believe there is a boy who would refuse."

"I agree with you," said Jack.

"But the difficulty is," remarked Ambrose, "that we can not feast old folk on cake and nuts and candy. I suppose this is about all that comes in those boxes."

"You mistake," remarked Roy. "I am sure you will find all sorts of cooked meats--turkeys, chickens, geese, and an unlimited supply of canned meats and delicacies."

Bracebridge was surprised, but then he had not much experience in college Christmas boxes. He was inclined to be slightly incredulous.

This was Ambrose's second year at St. Cuthbert's. As he had spent the previous Christmas at home, owing to the fact that he lived but a few miles from the college, he had not yet seen the college sights of Christmas time.

Had he seen the hundreds of Christmas boxes arrive a few days before the great feast; had he learned that one of the smaller study-halls had to be converted into a temporary boxroom for the holidays; had he seen the contents of an average Christmas box from home, he would have been possessed by no doubt as to the possibility of the boys, presuming they were willing, to supply the inmates of the home for the aged poor with as bounteous a dinner as heart could desire.

The proposal appealed to the fancy of our friends. They went at once to the President to obtain the necessary permission.

"I give you leave willingly," said the head of the college, "and I am pleased to see my boys cultivating a spirit of charity and considerateness for others. It will bring down G.o.d's blessing on you all."

"Father, it wasn't our idea at all," said Jack. "It originated with----"

"We have another permission to ask, Father," interrupted Roy Henning.

"What next?" said the President, smiling.

"We would like to be allowed to go and serve the dinner to the old people some day during the Christmas week."

"Dear me! What would three hundred and fifty boys do there?"

"I don't mean everybody, Father."

"Whom, then?"

"Just enough to serve all their tables."

"How many inmates are there in the Home?" asked the Father.

"About two hundred, I believe," replied Beecham.

"Very well, Henning; you may select two dozen boys to go with you."

"Thank you, Father. When may the feast take place?"

"Christmas day falls on Monday this year. Suppose you arrange matters for Wednesday. But Wednesday night there is to be the Seniors' play, isn't there?"

"Yes, Father," said Bracebridge, "but I do not think that will interfere. We can have the last rehearsal in the morning, if necessary, or we can be back by three o'clock in the afternoon."