Ho! Ho! Ho! Santa Claus' Reading List
Page 221
* * *
Robert's tongue was seldom idle, even at meals. "Sarah, who is that tall old gentleman at church, in the seat near the pulpit?" he asked. "He wears a cloak like what the Blues wear, only all blue, and is tall enough for a Life-guardsman. He stood when we were kneeling down, and said, Almighty and most merciful Father, louder than anybody."
* * *
Sarah knew who the old gentleman was, and knew also that the children did not know, and that their parents did not see fit to tell them as yet. But she had a passion for telling and hearing news, and would rather gossip with a child than not gossip at all. "Never you mind, Master Robin," she said, nodding sagaciously. "Little boys aren't to know everything."
* * *
"Ah, then, I know you don't know," replied Robert; "if you did, you'd tell."
* * *
"I do," said Sarah.
* * *
"You don't," said Robin.
* * *
"Your ma's forbid you to contradict, Master Robin," said Sarah; "and if you do I shall tell her. I know well enough who the old gentleman is, and perhaps I might tell you, only you'd go straight off and tell again."
* * *
"No, no, I wouldn't!" shouted Robin. "I can keep a secret, indeed I can! Pinch my little finger, and try. Do, do tell me, Sarah, there's a dear Sarah, and then I shall know you know." And he danced round her, catching at her skirts.
* * *
To keep a secret was beyond Sarah's powers.
* * *
"Do let my dress be, Master Robin," she said, "you're ripping out all the gathers, and listen while I whisper. As sure as you're a living boy, that gentleman's your own grandpapa."
* * *
Robin lost his hold on Sarah's dress; his arms fell by his side, and he stood with his brows knit for some minutes, thinking. Then he said, emphatically, "What lies you do tell, Sarah!"
* * *
"Oh, Robin!" cried Nicholas, who had drawn near, his thick curls standing stark with curiosity, "Mamma said 'lies' wasn't a proper word, and you promised not to say it again."
* * *
"I forgot," said Robin, "I didn't mean to break my promise. But she does tell—ahem!—you know what."
* * *
"You wicked boy!" cried the enraged Sarah; "how dare you say such a thing, and everybody in the place knows he's your ma's own pa."
* * *
"I'll go and ask her," said Robin, and he was at the door in a moment; but Sarah, alarmed by the thought of getting into a scrape herself, caught him by the arm.
* * *
"Don't you go, love; it'll only make your ma angry. There; it was all my nonsense."
* * *
"Then it's not true?" said Robin, indignantly. "What did you tell me so for?"
* * *
"It was all my jokes and nonsense," said the unscrupulous Sarah, "But your ma wouldn't like to know I've said such a thing. And Master Robert wouldn't be so mean as to tell tales, would he, love?"
* * *
"I'm not mean," said Robin stoutly; "and I don't tell tales; but you do, and you tell you know what, besides. However, I won't go this time; but I'll tell you what—if you tell tales of me to papa any more, I'll tell him what you said about the old gentleman in the blue cloak." With which parting threat Robin strode off to join his brothers and sisters.
Chapter 5
After Robert left the nursery he strolled out of doors, and, peeping through the gate at the end of the drive, he saw a party of boys going through what looked like a military exercise with sticks and a good deal of stamping; but, instead of mere words of command, they all spoke by turns, as in a play. Not being at all shy, he joined them, and asked so many questions that he soon got to know all about it. They were practicing a Christmas mumming-play, called "The Peace Egg." Why it was called thus they could not tell him, as there was nothing whatever about eggs in it, and so far from being a play of peace, it was made up of a series of battles between certain valiant knights and princes. The rehearsal being over, Robin went with the boys to the sexton's house (he was father to one of the characters called the "King of Egypt") where they showed him the dresses they were to wear. These were made of gay-colored materials, and covered with ribbons, except that of the "Black Prince of Paradine," which was black, as became his title. The boys also showed him the book from which they learned their parts, and which was to be bought at the post-office store.
* * *
"Then are you the mummers who come round at Christmas, and act in people's kitchens, and people give them money, that mamma used to tell us about?" said Robin.
* * *
The boy hesitated a moment and then said, "Well, I suppose we are."
* * *
"And do you go out in the snow from one house to another at night; and oh, don't you enjoy it?" cried Robin.
* * *
"We like it well enough," the lad admitted.
* * *
Robin bought a copy of "The Peace Egg." He was resolved to have a nursery performance, and to take the chief part himself. The others were willing for what he wished, but there were difficulties. In the first place, there are eight characters in the play, and there were only five children. They decided among themselves to leave out the "Fool," and Mamma said that another character was not to be acted by any of them, or indeed mentioned; "the little one who comes in at the end," Robin explained. Mamma had her reasons, and these were always good. She had not been altogether pleased that Robin had bought the play. It was a very old thing, she said, and very queer; not adapted for a child's play. If Mamma thought the parts not quite fit for the children to learn, they found them much too long: so in the end she picked out some bits for each, which they learned easily, and which, with a good deal of fighting, made quite as good a story of it as if they had done the whole. What may have been wanting otherwise was made up for by the dresses, which were charming.
* * *
Robin was St. George, Nicholas the valiant Slasher, Dora the Doctor, and the other two Hector and the King of Egypt. "And now we've no Black Prince!" cried Robin in dismay.
* * *
"Let Darkie be the Black Prince," said Nicholas.
* * *
"When you wave your stick he'll jump for it, and then you can pretend to fight with him."
* * *
"It's not a stick, it's a sword," said Robin.
* * *
"However, Darkie may be the Black Prince."
* * *
"And what's Pax to be?" asked Dora; "for you know he will come if Darkie does, and he'll run in before everybody else too."
* * *
"Then he must be the Fool," said Robin, "and it will do very well, for the Fool comes in before the rest, and Pax can have his red coat on, and the collar with the little bells."
Chapter 6
Robin thought that Christmas would never come. To the Captain and his wife it seemed to come too fast. They had hoped it might bring reconciliation with the old man, but it seemed they had hoped in vain.
* * *
There were times now when the Captain almost regretted the old bachelor's bequest. The familiar scenes of her old home sharpened his wife's grief. To see her father every Sunday in church, with marks of age and infirmity upon him, but with not a look of tenderness for his only child, this tried her sorely.
* * *
"She felt it less abroad," thought the Captain. "A home in which she frets herself to death, is after all, no great boon."
* * *
Christmas Eve came.
* * *
"I'm sure it's quite Christmas enough now," said Robin. "We'll have 'The Peace Egg' to-night."
* * *
So as the Captain and his wife sat sadly over their fire, the door opened, and Pax ran in shaking his bells, and followed by the nursery mummers. The performance was most successful. It was by no means pathetic, and yet, as has been said, the Captain's wife shed tears.
* * *
; "What is the matter, mamma?" said Robert, abruptly dropping his sword and running up to her.
* * *
"Don't tease mamma with questions," said the Captain; "she is not very well, and rather sad. We must all be very kind and good to poor dear mamma;" and the Captain raised his wife's hand to his lips as he spoke. Robin seized the other hand and kissed it tenderly. He was very fond of his mother. At this moment Pax took a little run, and jumped on to mamma's lap, where, sitting facing the company, he opened his black mouth and yawned, with a ludicrous inappropriateness worthy of any clown. It made everybody laugh.
* * *
"And now we'll go and act in the kitchen," said Nicholas.
* * *
"Supper at nine o'clock, remember," shouted the Captain. "And we are going to have real frumenty and Yule cakes, such as mamma used to tell us of when we were abroad."
* * *
"Hurray!" shouted the mummers, and they ran off, Pax leaping from his seat just in time to hustle the Black Prince in the doorway. When the dining-room door was shut, Robert raised his hand, and said "Hush!"
* * *
The mummers pricked their ears, but there was only a distant harsh and scraping sound, as of stones rubbed together.
* * *
"They're cleaning the passages," Robert went on, "and Sarah told me they meant to finish the mistletoe, and have everything cleaned up by supper-time. They don't want us, I know. Look here, we'll go real mumming instead. That will be fun!"
* * *
Nicholas grinned with delight.
* * *
"But will mamma let us?" he enquired.
* * *
"Oh, it will be all right if we're back by supper-time," said Robert, hastily. "Only of course we must take care not to catch cold. Come and help me to get some wraps."
* * *
The old oak chest in which spare shawls, rugs, and coats were kept was soon ransacked, and the mummers' gay dresses hidden by motley wrappers. But no sooner did Darkie and Pax behold the coats, etc., than they at once began to leap and bark, as it was their custom to do when they saw any one dressing to go out. Robin was sorely afraid that this would betray them; but though the Captain and his wife heard the barking they did not guess the cause.
* * *
So the front door being very gently opened and closed, the nursery mummers stole away.
Chapter 7
It was a very fine night. The snow was well-trodden on the drive, so that it did not wet their feet, but on the trees and shrubs it hung soft and white.
* * *
"It's much jollier being out at night than in the daytime," said Robin.
* * *
"Much," responded Nicholas, with intense feeling.
* * *
"We'll go a wassailing next week," said Robin. "I know all about it, and perhaps we shall get a good lot of money, and then we'll buy tin swords with scabbards for next year. I don't like these sticks. Oh, dear, I wish it wasn't so long between one Christmas and another."
* * *
"Where shall we go first?" asked Nicholas, as they turned into the high road.
* * *
"This is the first house," he said. "We'll act here;" and all pressed in as quickly as possible. Once safe within the grounds, they shouldered their sticks, and marched with composure.
* * *
"You're going to the front door," said Nicholas. "Mummers ought to go to the back."
* * *
"We don't know where it is," said Robin, and he rang the front-door bell. There was a pause. Then lights shone, steps were heard, and at last a sound of much unbarring, unbolting, and unlocking. It might have been a prison. Then the door was opened by an elderly, timid-looking woman, who held a tallow candle above her head.
* * *
"Who's there?" she said, "at this time of night."
* * *
"We're Christmas mummers," said Robin, stoutly; "we didn't know the way to the back door, but——"
* * *
"And don't you know better than to come here?" said the woman. "Be off with you, as fast as you can."
* * *
"You're only the servant," said Robin. "Go and ask your master and mistress if they wouldn't like to see us act. We do it very well."
* * *
"You impudent boy, be off with you!" repeated the woman. "Master'd no more let you nor any other such rubbish set foot in this house——"
* * *
"Woman!" shouted a voice close behind her, which made her start as if she had been shot, "who authorizes you to say what your master will or will not do, before you've asked him? The boy is right. You are the servant, and it is not your business to choose for me whom I shall or shall not see."
* * *
"I meant no harm, sir, I'm sure," said the housekeeper; "but I thought you'd never——"
* * *
"My good woman," said her master, "if I had wanted somebody to think for me, you're the last person I should have employed. I hire you to obey orders, not to think."
* * *
"I'm sure, sir," said the housekeeper, whose only form of argument was reiteration, "I never thought you would have seen them——"
* * *
"Then you were wrong," shouted her master. "I will see them. Bring them in."
* * *
He was a tall, gaunt old man, and Robin stared at him for some minutes, wondering where he could have seen somebody very like him. At last he remembered. It was the old gentleman of the blue cloak.
* * *
The children threw off their wraps, the housekeeper helping them, and chattering ceaselessly, from sheer nervousness.
* * *
"Well, to be sure," said she, "their dresses are pretty, too. And they seem quite a better sort of children, they talk quite genteel. I might ha' knowed they weren't like common mummers, but I was so flusterated hearing the bell go so late, and——"
* * *
"Are they ready?" said the old man, who had stood like a ghost in the dim light of the flaring tallow candle, grimly watching the proceedings.
* * *
"Yes, sir. Shall I take them to the kitchen, sir?"
* * *
"——for you and the other idle hussies to gape and grin at? No. Bring them to the library," he snapped, and then stalked off, leading the way.
* * *
The housekeeper accordingly led them to the library, and then withdrew, nearly falling on her face as she left the room by stumbling over Darkie, who slipped in last like a black shadow.
* * *
The old man was seated in a carved oak chair by the fire.
* * *
"I never said the dogs were to come in," he said.
* * *
"But we can't do without them, please," said Robin, boldly. "You see there are eight people in 'The Peace Egg,' and there are only five of us; and so Darkie has to be the Black Prince, and Pax has to be the Fool, and so we have to have them."
* * *
"Five and two make seven," said the old man, with a grim smile; "what do you do for the eighth?"
* * *
"Oh, that's the little one at the end," said Robin, confidently. "Mamma said we weren't to mention him, but I think that's because we're children.—You're grown up, you know, so I'll show you the book, and you can see for yourself," he went on, drawing "The Peace Egg" from his pocket: "there, that's the picture of him, on the last page; black, with horns and a tail."