CHAPTER VI THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS
Dorothy was scolded. There her own family--father, Joe and Roger, to saynothing of dear Aunt Winnie, and the cousins Ned and Nat--were waitingfor her important advice about a lot of Christmas things, and she hadridden off with Dr. Gray, attending to the gloomy task of having a sickchild and her mother placed in a sanitarium.
But she succeeded, and when on the following day she visited Emily andher mother, she found the nurses busy in an outer hall, fixing up theChristmas tree that Mr. Sanders had insisted upon bringing all the wayfrom the farmhouse where Dorothy had left it for little Emily.
The very gifts that Dorothy left unopened out there, when she found thechild sick, the nurses were placing on the tree, waiting to surpriseEmily when she would open her eyes on the real Christmas day.
And there had been added to these a big surprise indeed, for Mr. Wolterswas so pleased with the result of his charity, that he added to thehospital donation a personal check for Mrs. Tripp and her daughter. Thecheck was placed in a tiny feed bag, from which a miniature horse(Emily's pet variety of toy) was to eat his breakfast on Christmasmorning.
Major Dale did not often interfere with his daughter's affairs, but thistime his sister, Mrs. White, had importuned him, declaring that Dorothywould take up charity work altogether if they did not insist upon hertaking her proper position in the social world. It must be admitted thatthe kind old major believed that more pleasure could be gotten out ofDorothy's choice than that of his well-meaning, and fashionable, sister.But Winnie, he reflected, had been a mother to Dorothy for a number ofyears, and women, after all, knew best about such things.
It was only when Dorothy found the major alone in his little den off hissleeping rooms that the loving daughter stole up to the footstool, and,in her own childish way, told him all about it. He listened withpardonable pride, and then told Dorothy that too much charity is bad forthe health of growing girls. The reprimand was so absurd that Dorothyhugged his neck until he reminded her that even the breath of a warveteran has its limitations.
So Emily was left to her surprises, and now, on the afternoon of thenight before Christmas, we find Dorothy and Mabel, with Ned, Nat and Ted,busy with the decorations of the Cedars. Step ladders knocked each otherdown, as the enthusiastic boys tried to shift more than one to exactlythe same spot in the long library. Kitchen chairs toppled over just asDorothy or Mabel jumped to save their slippered feet, and the longstrings of evergreens, with which all hands were struggling, made theroom a thing of terror for Mrs. White and Major Dale.
The scheme was to run the greens in a perfect network across the beamedceiling, not in the usual "chandelier-corner" fashion, but latticed afterthe style of the Spanish serenade legend.
At intervals little red paper bells dangled, and a prettier idea fordecoration could scarcely be conceived. To say that Dorothy had inventedit would not do justice to Mabel, but however that may be, all credit,except stepladder episodes, was accorded the girls.
"Let me hang the big bell," begged Ted, "if there is one thing I havelonged for all my life it was that--to hang a big 'belle'."
He aimed his stepladder for the middle of the room, but Nat held thebell.
"She's my belle," insisted Nat, "and she's not going to be hanged--she'llbe hung first," and he caressed the paper ornament.
"If you boys do not hurry we will never get done," Dorothy reminded them."It's almost dark now."
"Almost, but not quite," teased Ted. "Dorothy, between this and dark,there are more things to happen than would fill a hundred stockings. Bythe way, where do we hang the hose?"
"We don't," she replied. "Stockings are picturesque in a kitchen, butabsurd in such a bower as this."
"Right, Coz," agreed Ned, deliberately sitting down with a wreath ofgreens about his neck. "Cut out the laundry, ma would not pay my littlered chop-suey menu last week, and I may have to wear a kerchief on Yuleday."
"Oh, don't you think that--sweet!" exulted Mabel, making a true lover'sknot of the end of her long rope of green that Nat had succeeded inintertwining with Dorothy's 'cross town line'.
"Delicious," declared Ned, jumping up and placing his arms about herneck.
"Stop," she cried. "I meant the bow."
"Who's running this show, any way?" asked Ted. "Do you see the time,Frats?"
The mantle clock chimed six. Ned and Nat jumped up, and shook themselvesloose from the stickery holly leaves as if they had been so manyfeathers.
"We must eat," declared Ned, dramatically, "for to-morrow we die!"
"We cannot have tea until everything is finished," Dorothy objected. "Doyou think we girls can clean up this room?"
"Call the maids in," Ned advised, foolishly, for the housemaids at theCedars were not expected to clean up after the "festooners."
Dorothy frowned her reply, and continued to gather up the ends ofeverything. Mabel did not desert either, but before the girls realizedit, the boys had run off--to the dining room where a hasty meal, none theless enjoyable, was ready to be eaten.
"What do you suppose they are up to?" Mabel asked.
"There is something going on when they are in such a hurry. What do yousay if we follow them? It is not dark, and they can't be going far,"answered Dorothy.
Mabel gladly agreed, and, a half hour later, the two girls cautiouslymade their way along the white road, almost in the shadow of three jollyyouths. Occasionally they could hear the remarks that the boys made.
"They are going to the wedding!" Dorothy exclaimed. "The seven o'clockwedding at Winter's!"
Mabel did not reply. The boys had turned around, and she clutchedDorothy's arm nervously. Instinctively both girls slowed their pace.
"They did not see us," Dorothy whispered, presently. "But they areturning into Sodden's!"
Sodden's was the home of one of the boys' chums--Gus Sodden by name. Hewas younger than the others, and had the reputation of being the mostreckless chap in North Birchland.
"But," mused Mabel, "the wedding is to be at the haunted house! I shouldbe afraid----"
"Mabel!" Dorothy exclaimed, "you do not mean to say that you believe inghosts!"
"Oh--no," breathed Mabel, "but you know the idea is so creepy."
"That is why," Dorothy said with a light laugh, "we have to creep alongnow. Look at Ned. He must feel our presence near."
The boys now were well along the path to the Sodden home. It was situatedfar down in a grove, to which led a path through the hemlock trees. Thesetrees were heavy with the snow that they seemed to love, for other sortsof foliage had days before shed the fall that had so gently stolen uponthem--like a caress from a white world of love.
"My, it is dark!" demurred Mabel, again.
"Mabel Blake!" accused Dorothy. "I do believe you are a coward!"
It was lonely along the way. Everyone being busy with Christmas at home,left the roads deserted.
"What do you suppose they are going in there for?" Mabel finallywhispered.
"We will have to wait and find out," replied Dorothy. "When one startsout spying on boys she must be prepared for all sorts of surprises."
"Oh, there comes Gus! Look!" Mabel pointed to a figure making tracksthrough the snow along the path.
"And--there are the others. It did not take them long to make up. Theyare--Christmas--Imps. Such make-ups!" Dorothy finished, as she beheld theboys, in something that might have been taken, or mistaken, for straycircus baggage.
Even in their disguise it was easy to recognize the boys. Ned wore akimono--bright red. On his head was the tall sort of cap that clowns andthe old-fashioned school dunce wore. Nat was "cute" in somebody's shortskirt and a shorter jacket. He wore also a worsted cap that was really,in the dim light, almost becoming. Ted matched up Nat, the inferencebeing that they were to be Christmas attendants on Santa Claus.
The girls stepped safely behind the hedge as the procession passed. Theboys seemed too involved in their purpose to talk
.
"Now," said Dorothy, "we may follow. I knew they were up to somethingbig."
"Aren't they too funny!" said Mabel, who had almost giggled disastrouslyas the boys passed. "I thought I would die!"
There was no time to spare now, for the boys were walking very quickly,and it was not so easy for the girls to keep up with them and at the sametime to keep away from them.
Straight they went for what was locally called the "haunted" house. Thiswas a fine old mansion, with big rooms and broad chimneys, which had oncebeen the home of a family of wealth. But there had been a sad tragedythere, and after that it had been said that ghosts held sway at theplace. It had been deserted for two years, but now, with the former ownerdead, a niece of the family, fresh from college, had insisted upon beingmarried there, and the house had been accordingly put into shape for theceremony.
It was to be a fashionable wedding, at the hour of six, and people hadkept the station agent busy all day inquiring how to reach the scene ofthe wedding.
Lights already burned brightly in the rooms, that could be seen to bedecorated in holiday style. People fluttered around and through the longFrench windows; the young folks, boys and girls, being hidden indifferent quarters, could alike see something of what was going on in thehaunted house.
"They're coming!" Dorothy heard Nat exclaim, just as he ducked in by thebig outside chimney. The broad flue was at the extreme end of the house,forming the southern part of the library, just off the wide hall that ranthrough the middle of the place. Dorothy and Mabel had taken refuge inone of the many odd corners of the big, old fashioned porch, which partlyencircled this wing, and commanding a wonderful view of the interior ofthe house, the halls and library, and long, narrow drawing room.
There was a smothered laugh at the corner of the porch where the boys hadducked, and the girls watched in wonder. The latter saw Nat boost Ned upthe side of the porch column, and Ted followed nimbly. In tense silencethe girls listened to their footsteps cross the porch roof, then asscraping and slipping and much suppressed mirth floated down.
"They're going down the chimney!" declared Dorothy, in astonishment.
"They surely are!" affirmed Mabel, leaning far over the porch rail.
"But, Doro, what of the fire?"
"They don't use that chimney. They use the one on the other side of thehouse, and the one in the kitchen."