The girls cried out in terror, but Mr. Merryweather and Phil shouted with laughter, and ran to the spot.
"Gone to ground!" they cried. "Dig "em out, Phil!" cried the Chief.
"Here"s a foot; give a good pull, now!"
Phil gave a vigorous pull, and was rewarded by a kick which sent him sprawling on his back in the snow. Then, laughing and spluttering, the boys emerged from the drift, rubbing the snow from their eyes, and shaking it from their clothing.
"I say!" cried Jack. "What do you keep in this field, sir? Was it a torpedo, or an electric eel?"
"It"s your uncle"s field, young man!" replied Mr. Merryweather. "I suspect it was nothing more than a rock, however. I thought the hill was all smooth gra.s.s."
"You might try it, sir!" said Gerald. "If there is a sound bone in my body, write me down Hollander. How are you, Ferrers? Anything broken?"
"No, indeed! Lost a b.u.t.ton, and--where is my other mitten? Oh! thank you, Hilda! Did we make a pretty picture, flying through the air?"
"Lovely!" said Hilda. "If I had only had my camera! But I was really frightened. I am hardly sure now that you are not killed, you did go so very hard!"
"The toboggan _is_ killed!" said Gerald, ruefully. "Kindling-wood, poor old thing! Just look at it!" He dragged to light some forlorn remnants, which certainly did not look as if they could be of service again save in some humble capacity.
"Too bad!" said his father. "Fortune of war, my boy! But there is plenty of room for you and Ferrers on the two others. We must see about this stone, and get it out of the way."
Search revealed a big, jagged stone, so fitted into the slope of the hill that the snow had lain smoothly over it; but it had caught the toboggan in mid-flight. It was soon torn from its bed, rolled down the hill, and deposited on the other side of the wall. Then they all climbed the hill again, trying as they went to sing the Tobogganing Song; failing for lack of breath, panting, singing again, and all the while struggling upward, laughing and chattering and pelting each other with the soft snow.
"When the field lies clear in the moon, boy, And the wood hangs dark on the hill, When the long white way shows never a sleigh, And the sound of the bells is still,
"Then hurry, hurry, hurry!
And bring the toboggans along!
A last "Never fear!" to Mother-my-dear, Then off with a shout and a song.
"A-tilt on the billowy slope, boy, Like a boat that bends to the sea, With the heart a-tilt in your breast, boy, And your chin well down on your knee,
"Then over, over, over, As the boat skims over the main, A plunge and a swoop, a gasp and a whoop, And away o"er the glittering plain!
"The boat, and the bird, and the breeze, boy, Which the poet is apt to sing, Are old and slow and clumsy, I know, By us that have never a wing.
"Still onward, onward, onward, Till the brook joins the meadow below, And then with a shout, see us tumbling out, To plunge in the feathery snow.
"Back now by the side of the hedge, boy, Where the roses in summer grow, Where the snow lies deep o"er their winter sleep, Up, up the big hill we go.
"And stumbling, tumbling, stumbling, Hurrah! "tis the top we gain!
Draw breath for a minute before you begin it-- Now over, and over again!"
"How are you, n.o.ble Hetman?" said Hildegarde, finding herself near Gerald, as they gained the top of the hill. "Aren"t you all full of snow, my poors, and very cold and wet?"
""Oh, days of me boyhood, I"m dreamin" of ye now!"" quoted Gerald. "I never thought that my mother"s words would come true in my person:
""Woffsky-poffsky, Woffsky-poffsky, Once he was a Cossack hetman; But he fell into the Dnieper, And became a Cossack wetman."
"And to speak sooth, sweet chuck, there may be a matter of half a bushel of snow--if you measure it by bushels,--it"s a matter of fancy--down my manly back at this moment."
"Oh, Gerald! But do go home, my dear, and change your things! You will get your death of cold, if you go about in this state."
"I"ll move into the adjoining territory at once!" said Gerald. "But calm yourself, angelic being! Consider that in this manner I avoid all danger of sunstroke! Every man his own refrigerator; patent applied for; no Irish need apply."
"What is the use of talking to people like this!" cried Hildegarde.
"Jack, are you as wet as that? Because if you are,--"
"As wet as what?" said Jack. "I am not, anyhow, if you are going to look at me in that way. Just wet enough to cool me off delightfully; very sultry to-day, don"t you think so?"
"Mr. Merryweather," cried Hildegarde. "Will you use your authority, please, and try to get some sense out of these boys? They are both wet through to the skin, and they will not--"
"Wet, are they?" said the Chief, cheerily. "Best thing in the world for "em, my dear! Quicken the circulation, and keep the pores open. Now then, boys and girls, we must pack closer this time. Sit close, Kitty!
Hilda, hold tight, my dear! All ready? Now, one, two, three, and off we go!"
And off they went.
CHAPTER XIV.
BELLEROPHON.
"ALL ready, boys?" asked the Colonel.
"All ready!" responded the boys, namely, Raymond Ferrers, aged sixty, Jack Ferrers, aged twenty, and Hugh Allen, aged nine. Barring more or less difference in height, and a trifle of gray hair in one case, they all appeared of much the same age; nor had the Colonel, evidently, a day the advantage of them. On the contrary, he was the youngest of the four, as he walked round and round the Christmas Tree, poking among the branches, readjusting a string of pop-corn here, or a glittering ornament there. It was their own tree, every twig, every needle of it their own. Not Hildegarde herself, nor her mother, nor any Merryweather, had had a word to say, or knew a single detail about it. They were invited,--they were coming; that was their part; all the rest had belonged to the four boys. Had they not gone in town together, and gone to Schwartz"s, and bought out the greater part of the shop? And had they not spent the greater part of the day (save dinner-time, and church-time, and the hour that Jack had taken for tobogganing) in decorating their plaything, and tying on the presents? Surely, such a tree had never been seen! It glittered from top to toe with icicles; it shone with globes of gold and silver; it was powdered with diamond snow, and hung with golden nuts; silver cobwebs draped it, hanging in long festoons from every bough, while round and round, in graceful festoons, went the long garlands of snowy pop-corn. Now nothing was left to do, save to light the candles; and still the Colonel walked and looked, puffing with pleasure, and still Brother Raymond followed at his heels, and Jack followed Raymond, and Hugh kept close behind Jack. And Elizabeth Beadle, surveying this scene from the depth of the hall, was so moved by it that she retired to the kitchen and wept for a quarter of an hour, for pure joy.
"Sure you have the pail of water handy, Jack?"
"Yes, sir, quite sure! Stepped into it just now."
"Then you had it footy, not handy!" murmured Hugh. His guardian turned, and looked anxiously at the boy.
"Hum, ha!" he said. "Talk a little nonsense, eh, Young Sir? That"s right! Feel quite well this evening, hey?"
Hugh certainly did not look well. His rosy color was gone, and there were dark circles under his blue eyes; but he answered so brightly, and was so full of joy and delightful antic.i.p.ation, that Colonel Ferrers smiled even as he sighed, and turned to his brother.
"Pretty sight, Raymond?" he said, for perhaps the twentieth time.
"Pretty custom, eh? Give you my word, sir, I haven"t enjoyed anything so much for years."
"If you go on at this rate, Tom," rejoined his brother, "you will be in short jackets again in a year or two. After all, what is there in the world so good as youth, my dear fellow? Let us hold it fast, say I, as long as we can!"
"Yes!" growled the Colonel. "But you wouldn"t have said that before you came here, Raymond Ferrers; and I shouldn"t have said it before Hildegarde Grahame came here,--"
"And her mother!" put in Raymond.
"And her mother, of course!" cried the Colonel, testily. "She never thought of coming here without her mother, did she? Don"t be a quibbler, my good fellow! If there is one thing I find it difficult to have Christian patience with, it is a quibbler. I tell you, sir, that before those people came here my life was a stagnant fish-pond, sir; with no fish in it, either, and--and it shows what a young woman can do, sir, when she is willing just to _be_ a young woman, and to minister cheerfulness and joy and--and affection to the people around her. Three years ago I had not a friend in the world,--or thought I had not, which amounts to the same thing,--except a round-shouldered fiddle-maker in another State, whom I never expected to see again. I was morose, sir! I was unfit for human companionship! And now--" the Colonel stopped to wipe his eye-gla.s.ses, and blew his nose portentously--"now I have a son in my own house,--two sons just now, for if you pretend that Jack is more your son than mine, I scoff at you, sir, and I deride you!--and a daughter close by, who will come to me if my little finger aches. And to that daughter, sir,--under Providence," and the Colonel bowed his head and dropped his voice,--"to Hildegarde Grahame, I owe all this, and more. So I say,--"