X
A WELL-LAID PLAN
In the Civil War there were over two thousand battles and the details could not be reported in a lifetime. But their result can be stated in a phrase. The same brevity must apply to the campaigns, the stratagems, ballistics and tactics of Mrs. Budlong: numberless efforts at secession ended as a lost cause.
There was one more desperate struggle. While only a few days stood between her and her famous Christmas afternoons, she and her dour husband were having a bitter council of war. She had another attack of inspiration.
"I have it! the very thing! Why haven"t we thought of it before?
Quarantine!"
"Quarantine?" echoed Mr. Budlong as if the word were gibberish.
"Yes. If we had something contagious in the house and a quarantine on, people couldn"t come here with their odious gifts and they would be so afraid to get ours that they"d be much obliged to us for not sending them any."
For the first time in years Mr. Budlong paid Mrs. Budlong a sincere homage:
"You"re a genius. It takes a woman to squirm out of a difficulty after all."
He was so excited he actually kissed her--and he hadn"t finished his evening paper at that!
This overjoyed her so far that she fairly glowed.
"Oh, I"m so glad you approve, Ulie dear. And you"ll help me, won"t you?"
"You bet I will, ducky dove."
"That"s glorious. Now which will you pretend to have, yellow fever or smallpox or--"
"Which will _I_ pretend to have? Do you mean to say that you expect ME to go bed with a fatal disease?"
"It doesn"t have to be fatal, my love. Just so long as it"s contagious, you know."
"Well, of all th--what"s to happen to my business?"
"Why, you can call it a vacation. And you can pretend to get well after Christmas; or you can have the doctor say it wasn"t yellow fever after all."
"But I stay in bed for several days, eh?"
"Oh, you can move round all you want, just so "s"t you don"t go outdoors, and keep away from the windows."
Mr. Budlong"s admiration was reverting to its normal state. He growled:
"You women would be an awful joke, if you were only a little funnier.
If you"re so keen on this quarantine business you quarantine yourself.
You can have yellow fever, or scarlet, or green or any color you like--robin"s egg blue fever for all I care."
"But, my darling, I can"t be having those things! You know I don"t believe in them this year, since I became a--oh, it wouldn"t do at all for Me. But You could have it because You believe in diseases."
"You bet I do, and I believe you"ve got softening of the brain." He paced the floor in an effort to keep up with his temper. Eventually he stopped short. He remembered that his son had failed to help the family out in its distress. He said:
"Let Ulie have something."
XI
GANG AGLEY AGAIN
Mrs. Budlong felt a certain superst.i.tious uneasiness, but was finally won over, and Ulie was unanimously elected the scapegoat--or in more modern form, the goat.
Ulie was in bed at the time sleeping like an innocent cherub and smiling in his sleep. He was dreaming of a great invention: he would set a figure-4 trap near his fireplace and snare Santa Claus by the foot. Then from a safe ambush under the bed, he would a.s.sail the old gentleman with his n.i.g.g.e.r-shooter till he laid him low, whereupon he could rifle the entire pack at his leisure, and select what he wanted. Ulie had not been attending Sabbath School in vain. The lesson of the week concerned David and Goliath.
Prom such dreams as these Ulie woke the next morning to be told that he need not leave his bed. He had scarlet fever and must keep close under his cover.
"Scarlet nothin"!" was Ulie"s reply. "I gotter go to a meetin" of the Youth"s Helpin" Hand Socirety this afternoon and I"ll be darned if I stay in any dog-on bed."
Mr. Budlong finally persuaded him--Ulie wasn"t dressed yet and it hurts worse on the bare hide. Then Mr. Budlong hurried down town to bribe a doctor and borrow a red placard of the board of health. He was just rounding the corner on the way home when he caught sight of Ulie descending from the window by means of a knotted sheet. Ulie had only a nightgown on, and owing to the heavy wind it wasn"t much on.
He dropped to the ground before Mr. Budlong could reach him, then darted away across lots barefooted through the snow towards the Detwillers". Mr. Budlong treed him just before he reached the neighbors. But the boy would not come down till his father promised immunity both from punishment and from scarlet fever.
The Detwillers were arriving on the run, so the father promised, hid the scarlet fever propaganda in his inside pocket, wrapped Ulie in his own overcoat and carried him home. There was so much dread of pneumonia that the guilty parents could not include Ulie in any more schemes. And they could think of no schemes. The day before the Day Before Christmas found them in a panic. The Day Before found them grimly resolved to stand siege.
On the blessed Eve they sat before their cheerless fire-front and stared at the packages that had been pouring in all day long. The old postman had staggered under the final load and hinted so broadly for a Christmas present that he got one--the first breach in their solemn resolve.
They had excepted Ulie, of course, from the embargo. But they had been in such a flurry that they had postponed him till they forgot him entirely. The doorbell was rung so incessantly throughout the evening that the cook sat on the hall stairs to be handy. She piled the packages up on the piano till they spilled off. The piano lamp was gradually sinking beneath the encroaching tide. Presents were brought in wagons, carriages, buggies, carts, by coachmen, gardeners, cooks, maids, messenger boys, and children of all ages and dimensions.
On any other occasion Mrs. Budlong would have been running here and there, peeking into parcels and restraining her curiosity till the next day out of sheer joy in curiosity. Now she opened never a bundle. She could only think of the morrow when all of these donors found that reciprocity had gone down to defeat. The Budlongs avoided each other"s eyes. They were thinking the same thing. The strain endured till it tested their metal to the breaking point. When three enormous packages were brought to the door by the Detwillers" hired man, Mrs. Budlong broke out hysterically:
"I just can"t stand it."
"h.e.l.l!" roared Mr. Budlong. "Get on your hat and coat. We"ll go down and buy everything that"s left in town."
XII
AN AMAZING CHRISTMAS
Holiday bargains in Carthage were not brilliant. After being pawed over for several weeks, they were depressing indeed. When the Budlongs strode into Strouther and Streckfuss"s, it was nearly ten o"clock at night. The sales-wretches, mostly pathetic spinsters of both s.e.xes, were gaunt and jaded. They yawned incessantly and held on to the counters.
Even Messrs. Strouther and Streckfuss had the nap worn off their plushy sleekness. They were surveying the wreckage, and dolefully realizing that some of the Christmas bills would not be paid by the Fourth of July.
When the Budlongs made their irruption, they were not received cordially. Word had gone abroad that the Budlongs were buying all their Christmas presents out of town. They must be, for they bought none in. This treachery to home industry was bitterly resented. Then Budlong galvanized everybody with a cry like a flash of lightning: