Hardly had the curtain dropped when tumultuous applause broke forth. Dicky and his brother were called again and again before the curtain. Mr. Marsh hurried down the aisle with two immense bouquets of red roses. This was Harry’s surprise. He had proposed to the messenger boys that they give ten cents apiece to buy these tributes of honor, and they had responded to a boy.
Half an hour later two happy-faced lads, their arms full of be-ribboned bundles, stepped into the snow-packed street. The bundles represented the good will of the various members of their department. They meant that the tired salespeople who had stuck to their posts so faithfully through the bustle and hurry of Christmas had not been so tired as to forget that a merry, gift-laden Christmas is the most important thing in the world to a boy. In each lad’s pocket reposed a two dollar and a half gold piece, the gift of their respective buyers, and as Harry Harding and Teddy Burke trudged home through the sharp wintry air they both agreed that they were truly the luckiest boys under the sun.
“I guess Santa Claus will be around to see you to-night,” was Teddy’s observation, called after Harry as they parted at the corner.
“I shouldn’t be surprised if he called on you, too,” flung back Harry.
Each boy smiled to himself as he sped home on his separate way, glowing with the unselfish ardor of giving.
When Harry Harding opened his eyes the next morning on the light of a perfect Christmas day, the first thing that met his eager gaze was a thick, square, be-ribboned package. It lay on the little table beside his bed, and on the holly-wreathed tag tied to the ribbon was written in Teddy’s unmistakable handwriting, “Merry Christmas from Teddy.” The package contained a set of Kipling’s “Jungle Books,” for which Harry had often sighed. While at almost the same moment Teddy Burke was lovingly caressing a beautiful dark blue sweater which Mrs. Harding’s patient fingers had knitted for her adopted son. And as each youngster admired and gloated over this newest proof of the other’s regard it came to him that after all there was nothing in the world quite so satisfactory as having a real chum.