“Please don’t speak of leaving us just yet, Brother,” said Dick’s mother. “All of us I am sure would miss your cheery ways very much. Father has seemed so happy with you for company, and I began to believe he was getting younger every day of your stay. And you said you had no other home.”
“But my dear sister, every little counts now with you, and I am unable to work any longer, much as I should like to buckle to,” remonstrated Uncle Silas, just as though he meant every word he said.
“Oh! but what you eat does not matter much,” she told him, affectionately, as she laid a loving hand on the wanderer’s arm. “Stay with us a little longer, Silas, and perhaps the skies will brighten. I seem to have faith that the tide must turn soon now; and we have been a happy family together, you know.”
Uncle Silas was affected even to tears, and he turned aside as though ashamed of giving way to a weakness. Leslie saw this, but being of a skeptical turn of mind, especially in connection with everything that concerned the wanderer, he rubbed his chin in his odd way, and muttered to himself:
“His eyes looked watery, all right; but mebbe after all they were crocodile tears. Some people can make themselves cry even on the stage. But I wonder what the old fellow’s game can be? One thing sure, I bet you he doesn’t mean to skip out of the comfy nest he’s struck after all his wanderings.”
Indeed, Uncle Silas was soon exerting himself to raise the drooping spirits of the others, and even began to joke in a way he had never done before.
“Why should we allow ourselves to mope, and feel badly when tomorrow morning will be Christmas,” he told them several times. “Something may happen to make this old world look brighter to our eyes. You know what you read in the lesson, Grandpop—‘weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.’ Let’s hope so, anyway.”
CHAPTER XXVII
WHAT HAPPENED ON CHRISTMAS EVE
As the evening set in Dick felt his gloomy fears increase rather than diminish. It was strange, too, because as a general thing the boy had always been of a cheery disposition, and able to stand up under all manner of ordinary troubles.
He was not thinking of himself at all. What sacrifices the new plan he had in mind entailed did not count in the least. It was mother, and dear old grandpop, Dick was so anxious about. He knew how in times past they had frequently been forced to scrimp and save in order to enjoy a few things they craved; and now it would be harder than ever to make ends meet.