After a while William roused himself and fed his chickens and looked once more at the house of John Hartman. There was smoke rising from the chimney, and tears came into William's eyes, as though the smoke had drifted across the fields and had blinded him. Suddenly he struck the sharp paling a blow with his hard hand and spoke aloud, not with his usual faltering and mumbling tongue, but clearly and straightforwardly. William had found a help and a defense.
"I will tell him!" cried he. "This day I will tell my son, Alvin!"
All the long, snowy Christmas morning, Alvin sat about the house. He did not read because he had no books, and besides, he did not care much for books. Alvin was a very handsome boy, but he did not have much mind. He did not sing or whistle on this Christmas morning because he was not cheerful; he did not whittle because whittling would have wasted both knife and stick, and his father would have reproved him. He did not walk out because he was not an active boy like David Hartman, and he did not visit because he was not liked in Millerstown. He did not take a boy's part in the games; he was afraid to swim and dive; he whined when he was hurt.
He looked out the window toward the Hartman house with a vague envy of David, who had so much while he had so little. He watched his father's parsimonious preparation of the simple meal—how Grandmother Gaumer and Bevy Schnepp would have exclaimed at a Christmas dinner of butcher's ham!
"Oh, the poor souls!" Grandmother Gaumer would have cried. "I might easily have invited them to us to eat!"
"Where does the money go, then?" Bevy would have demanded. "He surely earns enough to have anyhow a chicken on Christmas! Where does he put his money? No sugar in the coffee! Just potatoes fried in ham fat for vegetables!"
All the long afternoon, also, Alvin sat about the house. He did not think again of the Hartmans; he did not think of Katy Gaumer, who thought so frequently of him; he thought of the red tie and wished that he had money to buy it.
All the long afternoon his father huddled close to the other side of the stove and muttered to himself as though he were preparing whatever he meant to tell Alvin. It must be either a very puzzling or a very long story, or one which required careful rehearsing. When the sun, setting in a clear sky, had touched the top of a mountain far across the plain, he began to speak suddenly, as though he had given to himself the departure of day for a signal. He did not make an elaborate account of the strange events he had to relate; on the contrary, he could hardly have omitted a word and have had his meaning clear. He said little of Alvin's mother; he drew no deductions; he simply told the story.
"Alvin!" cried he, sharply.
Alvin looked up. His head had sunk on his breast; he was at this moment half asleep. He was startled not alone by the tone of his father's voice, but by his father's straightened shoulders, by his piercing glance.