One evening, in the early part of December, the children hurried through their supper of bread and butter and milk, and ran to Harbert’s house. Aunt Crissy was there, and her fat face and white teeth shone in the firelight as she sat smiling at the youngsters.
“I done got Chris’mas in my bones,” she was saying, as Wattie and Willie entered.
“Well, I ain’t g wine ter say dat,” said Har-bert, “kaze I’m dat ole dat I ain’t got no roo-mance in my bones fer nothin’ ’tall, ’ceppin’ ’tis de rheumatism; yit dat don’t hender Chris’mas, an’ I ain’t makin’ no deniance but what hit’s in de a’r.”
“Now you er talkin’,” exclaimed Aunt Crissy, with unction. “You mos’ sholy is.”
There was a little pause, and then Harbert cried out:
“In de name er goodness, des lissen at dat!”
What was it? The wind, rising and falling, ebbing and flowing like the great waves of the sea, whistled under the eaves, and sighed mournfully over the chimney. But it was not the wind that Harbert heard. There was a sharp rattling on the shingles and a swift pattering at the windows. Harbert and Aunt Crissy looked at each other and then at the children.
“What is it?” asked Wattie, drawing a little closer to Harbert.
“Pshaw! I know what it is,” said Willie, “it’s sleet.” Harbert shook his head gravely as he gazed in the fire.
“It mought be,” he said, “an’ den agin it moughtn’t. It mought be ole Sandy Claus sorter skirmishin’ roun’ an’ feelin’ his way.”