“It’s bad enough having one’s wife buy these things for one, but when it comes to having a salesman sell you over a telephone the style of shirt and collar ‘he always wears himself,’ it is maddening,” began Thaddeus, and then he went on at such an outrageous rate that Bessie became hysterical, and Thaddeus’s conscience would not permit of his going out at all that night, and that was the beginning of the end.
“I’ll fix ’em at Christmas-time,” said Thaddeus.
“You won’t forget them at Christmas, I hope, Thad,” said Bessie, whose forgiving nature would not hear of anything so ungenerous as forgetting the servants during the holidays.
“No,” laughed Thaddeus. “I won’t forget ’em. I’ll give ’em all the very things they like best.”
“Oh, I see,” smiled Bessie. “On the coals-of-fire principle. Well, I shouldn’t wonder but it would work admirably. Perhaps they’ll be so ashamed they’ll do better.”
“Perhaps—if the coals do not burn too deep,” said Thaddeus, with a significant smile.
Christmas Eve arrived, and little Thad’s tree was dressed, the gifts were arranged beneath it, and all seemed in readiness for the dawning of the festal day, when Bessie, taking a mental inventory of the packages and discovering nothing among them for the servants save her own usual contribution of a dress and a pair of gloves for each, turned and said to Thaddeus:
“Where are the hot coals?”
“The what?” asked Thaddeus.
“The coals of fire for the girls and John.”