Two-thirds of the sum required was raised that night. For ten days more the old bell rang on every possible occasion, until it became an accusing voice of conscience to the parish. Prayer-meetings once more began sharp on the hour, and proceeded with old-time vigor. The interest spread until a real revival was in progress before the North Penfield Society were fairly aware of the change. Still the “bell fund” lacked fifty dollars of completion.
On the evening of the twentieth of December, in the midst of a furious storm, a knock was heard at the parsonage, and lo, at the hastily opened door stood Squire Radbourne, powdered with snowflakes, and beaming like a veritable Santa Claus.
“I couldn’t feel easy,” he announced, after he had been relieved of coat and furs, and seated before the blazing fire, “to have next Sunday go by without a new bell on the meeting-house. We must have some good hearty ringing on that morning, sure; it’s the twenty-fifth, you know. So here’s a little Christmas present to the parish—or the Lord, either way you want to put it.”
The crisp fifty-dollar note he laid down before the delighted couple was all that was needed.
Harold made a quick calculation—he had already selected a bell at a foundry a hundred miles away—and sitting down at his desk wrote rapidly.
“I’ll mail your letter,” said the squire. “It’s right on my way—or near enough. Let’s get it off to-night, to save time.”
And away he trudged again, through the deepening drifts and the blur of the white storm.