THE HOUSE OF THE SEVEN SANTAS

For once the weather bureau had scored a good, clean hit. The bull's-eye

was pierced squarely in the middle, and the promised blizzard falling
upon the city at noon held the metropolis completely in its grip.
Everything in the line of public transportation in and out of the town
was tied up so tightly that it did not seem possible that it would ever
be unraveled again. The snow was piling waist high upon the streets, and
the cutting winds played their fantastic pranks with a chill and cruel
persistence.

It was with great difficulty that Dobbleigh made his way into the Grand
Central Railway Station. Like other suburban commuters at Christmas
time, he was heavily laden with bundles of one kind and another. He
fairly oozed packages. They stuck out of the pockets of his heavy
ulster. A half dozen fastened together with a heavy cord he carried in
his right hand, and some were slung about his shoulders, and held there
by means of a leathern strap. The real truth was that Dobbleigh had been
either too busy, or had forgotten the wise resolutions of the autumn,
and had failed to do his Christmas shopping early, with the result that
now, on Christmas Eve, he was returning to the little Dobbleighs with a
veritable Santa Claus' pack, whose contents were designed to delight
their eyes in the early hours of the coming morning.

It was with a great sense of relief that he entered the vast waiting
room of the station, and shook the accumulated snow from his coat, and
removed the infant icicles from his eyes, but his joy was short-lived.
Making his way to the door, he paused to wish the venerable doorman a
Merry Christmas.

"Fierce night, Hawkins," he said, as he readjusted his packages. "I
shall be glad enough to get home."

The old man shook his head dubiously.

"I'm afraid you won't enjoy that luxury to-night, Mr. Dobbleigh," he
said. "We haven't been able to get a train out of here since one
o'clock, and the way things look now there won't be any business at this
stand for twenty-four hours, even if we have luck."

"What's that?" returned Dobbleigh. "You don't mean to say--"

"No trains out to-night, sir," said the doorman. "The line's out of
commission from here to Buffalo, anyhow, and nobody knows what's going
on west of there. The wires are down, and we're completely shut off from
the world."

Dobbleigh gave a long, low whistle.

"By Jove, Hawkins," he muttered ruefully. "That's tough."

"Kind o' hard on the kiddies, eh?" said the old doorman sympathetically.

"Mighty hard," said Dobbleigh, with a catch in his voice. "No chance of
anything--not even a freight?" he went on anxiously.

"Couldn't pull a feather through with thirty locomotives," was the
disheartening response. "I guess it's the hotel for yours to-night,
sir."

Dobbleigh turned away, and pondered deeply for a few moments. Taking
care of himself for the night was not, under the circumstances, a very
difficult proposition, for his club was not far away, so that he was not
confronted with the uncomfortable prospect of sleeping on the benches
of the railway station, but the idea of the little Dobbleighs not
finding their treasures awaiting them on the morrow, to say nothing of
the anxiety of Mrs. Dobbleigh over his non-arrival, was, to say the
least, disconcerting.

"Oh, well," he said philosophically, after going over the pros and cons
of the situation carefully, "what's the use of worrying? What must be
must be, and I'll have to make the best of it."

He buttoned his heavy coat up snugly about his neck, and, seizing his
bundles with a firmer grip, wished the old doorman a good night, and
went out again into the storm. Fifteen minutes later, looking more like
a snowman than an ordinary human being, he entered the club, and, if it
be true that misery finds comfort in company, he was not doomed to go
without consolation. There were five other fellow-sufferers there trying
to make the best of it.

"Hello, Dobby," cried his friend and neighbor, Grantham. "What's
happened to you--an eighteen-karat family man spending his Christmas Eve
at a club? Shame on you!"

"I am duly repentant, Gran," replied Dobbleigh, "but you see, as your
neighbor, I felt it my duty to keep an eye on you this night. There are
hobgoblins in the air. Why are you not at home in the bosom of your
family yourself?"

"The walking is too bad," said Grantham. "And, besides, that confounded
valet of mine forgot to put my snowshoes in my suit-case."

"They say the river is frozen solid all the way up," put in Billie
Ricketts, who is a good deal of a wag, as all old bachelors are apt to
be. "Why don't you fellows skate home?"

"I tried it," smiled Grantham, "but the wind is blowing down the river,
and I live up. I hadn't been going more than two hours when I landed on
Staten Island."

In this way the exiles strove to comfort each other, and on the surface
succeeded, but inwardly a very miserable lot they were. Clubs have their
attractions, but we have not yet succeeded in developing an institution
of that kind which is a fair substitute for the home fireside on a
Christmas Eve. Even the most confirmed old bachelor will confess to you
that, way down deep in his heart, the comforts of such organizations
seem cheerless and cold in contrast to the visions of smiling
hearthstones and merry gatherings of happy children, that come to them
in their dreams.

"You've got some bundle there, Dobby," said Grantham, as Dobbleigh
relieved himself of his burden of packages. "What are you going to do,
open a department store?"

"Huh!" ejaculated Ricketts. "You're a fine fellow to talk. Ought to have
seen Gran when he staggered in here an hour ago, Dobby. I thought at
first he was a branch office of the American Express Company--honest I
did. Talk about your bundle trust--Gran had the market cornered."

"Well, why shouldn't I have?" demanded Grantham. "Haven't I got five of
the finest kids that ever climbed a Christmas tree?"

"Nope," said Dobbleigh, with an air of conviction. "Your five are
dandies, Gran, but you ought to see my six."

"I've seen 'em," said Grantham, "and I'll give every blessed one of 'em
honorable mention as high-steppers and thoroughbreds, but when it comes
to the real thing--well, my five are blue-ribbon kids all right, all
right."

"How you fathers do brag about little things!" snorted Ricketts. "You
two braggarts can roll your eleven into one, and the aggregate wouldn't
be a marker to what my children would be if I had any. I've half a mind
to give up my state of single blessedness, just to show you vainglorious
chaps what--"

Just what Ricketts was going to show the assembled gathering the world
will never be able to do more than guess, for he was not permitted to
finish the sentence. It was at this precise point that Doctor Mallerby,
shedding snow from his broad, burly figure at every step, staggered into
the room, and, with a scant greeting to his friends, hastened to the
blazing log fire on the club hearth, and kneeling before it, began
unwrapping a bundle of some size that he, too, carried in his arms.

"What on earth have you got there, doctor?" cried Ricketts, craning his
neck over the newcomer's shoulder. "One of these new character dolls?"

"No, Billie, no," said Mallerby, fumbling away at the bundle. "I wish to
Heaven it were. Can't you see, old man--it's the real thing!"

"The real what?" said Ricketts, bending lower.

"The real thing," returned Mallerby, in a low voice. "A poor little tot
of a newsboy--"

"Where on earth did you pick him up?" gasped Ricketts, as the others
gathered around.

"Out of the storm," said Mallerby. "I found him huddled up in the
vestibule of Colonel Mortimer's when I came out of the house ten minutes
ago. The poor little devil was curled up almost into a knot, trying to
keep warm, and lay there fast asleep, with his papers under his arm. I
honestly believe that if I hadn't come out when I did it would have been
too late. This is a fierce storm."

"He isn't--he isn't frozen, is he?" faltered Dobbleigh, as he gazed into
the blue little face of the unconscious urchin, a face grimy with the
frequent mixture of two dirty little fists and his tears.

"Not quite," said Mallerby. "I think I got him in time, and he'll pull
through, but he had a mighty close call of it. By George, boys, just
think of a wee bit of a tot like that, barely more than six years old,
having to be out on a night like this! Why, the poor little cuss ought
to be dreaming of Santa Claus in a nice warm bed somewhere, instead of
picking pennies out of these arctic streets of ours, in order to keep
body and soul together."

Warmed by the glow of the fire, the youngster stirred as the doctor
spoke, and a weary little voice, scarce higher than a whisper, broke the
stillness of the room:

"Extree! Bigges' blizzid in twenty years. Extree! Piper, sir?"

The seven sophisticated men of the world, gathered about the prostrate
figure, stood silent, and three of them turned away, lest the others
should see the unmanly moisture of their eyes.

"Here, by thunder!" gasped Ricketts, pulling a roll of bills from his
pocket. "Hanged if I won't buy the whole edition."

"That's all right, Billie," smiled the doctor. "What he needs just now
is something less cold than money. We'll take him upstairs, and give him
a warm bath, fill his little stomach up with milk, and put him to bed,
with a nice fuzzy blanket to thaw out his icy little legs."

"Splendid!" said Ricketts. "But, see here, doctor, I want to be in on
this. Isn't there anything I can do to help?"

"Yes," said the doctor. "You might make this proceeding regular by
putting him up as your guest on a ten-day card."

The little bundle of rags and humanity was tenderly carried to the
regions above, and under the almost womanly ministrations of Doctor
Mallerby was completely restored to cleanliness and warmth; what hunger
he might have been conscious of was assuaged by a great bumper of milk,
and then in the most sumptuous apartment the club was able to provide
the thawed-out little gamin was put to bed.

The snowy sheets, the soft, downy pillows, and the soul-warming
blankets, were not needed to lure him into the land of dreams, for the
bitter experiences of the earlier hours of the night still weighed
heavily upon his eyelids, even if his mind and heart were no longer
conscious of them. He presented a most appealing picture as he lay
there, after settling back with a deep-drawn sigh of content into the
kindly embrace of a bed seven or eight sizes too big for him, his little
legs scarcely reaching halfway to the middle, and his tousled head of
red hair forming a rubricated spot on the milk-white pillow-case as it
stuck up out of the bed-clothes, and lay comfortably back in what was
probably the first soft nest it had known since it lay on its mother's
breast--if, indeed, it had ever known that rare felicity.

"There," said the doctor, as the little foundling, with a suspicion of
a smile on his pursed-up lips, wandered more deeply into the land of
Nod. "I guess he's fixed for the night, anyhow, and the rest of us can
go about our business."

The seven men tiptoed softly out of the room, and adjourned to the
spacious chambers below, where for an hour they tried to lose themselves
in the chaos of bridge. They were all fairly expert players at that
noble social obsession, but nobody would have guessed it that night. No
party of beginners ever played quite so atrociously, and yet no partner
was found sufficiently outraged to be acrimonious. The fact was that not
one of them was able to keep his mind on the cards, the thoughts of
every one of them reverting constantly to the wan little figure in that
upper room.

Finally Dobbleigh, after having reneged twice, and trumped his partner's
trick more than once, threw down his cards, and drew away from the table
impatiently.

"It's no use, fellows," he said. "I can't keep my eye on the ball. I'm
going to bed."

"Same here," said Ricketts. "Every blessed face card in this
pack--queen, king, or jack--is a red-headed little newsboy to me, and
every spade is a heart. It's me for Slumberland."

So the party broke up, and within an hour the clubhouse went dark.
Doctor Mallerby assumed possession of a single room adjoining that of
their little guest, so that he might keep an eye upon his newly
acquired patient through the night, and the others distributed
themselves about on the upper floors.

At midnight all was still as a sylvan dell in the depths of a winter's
night, when no sounds of birds, or of rustling leaves, or of babbling
waters break in upon the quiet of the scene.

       *       *       *       *       *

It was three o'clock in the morning when Doctor Mallerby was roused
suddenly from his sleep by the sound of stealthy footsteps in the
adjoining room, where the little sleeper lay. He rose hastily from his
couch, and entered the room, and was much surprised to see, in the dim
light of the hall lamp, no less a person than Dobbleigh, acting rather
suspiciously, too.

"Hullo, what are you up to, Dobby?" he queried, in a low whisper, as he
espied that worthy, clad in a bath robe of too ample proportions,
stealing out of the room.

"Why--nothing, Mallerby, nothing," replied Dobbleigh, evidently much
embarrassed. "I--er--I just thought I'd run down, and see how the little
chap was getting along. I'm something of a father myself, you know."

"What's all this?" continued the doctor, as his eye fell upon a number
of strange-looking objects spread along the foot of the bed, far beyond
the reach of the little toes of the sleeper--a book of rhymes with a
gorgeous red cover; a small tin trumpet, with a pleasing variety of
stops; a box of tin soldiers; and a complete rough-rider's outfit,
sword, cap, leggings, and blouse; not to mention an assortment of other
things well calculated to delight the soul of youth.

"Why," faltered Dobbleigh, his face turning as red as the flag of
anarchy, "you see, I happened to have these things along with me,
Mallerby--for my own kiddies, you know--and it sort of seemed a pity not
to get some use out of them on Christmas morning, and so--Oh, well, you
know, old man."

The hand of the doctor gripped that of the intruder, and he tried to
assure him that he did know, but he couldn't. He choked up, and was
about to turn away when the door began moving slowly upon its hinges
once more, and Grantham entered, quite as much after the fashion of the
stealthy-footed criminal as Dobbleigh. He, too, carried a variety of
packages, and under each arm was a tightly packed golf stocking. He
started back as he saw Dobbleigh and the doctor standing by the bedside,
but it was too late. They had caught him in the act.

"Ah, Grantham," said Dobbleigh, with a grin. "Giving an imitation of a
second-story man, eh? What are you going to do with those two stuffed
clubs? Sandbag somebody?"

"Yes," said Grantham sheepishly. "I've had it in for the doctor for
some time, and I thought I'd sneak down and give him one while he
slept."

"All right, Granny," smiled the doctor. "Just hang your clubs on the
foot of the bed here, and after I've got to sleep again, come in, and
perpetrate the dastardly deed."

"Fact is, boys," said Grantham seriously, "these things I was taking
home to my youngsters are going to waste under the circumstances, and I
had an idea it wouldn't hurt our guest here to wake up just once to a
real Santa Claus feast."

"Fine!" said the doctor. "Looks to me as if this youngster had thrown
doubles. Dobby here has already fitted him out with a complete army,
and various other things, too numerous to mention."

"Why, look who's here!" cried Dobbleigh, interrupting the doctor, as the
door swung open a third time, and Seymour appeared, his raiment
consisting of a blanket and a pair of carpet slippers, causing him in
the dim light to give the impression of an Indian on the warpath. "By
Jove, Tommy," he added, "all you need is a tomahawk in one hand, and a
bunch of wooden cigars in the other, to pass for the puller-in of a
tobacco shop. What are you after, sneaking in here like old Sitting
Bull, at this unholy hour of the morning? After the kid's scalp?"

"Why, you see, Dobby," replied Seymour, revealing a soft, furry cap and
a pair of gloves that looked as if they had just been pulled off the
paws of a bear cub, "I happened to be taking these things home for my
boy Jim--he's daft on skating, and it's cold as the dickens up at
Blairsport--but Jimmie can wait until New Year's for his, I guess. It
came over me all of a sudden, while I was trying to get to sleep
upstairs, that our honored guest might find them useful."

"Look at those chapped little fists," said the doctor. "That's your
answer, Seymour!"

"They're his, all right," said Seymour, sitting on the side of the bed,
and comparing the gloves with the red little hands that lay inert on the
counterpane. "By Jove!" he muttered, as he took one of the diminutive
hands in his own. "They're like sandpaper."

[Illustration: One by one the prisoners of the night dropped in
surreptitiously. _Page_ 155.]

"Selling papers in winter doesn't give these babies exactly the sort of
paddies you'd expect to find on a mollycoddle," said the doctor.

And so, here in the House of the Seven Santas, things went for the next
hour. One by one all the prisoners of the night, with the exception of
Ricketts, dropped in surreptitiously, to find that the ideas of each
were common to them all, and the little mite under the bedclothes was
destined soon to emerge from the riches of his dreams into a reality
even richer and more substantial. The varied gifts were ranged about
the foot of the bed, the golf stockings bulging with sweets were hung at
its head, and the big-hearted donors retired, this time to that real
sleep which comes to him who has had the satisfaction of some kindly
deed to look back upon.

"Poor Ricketts!" sighed the doctor, as he noted the one absentee. "How
much these old bachelors lose at this season of the year!"

       *       *       *       *       *

Two hours later, just as the first rays of the dawn began to light up
the guest room, its small occupant opened his eyes, and began rubbing
them violently with his fists.

"Chee!" was his first utterance, and then he sat up and gazed about
him. His unfamiliar surroundings naturally puzzled him, and a look of
childish wonder came over his face. "Where'm I at?" he muttered. "Guess
diss must be dat Heaven place de guys down to de mission talks about."

He clambered out of bed, and as he did so his eyes took in the wondrous
array of gifts spread before him.

"Well, whad'd'yer know about dat?" he muttered. "What kind of a choint
is diss, anyhow?"

As he attempted to walk across the room his small feet became entangled
in the flowing skirt of Mallerby's bath robe, which he wore in lieu of a
nightshirt.

"Dat's it," he said, as he tripped, and stumbled to the floor. "I'm
dead, dat's what I am--and dese is my anchel clo'es. Chee, but dey's
hard to walk in. Seems to me I'd radder have me pants."

In a moment he had regained his feet, and the marvelous variety of toys
began to reveal themselves in detail to his astounded vision.

"Will yer pipe de layout!" he gasped ecstatically. "Wonder what kid's
goin' to have de luck to draw dem in his socks?"

And just then the door opened again, and a sleepy-eyed old bachelor came
stealing in, in the person of Ricketts. He wore his pajamas, and a
yellow mackintosh thrown over his shoulders.

"Good morning, kiddie," he said, closing the door softly behind him.
"Merry Christmas to you!"

"Merry Chrissmus yerself!" smiled the youngster. "Say, mister, kin yer
tell me where I'm at? Diss ain't like my reg'lar lodgin' house, and I
must ha' got in wrong somehow."

"Where is your regular lodging house?" asked Ricketts, seating himself
on the side of the bed.

"Oh, any old place where dere's room fer me an' me feet at de same
time," replied the boy. "Packin' boxes mostly in de winter-time, and de
docks in de summer."

"But your parents?" demanded Ricketts. "Where are they?"

"Me what?" asked the boy.

"Your parents--your father and mother?" explained Ricketts.

"I ain't never had no mudder," said the boy. "But me fadder--well, me
an' him had a scrap over me wages las' summer, and I ain't seen him
since."

"Your wages, eh?" smiled Ricketts. The idea of this little tad earning
wages struck him as being rather humorous.

"He t'ought I ought to give him de whole wad," said the boy, "and when
he licked me for spendin' a nickel on meself and a fr'en' o' mine las'
Fourth o' July, I give him de skidoo."

"I see," said Ricketts, regarding the little guest with a singular light
in his eye. "You've got a fine lot of stuff here from old Santa Claus,
haven't you?"

"What, me?" asked the boy, gazing earnestly into Ricketts' face. "Is
dese here t'ings for me?"

"Why, of course," said Ricketts. "Old Daddy Santa Claus on his rounds
last night found you occupying a handsome apartment on Fifth Avenue, but
the steam heat had been turned off, and, fearing you might catch cold,
he picked you up and brought you to his own home. He'd been looking for
you all day."

"And dese is--really--_fer me_?" cried the child.

"Every blessed stick and shred of them," said Ricketts fervently.

The boy squatted flat upon the floor, completely staggered by the sudden
revelation of his wealth.

"_Chee!_" was all he could think of to say.

And then began a romp through a veritable toyland, in which two lonely
wanderers through the vales of life had the first taste of joys they had
never known before; the red-headed little son of the streets getting the
first glimpse of kindness that his starved little soul had ever enjoyed;
the confirmed old bachelor finding the only outlet that fate had ever
vouchsafed him for those instincts of fatherhood which are the priceless
heritage of us all.

Small wonder that the play waxed fast, furious, and noisy. The lad, up
to this time confronted ever with the pressing necessities of life,
developed a capacity for play that was all the more intense for the
privations of his limited years; the bachelor finding the dam of his
pent-up feelings loosened into an overwhelming flood of pure joyousness.
There were cries of joy, and shrieks of laughter, and when, with some
difficulty, because of his lack of experience, Ricketts finally
succeeded in getting the lad arrayed in his rough-rider suit, whose
buckles and buttons seemed aggravatingly small for hands that had
developed nothing but thumbs, the tin trumpet, with all the stops save
the one that would silence it even temporarily, was brought into play;
and the battles that were fought in the ensuing hour between a noble
army of warriors, led by the youngster against himself as either a
Spanish army or a wild Indian tribe, have no equals in the annals of
warfare.

The morning was pretty well advanced when the other sleeping Santas were
roused from their dreams by shouts of victory, to be confronted upon
investigation by a prostrate enemy, in the person of Ricketts, lying
face downward upon the floor, with a diminutive rough-rider standing
upon the small of his back, waving a nickel sword in the air, while he
blew ear-splitting blasts upon his trumpet to announce the arrival of
the conqueror.

"Well, well, well!" said Doctor Mallerby, with a loud laugh, as he and
the others burst into the room. "What's going on? Another San Juan
Hill?"

"The same," panted Ricketts, from his coign of disadvantage. "And I'm
the hill. All that remains now is for some of you fellows to hurry up,
and get a bath towel from somewhere, and hoist the flag of truce."

       *       *       *       *       *

The morning passed, and the storm showing some signs of abatement, the
exiled men began to cherish hopes of getting home before night.
Communication with the railway station elicited the gratifying news that
about four o'clock in the afternoon a train would be sent forth to carry
the marooned suburbanites back to the scenes of their domestic desires.

Meanwhile, the honored guest received to the full all the attention of
which the Seven Santas were capable; only in making up for the lost
playtime of the past the guest proved to be untiring, while the Seven
Santas were compelled now and then to work in relays in order to keep up
with the game.

Hence it was that at various hours of the day dignified business men
were to be seen squatting upon the floor, irrespective of that dignity,
running iron cars over tin railway tracks, arranging the serried ranks
of tin soldiers in battle array, answering strident summonses to battle
sounded on that everlasting tin trumpet, and, strange to say, joining
their young friend in feasts of candy and other digestion-destroying
sweets which they had forever eschewed long years before.

"I suppose I'll suffer for this," said Grantham, as at the command of
his superior officer he swallowed the handle of a peppermint walking
stick, after fletcherizing it carefully for several minutes, "but, by
ginger, it's worth it."

"You'll be all right, Gran," laughed the doctor. "If worst comes to the
worst, I'll blow you to a pony of ipecac, unless you prefer squills."

But at last even the strenuous nature of the guest began to show signs
of the day's inroads upon his strength, and when the hour for the
departure of the suburbanites came shortly before four, and they all
gathered around to bid him their adieus, they were hardly surprised to
find him cuddled up on the bearskin rug before the fire, fast asleep,
with his tin trumpet hugged tightly to his breast.

"We're a great lot!" said Dobbleigh suddenly. "We can't all go off, and
leave him here alone. What the dickens are we going to do?"

"Don't bother," said Ricketts, from the depths of the lounge, where he
had been trying for some minutes to get a much-needed rest. "I--I--er--I
haven't anything on hand, boys. Leave him to me. I'll take care of him."

"I move we all meet here to-morrow," said Grantham, "and see what's to
be done with the kid."

Ricketts rose up from the lounge, and started to speak, but he was
interrupted by the doctor.

"Did any of you think to ask the little tad his name?" he inquired.

"That's where I come in, boys," said Ricketts. "You needn't bother your
heads about his name or his to-morrow--I'll take care of both. You men
have provided him with the joys of to-day--pretty substantial joys, too,
as those of us who have helped him to enjoy them can testify. As a
hearthless old bachelor, bundleless and forlorn, I was unable to qualify
on the toy end of things, but when it comes to names, I'll give him one
as my contribution to his Christmas possessions."

"Good for you, Billie!" laughed Dobbleigh. "Would you mind telling us
what it is to be, so that we can put him on our visiting lists?"

"Not in the least," returned Ricketts, with an affectionate glance at
the boy. "He is to be known henceforth as William Ricketts, Junior."

"_William Ricketts, Junior?_" cried the others, almost in one voice.

"Precisely," said Ricketts, turning and facing them. "From now on you
fellows will have to quit putting it all over me because you have
children, and I haven't. I've come into a ready-made family--rather
unexpectedly, but there it is. It's mine, and I'm going to keep it. I've
been without one too long, and after what I have tasted this day I find
that I have acquired a thirst for paternity that can never be cured.
To-morrow I propose to adopt our small guest here formally by due
process of law."

"But where do we come in on this?" cried Grantham. "It's bully of you,
old man, but we can't permit you to shoulder the whole burden of this
boy's--"

"Shut up, Gran!" retorted Ricketts, with an affectation of fine scorn.
"You and the rest of this bunch are nothing but a lot of blooming
uncles. And by the way, gentlemen," he added, with a courtly bow, "I
thank you all from the bottom of my heart for your kindness to my son.
Good night."

And with that, six of the exiles passed out into the twilight, and
hurried back to their own firesides, leaving Ricketts to his own.

And that is why, too, that the club servants, when they came to make
their rounds that night before turning out the lights, were surprised to
find old Billie Ricketts lying fast asleep in the warm embrace of one of
the richly upholstered armchairs of the lounging room, before the
blazing log fire on the hearth, with a mite of a boy curled up in his
lap, his little red head snuggled close to the manly chest of his
protector, and a happy little smile upon his lips, that showed that his
dreams were sweet, and that in those arms he felt himself secure from
the trials of life.

There was that upon the faces of both that gave the watchers pause, and
they refrained from waking them, merely turning out the electric
lights, and tiptoeing softly out of the room, leaving the sleepers
bathed in the mellow glow of the dancing flames.

Two lonely hearts had come into their own in the House of the Seven
Santas!


THE END.