University of Virginia Library

5. THIS IS CHRISTMAS

For half a minute, as it seemed afterwards, no one spoke. Then Matty flew to her mother, and flung her arms around her neck, and kissed her again and again.

Tom hardly knew what he was doing; but he recovered self-command enough to know that he must try to be manly and businesslike, — and so he rushed downstairs to find the man who brought the note. It proved to be a man he did not know. Not a messenger from the bureau, not one from

the Navy Department, least of all, an aid of the Assistant Marshal's. He was an innocent waiter from the Seaton House, who said a gentleman called him and gave him the note, told him to lose no time, and gave him half a dollar for coming. He had asked for an answer, though the gentleman had not told him to do so.

Tom wrote: "Hurrah! All's well! All at home. — T." and gave this note to the man.

They all talked at once, and then they sat still without talking. The children — must it be confessed? — asked all sorts of inopportune questions. At last Tom was even fain to tell the story of the bear himself, by way of silencing the Brick and Laura; and with much correction from Horace, had got the bear well advanced in smelling at the almond-candy and the figs, when a carriage was heard on the street, evidently coming rapidly towards them. It stopped at the door. The bear was forgotten, as all the elders in this free-and-easy family rushed out of the parlor into the hall.

Papa was there, and was as happy as they. With papa, or just behind him, came in the man with the rough coat, whose face at church had been so dirty, whose face now was clean. To think that papa should have brought the Deputy-Marshal with him! For by the name of "the Deputy-Marshal" had this mysterious stranger been spoken of in private by the two young men since the fatal theory had been advanced that he had come into the church to arrest Mr. Molyneux.

The unknown, with great tact, managed to keep in the background, while Mrs. Molyneux kissed her husband, and while Matty kissed him, and while among them they pulled off his coat. But Mr. Molyneux did not forget. He made a chance in a moment for saying, "You must speak to our friend who has brought me here; no one was ever so welcome at a Christmas dinner. Mr. Kuypers, my dear, Mr. Kuypers, Matty dear; these are my boys, Mr. Kuypers."

Then the ladies welcomed the stranger, and the boys shook hands with him. Mr. Molyneux added, what hardly any one understood: "It is not every friend that travels two thousand miles to jog a friend's memory."

And they all huddled into the parlor. But in a moment more, Mrs. Molyneux had invited Mr. Kuypers to go upstairs to wash himself, and he, with good feeling, which he showed all the evening, gladly took himself out of the way, and so, as Tom returned from showing him to his room, the parlor was filled with "those God made there," as the little boy used to say, and with none beside.

"Now tell us all about it, dear papa," cried Tom.

"I was trying to tell your mother. But there is not much to tell. Poor Mr. Kuypers had travelled all the way from Colorado, the minute he heard I was in trouble. Yesterday he bought the `Scorpion' in the train, and found the Committee was down on us. He drove here from the station as soon as the train came in. He missed you here, and drove

by mistake to Trinity. That made him late with us, and so, as the service had begun, he waited till it was done."

"Well!" said Bev, perhaps a little impatiently.

"But so soon as we were going out he touched me, and said he had come to find me, in the matter of the Rio Grande vouchers. Do you know, Eliza, I can afford to laugh at it now, but at the moment I thought he was a deputy of the Sergeant-at-Arms?"

"There!" screamed Tom, "I said he was a deputy-marshal!"

"I said, `Certainly;' and I laughed, and said they seemed to interest all my friends. Then he said, `Then you have them? If I had known that, I would have spared my journey.' This threw me off guard, and I said I supposed I had them, but I could not find them. And he said eagerly — this was just on the church steps — `But I can.'

"Then he said he had a carriage waiting, and he bade me jump in.

"So soon as we were in the carriage he explained, what I ought to have remembered, but could not then recollect for the life of me, that after General Trebou returned from Texas, there was a Court of Inquiry, and that there was some question about these very supplies, the beans and the coffee particularly; they had nothing to do with the landing nor with the Mexicans. And the Court of Inquiry sent over one day from the War Department, where they were sitting, to our office for an account, because we were said to have it.

Mr. Kuypers was their messenger to us, and because we had bound them all together, the whole file was sent as it was. He took them, and as it happened, he looked them over, and what was better, he remembered them. Where our receipt is, Heaven knows!

"Well, that Court of Inquiry was endless, as those army inquiries always are. Mr. Kuypers was in attendance all the time. He says he never shall forget it, if other people do.

"So, as soon as he saw that we were in trouble at the bureau — that I was in trouble, I mean," said Mr. Molyneux, stoutly, "he knew that he knew what nobody else knew, — that the vouchers were in the papers of that Court of Inquiry."

"And he came all the way to tell? What a good fellow!"

"Yes, he came on purpose. He says he could not help coming. He says he made two or three telegrams; but every time he tried to telegraph, he felt as if he were shirking. And I believe he was right. I believe we should never have pulled through without him. `Personal presence moves the world,' as Eli Thayer used to say."

"And you found them?" asked Mrs. Molyneux, faintly essaying to get back to the story.

"Oh Yes, we found them; but not in one minute. You see, first of all, I had to go to the chief clerk at the War Department and get the department opened on a holiday. Then we had no end of clerks to disturb at their Christmas dinners, and at

last we found a good fellow named Breen who was willing to take hold with Mr. Kuypers. And Mr. Kuypers himself," here he dropped his voice, "why, we have not three men in all the departments who know the history of this government or the system of its records as he does.

"Once in the office, he went to work like a master. Breen was amazed. Why! We found those documents in less than half an hour!

"Then I sent Breen with a note to the Secretary. He was good as gold; came down in his own carriage, congratulated me as heartily — well almost as heartily as you do, Tom — and took us both round, with the files, to Mr. McDermot, the Chairman of the House Committee. He was dining with his mess, at the Seaton House, but we called him out, and I declare, I believe he was as much pleased as we were.

"I only stopped to make him give me a receipt for the papers, because they all said it was idle to take copies, and here we are!"

On the hush that followed, the Brick made his way up on his father's knee and said, —

"And now, papa, will you tell us the story of the bear? Tom does not tell it very well."

They all laughed, — they could afford to laugh now; and Mr. Molyneux was just beginning upon the story of the bear, when Mr. Kuypers reappeared. He had in this short time revised his toilet, and looked, Mr. Molyneux said in an aside, like the angel of light that he was. "Bears!" said

he, "are there any bears in Washington? Why, it was only last Monday that I killed a bear, and I ate him on Tuesday."

"Did you eat him all?" asked the Brick, whose reverence for Mr. Kuypers was much more increased by this story than by any of the unintelligible conversation which had gone before. But just as Mr. Kuypers began on the story of the bear, Chloe appeared with beaming face, and announced that dinner was ready.

That dinner, which this morning every one who had any sense had so dreaded, and which now seemed a festival indeed!

Well! there was great pretence in fun and form in marshalling. And Mr. Kuypers gave his arm to Matty, and Horace his to Laura, and Beverly his to Flossy, and Tom brought up the rear with the Brick on his shoulders. And Mr. Molyneux returned thanks and asked a blessing all together. And then they fell to, on the turkey and on the chicken pie. And they tried to talk about Colorado and mining; about Gold Hill and Hale-and-Norcross, and Uncle Sam and Overman and Yellow Jacket. But in spite of them all, the talk would drift back to Bundy and his various signs, "Our House" and Tom and Jerry; to the wife of Mr. Whilthaugh; to Commodore Benbow; to old Mrs. Gilbert and Delaware Avenue. And this was really quite as much the fault of Mr. Kuypers as it was of any of the Molyneux family. He seemed as much one of them as did Tom himself. This anec

dote of failure and that of success kept cropping out. Walsingham's high-bred and dignified enthusiasm for the triumph of the office, and the satisfaction that Eben Ricketts would feel when he was told that the Navy never had the vouchers, — all were commented on. Then Mr. Molyneux would start and say, "We are talking shop again. You say the autumn has been mild in the mountains;" and then in two minutes they would be on the trail of "Search and Look" again.

It was in one of these false starts that Mr. Kuypers explained why he came, which in Horace's mind and perhaps in the minds of the others had been the question most puzzling of all.

"Why," said Horace, bluntly, "had you ever heard of papa before!"

"Had I heard of him? " said Mr. Kuypers. "I think so. Why, my dear boy, your father is my oldest and kindest friend!" At this exclamation even Mrs. Molyneux showed amazement. Tom laid down his fork and looked to see if the man was crazy, and Mr. Molyneux himself was thrown off his balance.

Mr. Kuypers was a well-bred man, but this time he could not conceal his amazement. He laid down knife and fork both, looked up and almost laughed, as he said with wonder, —

"Don't you know who I am?"

"We know you are our good angel to-day," said Mrs. Molyneux, bravely; "and that is enough to know."

"But don't you know why I am here, or what sent me?"

Mr. Molyneux said that he understood very well that his friend wanted to see justice done, and that he had preferred to see to this in person.

"I thought you looked queer," said Mr. Kuypers, frankly; "but still, I did not know I was changed. Why, don't you remember Bruce? You remember Mrs. Chappell, surely."

"Are you Bruce?" cried Mr. Molyneux; and he fairly left his chair and went round the table to the young man. "Why, I can see it now. But then — why, you were a boy, you know, and this black beard — "

"But pray explain, pray explain," cried Tom. "The mysteries increase on us. Who is Mrs. Chappell, and, for that matter, who is Bruce, if his real name be not Kuypers?"

And they all laughed heartily. People got back their self-possession a little, and Mr. Kuypers explained.

"I am Bruce Kuypers," said he, "though your father does not seem to remember the Kuypers part."

"No," said Mr. Molyneux, "I cannot remember the Kuypers part, but the Bruce part I remember very well."

"My mother was Mrs. Kuypers before she married Mr. Chappell, and Mr. Chappell died when my brother Ben was six years old, and little Lizzy was a baby."

"Lizzy was my godchild," said Mrs. Molyneux, who now remembered everything.

"Certainly she was, Mrs. Molyneux, and last month Lizzy was married to as good a fellow as ever presided over the melting of ingots. We marry them earlier at the West than you do here."

"Where Lizzie would have been," he said more gravely, addressing Tom again, "where my mother would have been, or where I should have been but for your father and mother here, it would be hard to tell. And all to-day I have taken it for granted that to him, as to me, this has been one part of that old Christmas! Surely you remember?" he turned to Mrs. Molyneux.

Yes, Mrs. Molyneux did remember, but her eyes were all running over with tears and she did not say so.

"Mr. Molyneux," said Bruce Kuypers, again addressing Tom, "seventeen years ago this blessed day, there was a Christmas morning in the poor old tenement above Massachusetts Avenue such as you never saw, and such as I hope you never may see.

"There was fire in the stove because your father had sent the coal. There was oatmeal mush on the table because your father paid my mother's scot at your father's grocer.

"But there was not much jollity in that house, and there were no Christmas presents, but what your mother had sent to Bruce and Ben and Flora, and even to the baby. Still we kept up such

courage as we could. It was a terribly cold day, and there was a wet storm.

"All of a sudden a carriage stopped at the door, and in came your father here. He came to say that that day's mail had brought a letter from Dr. Wilder of the navy, conveying the full certificate that William Chappell's death was caused by exposure in the service. That certificate was what my mother needed for her pension. She never could get it, but your father here had sifted and worried and worked. The `Macedonian' arrived Thursday at New York, and had Dr. Wilder on board, and Friday afternoon your father had Wilder's letter, and he left his own Christmas dinner to make light my mother's and mine. That was not all. Your father, as he came, had stopped to see Mr. Birdsall, who was the Speaker of the House. He had seen the Speaker before, and had said kind things about me. And that day the Speaker told him to tell me to come and see him at his room at the Capitol next day. Oh! how my mother dressed me up! Was there ever such a page seen before! What with your father's kind words and my dear mother's extra buttons, the Speaker made me his own page the next day, and there I served for four years. It was then that I was big enough to go into the War Department, and Mr. Goodsell — he was the next Speaker, if you remember — recommended me there.

"After that," said Bruce Kuypers, modestly, if I did not see you so often, but I used to see

you sometimes, and I did not think" — this with a roguish twinkling of the eye — "that you forgot your young friends so soon."

"I remember you," said Tom. "I used to think you were the grandest man in Washington. You gave me the first ride on a sled I ever had, when there was some exceptional fall of snow."

"I think we all remember Mr. Kuypers now," said Matty, and she laughed while she blushed; "he always bought things for our stockings. I have a Noah's Ark upstairs now, that he gave me. In my youngest days I had a queer mixture of the name Bruce and the name Santa Claus. I believe I thought Santa Claus' name was Nicholas Bruce. I am sure I did not know that Mr. Bruce had any other name."

"If you had said you were Mr. Chappell," said Mr. Molyneux, "I should have known you in a minute."

"But I was not," said the young man, laughing.

"Well, if you had said you were `Bruce,' I should have known."

"Dear me, yes; but I have been a man so long, and at Gem City nobody calls me Bruce, but my mother and Lizzy. So I said `Mr. Kuypers,' forgetting that I had ever been a boy. But now I am in Washington again, I shall remember that things change here very fast in ten years. And yet not so fast as they change at the mines."

And now everybody was at ease. How well Mrs. Molyneux recalled to herself what she would

not speak of that Christmas Day of which Mr. Kuypers told his story! It was in their young married life. She had her father and mother to dine with her, and the event was really a trial in her young experience. And then, just as the old folks were expected, her husband came dashing in and had asked her to put dinner a little later because he had had this good news for the poor Widow Chappell, and she had to tell her father and mother, when they came, that they must all wait for his return.

The Widow Chappell was one of those waifs who seem attracted to Washington by some fatal law. It had been two or three months before that Mr. Molyneux had been asked to hunt her up and help her. A letter had come, asking him to do this, from Mrs. Fales, in Roxbury, and Mrs. Fales had sent money for the Chappells. But the money had gone in back rent, and shoes, and the rest, and the wolf was very near the Chappells' door, when the telegraph announced the "Macedonian." Mr. Molyneux had telegraphed instanter to this Dr. Wilder. Dr. Wilder had some sense of Christmas promptness. He remembered poor Chappell perfectly, and mailed that night a thorough certificate. This certificate it was which Mr. Molyneux had carried to the poor old tenement of Massachusetts Avenue, and this had made happy that Christmas Day — and this.

"Why," said Mr. Bruce Kuypers, almost as if he were speaking aloud, " it seems so queer that

Christmas comes and goes with you, and you have forgotten all about that stormy day, and your ride to Mrs. Chappell's!

"Why, at our place, we drink Mr. Molyneux's health every Christmas Day, and I am afraid the little ones used to think that you had a red nose, a gray beard, and came down the chimney!"

"As, at another place," said Matty, "they thought of Mr. Bruce — of Noah's Ark memory."

"Anyway," said Mr. Molyneux, "any crumbs of comfort we scattered that day were BREAD UPON THE WATERS."

Of Mr. Kuypers's quick journey the main points have been told. Six days before, by some good luck, which could hardly have been expected, the "Gem City Medium's" despatch from Washington was full enough to be intelligible. It was headed, "ANOTHER SWINDLER NAILED." It said that Mr. Molyneux, of the Internal Improvement office, had feathered his nest with $500,000{sic} during the war, in a pretended expedition to the Rio Grande. It had now been discovered that there never was any such expedition, and the correspondent of the Associated Press hoped that justice would be done.

The moment Bruce Kuypers read this he was anxious. Before an hour passed he had determined to cross to the Pacific train eastward. Before night he was in a sleeping-car. Day by day as he met Eastern papers, he searched for news of the investigation. Day by day he met it, but thanks to his promptness he had arrived in time.

It was pathetic to hear him describe his anxiety from point to point, and they were all hushed to silence when he told how glad he was when he found he should certainly appear on Christmas Day.

After the dinner, another procession, not wholly unlike the rabble rout of the morning, moved from the dining-room to the great front parlor, where the tree was lighted, and parcels of gray and white and brown lay round on mantel, on piano, on chairs, on tables, and on the floor.

No; this tale is too long already. We will not tell what all the presents were to all the ten, — to Venty, Chloe, Diana, and all of their color. Only let it tell that all the ten had presents. To Mr. Kuypers's surprise, and to every one's surprise, indeed, there were careful presents for him as for the rest, but it must be confessed that Horace and Laura had spelled Chipah a little wildly. The truth was that each separate person had feared that he would feel a little left on one side, — he to whom so much was due on that day. And each person, severally, down to the Brick himself, had gone secretly, without consulting the others, to select from his own possessions something very dear, and had wrapped it up and marked it for the stranger. When Mr. Kuypers opened a pretty paper, to find Matty's own illustrated Browning, he was touched indeed. When in a rough brown paper he found the Brick's jack-knife labelled "FOR THE MAN," the tears stood in his eyes.

The next day the "Evening Lantern" contained this editorial article: —

"The absurd fiasco regarding the accounts of Mr. Molyneux, which has occupied the correspondents of the periodical press for some days, and has even been adverted to in New York journals claiming the title of metropolitan, came to a fit end at the Capitol yesterday. The wiseacre owls who started it did not see fit to put in an appearance before the committee. Mr. Molyneux himself sent to the Chairman a most interesting volume of manuscript, which is, indeed, a valuable historical memorial of times that tried men's souls. The committee and other gentlemen present examined this curious record with great interest. Not to speak of the minor details, an autograph letter of the lamented Gen. Trebou gives full credit to the Bureau of Internal Improvement for the skill with which they executed the commission given them in a department quite out of their line. Our brethren of the `Argus' will be pleased to know that every grain of oats and every spear of straw paid for by, the now famous $47,000, are accounted for in detail. The authenticated signatures of the somewhat celebrated Camara and Gazza and the mythical Captain Cole appear. Very valuable letters, throwing interesting light on our relations with the Government of Mexico, from the pens of the lamented Adams and Prigg, show what were the services of those Spanish turncoats and their allies.

"We cannot say that we regret the attention which has thus been given to a very important piece of history, too long neglected in the rush of more petty affairs.

We take the occasion, however, to enter our protest once more against this preposterous system of `Resolutions,' in which, as it were in echo to every niaiserie of every hired pen in the country, the House degrades itself to the work of the common scavenger, orders at immense expense an investigation into some subject where all well informed persons are fully advised, and at a cost of the national treasure, etc., etc., etc. to the end of that chapter.'"

But I fear no one at the Molyneux mansion had "the lantern." They had "found a man," and did not need a lantern to look farther.

It was as Mr. Molyneux had said: he had cast his Bread upon the Waters, and he had found it after many days.