CHAPTER XXI

ANOTHER CHRISTMAS DAY DRAWS NEAR

Once November passes, Christmas seems very near at hand, and, before we know it, the day dearest to all young people, with its plans, its secrets, and its surprises, is with us. But before that day arrived, a great sorrow came to Denise, and she felt that not even Christmas joys could entirely dispel her sadness.

Since early winter Tan had been ailing, and as the weather grew colder and colder, the rheumatism which had caused him so much suffering the previous winter, and which the veterinary had said he feared he could not survive if it attacked him again, made life almost a burden for the dear old pet, and sometimes, when she saw how wretched he was, Denise almost wished that his suffering might be ended forever. But then came the thought of never seeing him again, and his long years of devotion to her; for eight years seem a very great number when one is young. And it really was a great number in Denise’s life; it was two-thirds of all she, herself, had lived.

Tan still had his warm stall in the Birds’ Nest, and John cared for him very tenderly, but it was Denise alone who could soothe him and comfort him when the poor bones ached past endurance. Seated upon some fresh straw in his stall, she would hold the poor weary old head in her lap, rubbing and “pooring” it, and rambling on in the crooning voice she had always used when holding her little love-talks with her pets, and which they all understood and responded to, each in his own particular manner.

December opened with a wild, driving snow, the sort that soon buries everything from sight, and creeps into every crevice. A high wind sent the snow scurrying before it, and the cold penetrated the very marrow of one’s bones.

“I think I’ll stop in the Birds’ Nest the night, sir. The poor old goat can’t hold out through it, I’m afraid, and it sort of goes agin the grain of me fer me to lave him to give up the fight all by himself afther the years I’ve tuck care of him,” said John to Mr. Lombard, when he brought him home from the station that night.

“Is it really so? Poor old Tan! If he is only a goat, he has certainly been a faithful creature, and I’ve known many a human being give less proof of affection and appreciation of kindness than he has given,” replied Mr. Lombard.

“’Tis right ye are, sir, and the way he do be looking for Miss Denise and a listenin’ for her voice would clean break the heart of ye. Faith, he can hear her no matter where she is, I belave, and give his queer blaat av an answer. And the eyes av him whin she comes into the Nest are just fair human.”

“I’ll go right out to the Nest with you,” replied Mr. Lombard, and John drove on through the grounds.

A dim light was burning, shedding its rays upon the occupants of the tiny stalls, and the kittens curled up in their box in the corner of the stable. In the larger stall, well blanketed in his gay plaid blanket, stood Ned Toodles, peeping through the little slot in the door. The other stall did not have a door, and in it, lying upon a thick bed of fresh, clean straw, and swathed almost from head to foot in flannel bandages, lay Tan, no longer able to get upon his feet. As Mr. Lombard stooped down to stroke him he gave his usual friendly blaat, although not in the same vigorous tone.

“Poor old pet,” said Mr. Lombard, “is the story of your devoted life almost told? Your little mistress will grieve long and sorely for you, I fear. No, he cannot last much longer, John, and, perhaps, we should be thankful, for he suffers cruelly. I’ll leave him to your care, for he could not be in better hands.”

“Sure, he is Miss Denise’s, and that’s all that anny wan nade know,” answered John.

Dawn was just breaking when John came up to the house to ask for Miss Denise. The good fellow had spent the entire night ministering to the pet he had cared for for eight years, and, as the night waned, the tender-hearted fellow felt that he could not see him suffer as he was without at least trying to do something more for his comfort. Nothing had soothed him as Denise’s stroking, and John felt that since it could only be for a few hours at most he would call the little mistress.

It was not yet seven o’clock, but Denise and her father hurried into their clothing and hastened to the Nest.

“Poor, dear old Tanny-boy,” called Denise, as she went toward the stall, and a weak, quavering blaat answered her as Tan strove to raise his head. But the head had been raised for the last time. Without a word, but with brimming eyes, Denise sat down upon the straw and lifted the weary head into her lap, crooning over it in the old, familiar way. For hours during that long night John had striven in vain to quiet Tan’s piteous moans by bathing him with hot lotions, but all to no purpose. But who shall say that love may not compass what skill cannot? No sooner did Tan feel that beloved little mistress’s gentle strokes than the moans ceased, and the sigh almost of a tired child testified that so far as human comfort could minister to him and bring relief, he had found it. The snow had ceased falling in the night, and when the sun arose it shone upon a gleaming white world--a world which seemed too beautiful to hold any sorrow. Breakfast-hour came and passed, but Denise did not give it a thought, and neither Mr. nor Mrs. Lombard would disturb her. Mr. Lombard deferred his departure for town, and waited for Denise to end her watch, which he felt sure must end very soon. It was not long past nine o’clock when Tan gave a sudden start, looked up into Denise’s face with the look of loving devotion she had known so long, gave one of the old familiar blaats, and dropped his head upon her lap again, to give one long, weary sigh, and close the great topaz eyes forever.

“I just can’t believe it is so,” said Denise an hour later, when her sobs were subsiding and she was nestling in the arms which never failed her in any sorrow. “I have had him so long that it seems as though I couldn’t get on without seeing him every day. What will be done with him, mamma?”

“Will you leave that entirely to papa and me, darling?” asked Mrs. Lombard, as she stroked back the rumpled locks from the hot forehead.

“Yes; I don’t want to even see him again, for unless I could see him standing as he used to be, and his great eyes looking right at me, I just couldn’t stand it, mamma.”

“Well, try not to think about it any more just now, dear, but have Ned put to the cutter and take me for a drive to the village. I wish to do some errands, and the roads are pretty well broken now. It will do us both good,” and so it happened that all that was left of Tan had passed from sight before Denise and her mother came home, both the happier for the drive in the crisp, keen air.

Denise’s holiday began the week before Christmas, for Miss Meredith lived a long way from Springdale, and three days were required to make her journey home. Then came trips to the city, and one of them resulted in a funny enough addition to the family of pets, for, while passing through one of the streets in the lower part of the city with her father and mother, a forlorn, wretched dog, a tin saucepan tied to its tail, frightened nearly to death, and hotly pursued by a mob of howling, yelling boys, came tearing toward them. Denise was walking a few steps in advance of her father and mother, and, before she could gather herself together to resist the onslaught, the dog, as though he had instinctively recognized in her a protector of his kind and all helpless creatures, had sprung straight at her, knocking her flat upon the sidewalk. With never a thought for self, she instantly clasped her arms around the dirty, miserable beast, and clung to him for dear life and justice. Her father and mother had sprung toward her, as had one or two passers-by, each one feeling sure that they would find the dog’s teeth firmly buried in some part of her.

But that dog had been wise in his choice of a protector, and was also wise enough not to abuse his good fortune.

Now the sight of a handsomely dressed twelve-year-old girl sitting in the middle of the sidewalk and holding in her arms a dirty, forlorn dog with a tin pan securely fastened to the end of his tail, and trembling with fright, is certainly not a common one, and in just one brief little minute about one hundred people of all sorts and conditions, to say nothing of the boys who had been in hot chase after the dog, and a big policeman, who felt that he had, at least, the right to make a few polite inquiries, were surrounding her.

“Denise, my darling!” was all Mrs. Lombard could exclaim, while Mr. Lombard endeavored to get the young lady and her dog upon their own legs. Close at hand was a large wholesale store, where fruits and vegetables of all sorts and kinds were piled in crates and barrels, and just behind some bouncing pumpkins loomed a fat, ruddy face, so like them that it might have been mistaken for one of them.

This animated pumpkin had been standing in the door of the store, and had witnessed the whole scene, and, just as Mr. Lombard got Denise right side up, and the big policeman was shooing off the crowd, he waddled out of his store and, beckoning with one fat, pudgy hand, said:--

“Yow prings dat yung lady und dat dog straightavay into mine store. She vas one fine trump already. Dat dog, he find himself in one great big luck, if he himself know. You git soom mud? Chust so. I take it you all off, and you pretty soon don’t know you got some bimeby.” As he talked, he took hold of Denise’s arm and led her into the store, Mr. and Mrs. Lombard being only too glad to follow and get away from the all-too-curious crowd. Into the store they hurried, and it was not until Denise was put into some sort of shape, and made fit to appear in public once more that they all realized that they had become the owners, willy-nilly, of about as forlorn a specimen of a dog as any one could have thrust upon them. Then arose the question of what in this world to do with him, and it _was_ a poser.