he wagon. This formidable
obstacle overcome and the Roneys still slumbering peacefully, the rest
was easy. The granary door was pried open and the wheat shovelled
hurriedly in upon the empty floor. Charlie then crept up to the house
and slipped his note under the door.

The sack was lifted from the now empty wagon and opened before the barn,
whereupon its occupant slipped meekly out and retreated at once to a far
corner, seemingly too much incensed at his discourteous treatment even
to fling a volley of farewell barks at his departing captors.

"Vell," remarked Nels, with a sigh of relief as they gained the road,
"Ay tank dose Roneys pelieve en Santa Claus now. Dose peen funny vay fer
Santa Claus to coom."

Charlie's laugh was good to hear. "He didn't exactly come down the
chimney, that's a fact, but it'll do at a pinch. We ought to have told
them to get a present for the dog--collar and chain. I reckon he
wouldn't hardly be thankful for it, though, eh?"

"Ay gass not. Ha liges ta haf hes nights ta hemself."

"Well, we had our fun, anyway. Sort of puts me in mind of old Wisconsin,
somehow."

From far off over the valley, with its dismantled cornfields and
snow-covered haystacks, beyond the ice-bound river, floated slow, and
sonorous, the mellow clanging of church bells. They were ushering in the
Christmas morn.

Overhead the starlit heavens glistened, brooding and mysterious, looking
down with luminous, loving eyes upon these humble sons of men doing a
good deed, from the impulse of simple, generous hearts, as upon that
other Christmas morning, long ago, when the Jewish shepherds, guarding
their flocks by night, read in their shining depths that in Bethlehem of
Judea the Christ-Child was born.

The rising sun was touching the higher hilltops with a faint rush of
crimson the next morning when the back door of the Roney house opened
with a creak, and Mr. Roney, still heavy-eyed with sleep, stumbled out
upon the porch, stretched his arms above his head, yawned, blinked at
the dazzling snow, and then shambled off toward the barn.

As he approached, the dog ran eagerly out, gambolled meekly around his
feet and caressed his boots. The man patted him kindly.

"Hello, old boy! What were you yappin' around so for last night, huh?
Grain-thieves? You needn't worry about them. There ain't nothin' left
for them to steal. No, sir! If they got into that granary they'd have to
take a lantern along to find a pint of wheat. I