express car,
planted in places where 'taint doin' nobody no good. I guess ef I do ut
careful I kin send ut back to the company, a little at a time, an' they'd
never know where ut come from."

Mary wept; Humpy stared, his mouth open, his one eye rolling queerly.

"I guess we kin put a little chunk away every year," The Hopper went on.
"We'd be comfortabler doin' ut. We could square up ef we lived long
enough, which we don't need t' worry about, that bein' the Lord's
business. You an' me's cracked a good many safes, Hump, but we never made
no money at ut, takin' out th' time we done."

"He's got religion; that's wot he's got!" moaned Humpy, as though this
marked the ultimate tragedy of The Hopper's life.

"Mebbe ut's religion an' mebbe ut's jes' sense," pursued The Hopper,
unshaken by Humpy's charge. "They wuz a chaplin in th' Minnesoty pen as
used t' say ef we're all square with our own selves ut's goin' to be all
right with God. I guess I got a good deal o' squarin' t' do, but I'm goin'
t' begin ut. An' all these things happenin' along o' Chris'mus, an' little
Shaver an' his ma bein' so friendly like, an' her gittin' me t' help
straighten out them ole gents, an' doin' all I done an' not gettin'
pinched seems more 'n jes' luck; it's providential's wot ut is!"

This, uttered in a challenging tone, evoked a sob from Humpy, who
announced that he "felt like" he was going to die.

"It's th' Chris'mus time, I reckon," said Mary, watching The Hopper
deposit the two checks in the clock. "It's the only decent Chris'mus I
ever knowed!"

THE END

End of Project Gutenberg's A Reversible Santa Claus, by Meredith Nicholson

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