The Burglar and the Blizzard: A Christmas Story | Page 4

the old man," Harris replied
dropping the mail bag into his wagon.
"Then you've got to drive me out."
"What, all the way to your place? No, sir, I guess it is too stormy for
me, too."
But Geoffrey at last, by the promise of three times what the trip was
worth, induced Harris to change his mind. He stepped into the mail cart,

and having stopped at the post-office to leave the bag, and at the stable
to change the cart for a sleigh, they finally set out on their five-mile
drive.
"Guess you come up to see about Mr. May's house being robbed?"
Harris hazarded before they had gone far.
"You're a nice lot, aren't you?" returned Geoffrey. "Five robberies and
not a motion to catch the thief!"
"Oh, I dunno, I dunno, there is a big reward out to-day," said Harris,
divided between pride in the notoriety and shame at the lawlessness of
his native town.
"Yes, but not by any of you."
"Well, the boys did talk some of a vigilance committee, if any more
houses was robbed."
"They are going to wait for him to make up his half dozen."
"Well, to tell the truth," said Harris, "it seems like he only went for you
city folks, and I guess the boys thought you could better afford to lose a
few things than they could to lose their sleep. That's about the size of
it."
Geoffrey could not but laugh. "That's a fine spirited way to look at it, I
must say."
"Well," returned Harris, who appeared to have need of the
monosyllable in order to collect and arrange his ideas. "'Tain't lack of
sand exactly, either, for most of the fellows about here thinks it is a
woman."
"A woman?" cried Geoffrey, remembering the lady in Boston.
"Yes, sir," said Harris, "a young woman. Look at the things took. What
burglar would want sheets and a lady's coat? Besides just before the
first one happened, Will Brown, he was driving along up your way and
a young woman, pretty as a picter, Will said, slips out of the wood and
asks for a lift. Well, Will takes her some two miles, and when they got
to that piece of woods at the back of your place she says of a sudden
that she guesses she wants exercise, and will walk the rest of the way,
and out she gets, and no one has seen her since. Seems kinder strange,
no house but yours within six miles, and you away."
"It would have seemed quite as strange if I had been at home," returned
Geoffrey, amused at his imputation.
"Well," Harris went on imperturbably, "you can't tell the rights of them

stories. Will Brown, he's a liar, just like all the Browns; still this time
he seemed to think he was telling the truth. Looks like we were going
to have a blizzard, don't it?"
When they reached the McFarlane cottage, Mrs. McFarlane appeared
bobbing on the threshold. She was an old Scotch woman and covered
all occasions with courtesy. It appeared that Holland's telegram had
been duly telephoned from the office, but that her husband was down
with rheumatism, the second gardener dismissed, and the "boy"
allowed to go home to spend Christmas, so that there had been no one
to send. Geoffrey suggested that she might have telephoned to the local
livery-stable, and she was at once so overcome at her own stupidity that
she could do nothing but bob and murmur, until Geoffrey sent her away
to get him something to eat.
It was about ten o'clock, when he determined to take a turn about his
house. The next day he intended removing all valuables to the vaults of
the Hillsborough bank.
It was a long walk from the cottage, and Geoffrey, as he trudged up hill
against the wind, was surprised to find how much snow had already
fallen. He had expected to return to New York the next day, but now a
fair prospect of being stalled on the way presented itself. It took him so
much longer to reach the house than he had supposed, that he
abandoned all idea of entering it. It stood before him grimly like a
mountain of grey stone, its face plastered with snow. He walked round
it, feeling each door and window to be sure of the fastenings. Once past
the corner, the house sheltered him from the wind. He was conscious of
that exhilaration snow storms so often bring, while at the same time the
atmosphere of desolation that surrounds all shut up houses, even one's
own, took hold of him. Unconsciously he stopped and felt in his pocket
for his revolver, and at the same moment, faintly, in the interior of the
house,