"Bertie!" came in an angry, imploring chorus of shouts and screams from
the cow-house window.

"Hullo," cried the owner of the name, turning his rather errant steps in
the direction of the summons; "are you people still there? Must have
heard everything cows got to say by this time. If you haven't, no use
waiting. After all, it's a Russian legend, and Russian Chrismush Eve not
due for 'nother fortnight. Better come out."

After one or two ineffectual attempts he managed to pitch the key of the
cow-house door in through the window. Then, lifting his voice in the
strains of "I'm afraid to go home in the dark," with a lusty drum
accompaniment, he led the way back to the house. The hurried procession
of the released that followed in his steps came in for a good deal of the
adverse comment that his exuberant display had evoked.

It was the happiest Christmas Eve he had ever spent. To quote his own
words, he had a rotten Christmas.




FOREWARNED


Alethia Debchance sat in a corner of an otherwise empty railway carriage,
more or less at ease as regarded body, but in some trepidation as to
mind. She had embarked on a social adventure of no little magnitude as
compared with the accustomed seclusion and stagnation of her past life.
At the age of twenty-eight she could look back on nothing more eventful