to be misled by idle gossip; to take not even her own testimony, but to
wait and see what he would see. At last he listened and was a little
soothed. It appeared that Santa Claus was one you might believe in or
might not. Even Clytie seemed to be puzzled about him. He could see that
she overflowed with belief in him, yet he could not make her confess it in
plain straight words. The meat of it was that good children found things
on Christmas morning which must have been left by some one--if not by
Santa Claus, then by whom? Did the little boy believe, for example, that
Milo Barrus did it? He was the village atheist, and so bad a man that he
loved to spell God with a little g.

He mused upon this while his tears dried, finding it plausible. Of course
it couldn't be Milo Barrus, so it _must_ be Santa Claus. Was Clytie
certain some presents would be there in the morning? If he went directly
to sleep, she was.

Hereupon the larger boy on the cot, who had for some moments listened in
forgetful silence, became again virtuously asleep in a public manner.

But the littler boy must yet have talk. Could the bells of Santa Claus be
heard when he came?

Clytie had known some children, of exceptional merit, it was true, who
claimed to have heard his bells on certain nights when they had gone early
to sleep.

_Why_ would he never leave anything for a child that got up out of bed
and caught him at it? Suppose one had to get up for a drink.

Because it broke the charm.