influence in Wainwright, the "Despatch" and the "Journal," both operated
in the interest of Beasley's party, and neither had "come out" for him.
The gossip I heard about our office led me to think that each was
waiting to see what headway Sim Peck and his faction would make; the
"Journal" especially, I knew, had some inclination to coquette with
Peck, Grist, and Company. Altogether, their faction was not entirely to
be despised.

Thus, my thoughts were a great deal more occupied with Beasley's chances
than with the holiday spirit that now, with furs and bells and wreathing
mists of snow, breathed good cheer over the town. So little, indeed, had
this spirit touched me that, one evening when one of my colleagues,
standing before the grate-fire in the reporters' room, yawned and said
he'd be glad when to-morrow was over, I asked him what was the
particular trouble with to-morrow.

"Christmas," he explained, languidly. "Always so tedious. Like Sunday."

"It makes me homesick," said another, a melancholy little man who was
forever bragging of his native Duluth.

"Christmas," I repeated--"to-morrow!"

It was Christmas Eve, and I had not known it! I leaned back in my chair
in sudden loneliness, what pictures coming before me of long-ago
Christmas Eves at home!--old Christmas Eves when there was a Tree....

My name was called; the night City Editor had an assignment for me. "Go
up to Sim Peck's, on Madison Street," he said. "He thinks he's got
something on David Beasley, but won't say any more over the telephone.