The Brick Moon, and Other StoriesHale, Edward Everett
Science
The Brick Moon, and Other Stories
Hale, Edward Everett
Short stories; United States -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction
The moment Bruce Kuypers read this he was anxious.
Before an hour passed he had determined to cross to the
Pacific train eastward. Before night he was in a
sleeping-car. Day by day as he met Eastern papers, he
searched for news of the investigation. Day by day he
met it, but thanks to his promptness he had arrived in
time. It was pathetic to hear him describe his
anxiety from point to point, and they were all hushed to
silence when he told how glad he was when he found he
should certainly appear on Christmas Day.
After the dinner, another procession, not wholly
unlike the rabble rout of the morning, moved from the
dining-room to the great front parlor, where the tree was
lighted, and parcels of gray and white and brown lay
round on mantel, on piano, on chairs, on tables, and on
the floor.
No; this tale is too long already. We will not tell
what all the presents were to all the ten,--to Venty,
Chloe, Diana, and all of their color. Only let it tell
that all the ten had presents. To Mr. Kuypers's
surprise, and to every one's surprise, indeed, there were
careful presents for him as for the rest, but it must be
confessed that Horace and Laura had spelled Chipah a
little wildly. The truth was that each separate person
had feared that he would feel a little left on one
side,--he to whom so much was due on that day. And each
person, severally, down to the Brick himself, had gone
secretly, without consulting the others, to select from
his own possessions something very dear, and had wrapped
it up and marked it for the stranger. When Mr. Kuypers
opened a pretty paper, to find Matty's own illustrated
Browning, he was touched indeed. When in a rough brown
paper he found the Brick's jack-knife labelled "FOR THE
MAN," the tears stood in his eyes.
The next day the "Evening Lantern" contained this
editorial article:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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