“Sleep a little later! What do you take me for, eh? D’ye think I’m such a fool and sluggard as to want to stay in bed longer on Christmas Day than on any other day? You ought to know me better than that! I have plenty of work to do just the same, Christmas Day or no Christmas Day, and I mean to do it!” “Certainly, sir. Yessir. Seven o’clock, sir!” “Seven o’clock, sharp!” And McNason’s thin lips closed upon the word “sharp” like the lid of a spring matchbox. Thereupon Towler backed deferentially towards the door. “Good-night, sir. Merry Christmas, sir!” And with this salutation,--which, offered to a person so distinctly removed from merriment as was his master, seemed almost a satire,--he disappeared. McNason, uttering a sound between a grunt and a curse, poked the fire again viciously, and flung on two logs from a wood-basket beside him,--chumpy resinous logs which began to splutter and crackle directly the heat touched them, and soon started flaring flames up the chimney with quite a lurid torchlight glow. The storm outside had increased in fury,--and hailstones were now mingled with the rain which dashed threateningly against the windows with every wild circling rush of the wind. “Glad I’m not going to a Christmas Eve party!” thought Josiah, as he listened to the hurrying roar of the gale--“A great many young fools will probably catch their deaths of cold to-night,--a wise dispensation of Nature for getting rid of surplus population!” He stretched each end of his mouth as far as it would go, and showed his crooked yellow teeth to the fire, this effort being his way of laughing. The clock struck half-past eleven,--and scarcely had its final chime died away on the air when another and unexpected sound startled him. Ring-ting-ting-ting!--ting-ring-ting-ting-ting!--Ring-ting-TING-TING! “Someone at the telephone!” he said, getting out of his comfortable chair, and hurrying to that doubtfully useful modern instrument, which, if once fixed in a private house puts the owner of it at the disposal of all his friends and business acquaintances who may be inclined to “call him up” on the most trivial excuses for wasting his time--“Who wants me at this hour, I wonder!” He soon had his ear to the receiver, and a small, shrill and quite unfamiliar voice came sharply across the wire. “Hello!” “Hello!” he rejoined. “Hell-oh! McNason! Are you there?” “Yes. I’m here. Who are you?” “That’s telling!” And the shrill piping accents broke into fragments of falsetto laughter that ran vibratingly into McNason’s ear and gave him cold shivers down his back--“Are you at home?” “Of course I am! Going to bed.” “Oh! Don’t go to bed! Hell-oh! McNason, don’t go to bed! I want you!” “Want me? What for?” Again the broken laughter quavered along the wire in uncanny snatches. “On business! Very important! Government loan! No delay! Great chance for you! Peerage! Christmas Eve! Don’t go to bed!”