"Can't yo' shut th' door after yo', Tom Pinder," exclaimed Betty, "or do yo' think yo're big enough to do for a door yersen?" "Uncle's not at home; he's gone to Huddersfield, I think," said Dorothy, hastily unrolling her sleeves, and hiding the glistening ivory of her arms. "Mrs. Tinker, perhaps?" hazarded Tom. "And aunt's in bed, as bad as can be with a sick head-ache. A pretty Christmas _we_ are likely to have; but is it any message you can leave?" for Tom had turned to go, "you look in trouble." "Jack here has brought me a message, Miss. It's from an old friend, perhaps from the oldest, and it concerns the best friend I have in the world. My more than guardian Mr. Black, the schoolmaster at Diggle, is sick, it is feared unto death, and Jack here has won over th' top through th' snow to fetch me to him." "An' dun yo' meean to say, Tom Pinder," broke in Betty, "'at this yer drowned rat of a man 'at stann's theer gaupin' as if he wer mooin-struck an' drippin' all ovver my cleean floor like a leeakin' piggin' 's come all th' way fro' Diggle i' this weather 'at's nooan fit for a dog to be aat in." "Aye, Betty," said Tom,--he was a prime favourite with Betty of old, and he knew it,--"not so warm as your kitchen, but it was urgent you see, and Jack's an old friend too, aren't you, Jack?" But Jack's eye and Jack's thoughts were fixed upon something more to a hungry man's purpose than mere matters of friendship--he had caught the whiff from the oven door--it was the scent of pork pie piping hot. Dorothy caught the glance that waywards. "Why how thoughtless I am. Now, Jack, I'm sure, as it's Christmas time"--needless qualification--"you can eat some Christmas fare. And they're the very first pies I've ever made, and I _do_ hope they'll be nice. Peggy, why don't you set some plates?" "And mind yo' hot 'em afore th' fire. Its simply beyond all belief how aw've to tell that girl to put hot plates wi' hot meeat, an' cowd wi' cowd, i'steead o' cowd wi' hot an' hot wi' cowd." "And you Tom,"--and then with a hesitation as though in doubt, "I mean, Mr. Pinder, you will take something before you cross those terrible hills?" If Dorothy had there and then asked Tom to sit down and make a comforting meal of dynamite washed down with prussic acid it is odds that he would have set to bowl and platter with a cheerful heart; but to put knife and fork into a rich brown crust that crunched beneath the blade and to see the hot jelly gush out over the plate and to catch the fragrance of the red and brown pork with judicious blending of lean and fat cut into squares like dice, and to see all this flanked by a crested jug of foaming beer.--Oh! Don't talk to me of nectar and ambrosia. "Yo'r health, miss," said Jack, politely and as distinctly as he could with his mouth full, "and yo'rs, too, aw'm sure"--this to Betty, whose ample form he surveyed with lingering approval "and a merry Chersmas when it comes."