“Scarlet nothin’!” was Ulie’s reply.  “I gotter go to a meetin’ of the Youth’s Helpin’ Hand Socirety this afternoon and I’ll be darned if I stay in any dog-on bed.”

Mr. Budlong finally persuaded him—­Ulie wasn’t dressed yet and it hurts worse on the bare hide.  Then Mr. Budlong hurried down town to bribe a doctor and borrow a red placard of the board of health.  He was just rounding the corner on the way home when he caught sight of Ulie descending from the window by means of a knotted sheet.  Ulie had only a nightgown on, and owing to the heavy wind it wasn’t much on.

He dropped to the ground before Mr. Budlong could reach him, then darted away across lots barefooted through the snow towards the Detwillers’.  Mr. Budlong treed him just before he reached the neighbors.  But the boy would not come down till his father promised immunity both from punishment and from scarlet fever.

The Detwillers were arriving on the run, so the father promised, hid the scarlet fever propaganda in his inside pocket, wrapped Ulie in his own overcoat and carried him home.  There was so much dread of pneumonia that the guilty parents could not include Ulie in any more schemes.  And they could think of no schemes.  The day before the Day Before Christmas found them in a panic.  The Day Before found them grimly resolved to stand siege.

On the blessed Eve they sat before their cheerless fire-front and stared at the packages that had been pouring in all day long.  The old postman had staggered under the final load and hinted so broadly for a Christmas present that he got one—­the first breach in their solemn resolve.

They had excepted Ulie, of course, from the embargo.  But they had been in such a flurry that they had postponed him till they forgot him entirely.  The doorbell was rung so incessantly throughout the evening that the cook sat on the hall stairs to be handy.  She piled the packages up on the piano till they spilled off.  The piano lamp was gradually sinking beneath the encroaching tide.  Presents were brought in wagons, carriages, buggies, carts, by coachmen, gardeners, cooks, maids, messenger boys, and children of all ages and dimensions.

On any other occasion Mrs. Budlong would have been running here and there, peeking into parcels and restraining her curiosity till the next day out of sheer joy in curiosity.  Now she opened never a bundle.  She could only think of the morrow when all of these donors found that reciprocity had gone down to defeat.  The Budlongs avoided each other’s eyes.  They were thinking the same thing.  The strain endured till it tested their metal to the breaking point.  When three enormous packages were brought to the door by the Detwillers’ hired man, Mrs. Budlong broke out hysterically: 

“I just can’t stand it.”

“Hell!” roared Mr. Budlong.  “Get on your hat and coat.  We’ll go down and buy everything that’s left in town.”