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It was a little too much for the good-hearted woman, who had
liked his mother. She compromised with herself by taking a plate if
ice-cream and a thick slice of cake, slipping out of her back door,
and hurrying down to Miss Carruthers's back yard.
Peter stood there, leaning on his ax. Seated on a larger woodpile
was old Daddy Christmas, one of the town beggars. Daddy Christmas
was incredibly old, wrinkled, ragged, and bent. His grizzled, partly
bald head nodded while he tried to talk to Peter.
"Peter," said Mrs. Humphreys, hastily, "here's some ice-cream and
cake for you." She blushed as she spoke. "It's a hot day--and you're
working. I thought you'd like something cool and nice." She thrust
the plate upon him.
Peter smiled at her charmingly.
"You're mighty kind, Mis' Humphreys," he told her.
"I'll come back for the plate and spoon, after a while," she said,
hurrying off. But at the gate, beside the thick crape-myrtle bushes,
she paused and looked back. Somehow she wanted to see Maria
Champneys's boy eating that ice-cream and cake.


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