A look of comprehension began to dawn in Ernest's eyes. "So that's why you wouldn't let us go near her kennel last time we were there," said he. "She had them all the time."
Sam grinned. "They're pretty young to take away from their mother," said he, "but she has three more. She's a good mother, Nellie is. You ought to see her chase the other dogs away. I had a job of it gettin' these two weaned before Christmas."
"Why did you have to get them weaned before Christmas?" asked Jack.
"Now you jest think that over, and see if you can tell me," said Sam.
Ernest had already half guessed the wonderful truth, but he didn't yet dare to say what he thought.
"Don't be afraid of 'em," said Sam. "They won't bite – or leastways, not serious. Besides, they're your own dogs."
"Our own dogs?" gasped Jack in astonishment, the glad light beginning to break in upon him.
"Sure," said Sam. "What else would they be here for? I thought Santa Claus might happen to forget you, and so I brought 'em down."
"Oh!" cried Ernest. "Christmas presents! To be our very own dogs! I guess none of the other boys will have such fine presents as these, Jack."
But Jack was speechless with joy.
"Have they got names?" asked Ernest.
"Sure," said Sam. "I told you how I name all my dogs with names beginning with the same letter. All my own puppies, I mean. It's for good luck. There's Rex, you know, and Robbin and Rockaway. These two are Romulus and Remus and they're twins. This one with the black ear is Romulus, and this one with the little map of Africa on his side is Remus. That's how you can tell 'em apart."
"Which is mine and which is Ernest's?" inquired Jack, at last finding his voice.
"Well, now, I hadn't thought of that," confessed Sam. "Suppose you draw lots for 'em. Here, I'll hold these two broom straws so you can't tell which is longest. You each draw one, and the one that gets the longest straw can have first choice of the puppies. Is that fair?"
The boys agreed to the plan and drew the straws. Ernest's proved to be the longer one.
"Well, he's older, anyway," said Jack. "Which one do you choose, Ernest?"
"I'll take Romulus," said Ernest promptly, having noted that the one with the black ear was a shade the larger of the two.
"All right," said Jack, "and Remus is mine." And he asserted stoutly that he would have chosen Remus anyway.
"That's good," said Sam. "Then you're both satisfied. Grown people would have made more fuss about it, I'll warrant you.
"Well, I must be steppin' along," he continued. "Take good care of the puppies, because they're valuable. Remember that they're used to sleepin' close to a warm mother and see that they have a good bed. I'd put some rags in a box for 'em if I was you. Let 'em have fresh air and sunshine and a chance to stretch their legs, but don't let 'em get wet or chilled through and put their bed where they ain't no draughts. Remember they ain't got their warm coats yet.
"Give 'em a saucer of milk with the chill taken off, six times a day, and break a little bread into it at supper time. In a few weeks you can cut down to three meals a day, with more solid food, but I'll be down to see you before then, if you don't get up to see me, and I'll tell you just how to manage. Let me know if you have any trouble of any kind, but I guess you won't."
The clicking of the front gate announced the return of Mr. Whipple to his noonday meal. The boys ran to the stable door and shouted, "Father! Oh, father, come see what we've got for Christmas!"
They dashed toward him and dragged him by main force to the stable. But when they got there, Sam Bumpus had mysteriously disappeared, without giving the boys a chance to thank him or to wish him another Merry Christmas.
Mr. Whipple examined the puppies with interest and watched their clumsy antics with amusement. Like most people he could not resist the charm of a wet-nosed, big-footed, round-bellied, fuzzy little puppy. Presently, however, a look of doubt came over his face.
"What do you propose doing with them?" he asked.
"Why, having them for our dogs," said Jack, surprised that his father should ask so obvious a question.
"I mean, where do you plan to keep them?"
"Why, in our room, I guess," said Ernest.
But Mr. Whipple shook his head doubtfully. "I don't imagine they've been taught yet how to behave themselves in the house," said he. "And anyway, I don't believe your mother will want them there. She doesn't like dogs, you know."
"Aw, she wouldn't mind little bits of soft dogs like these," protested Ernest.
"Well, you can try it and see," said Mr. Whipple, "but I wouldn't get my hopes up too high, if I were you."
Mrs. Whipple did object quite decidedly, and for a time it looked as though Romulus and Remus were unwanted guests in that household and that their young masters would be forced to part with them. Tears were shed, but of that we will say little. At last Mrs. Whipple was persuaded to grant a truce in order that the Christmas Eve festivities might not be entirely spoiled. Besides, it was too late now to take the puppies back to Sam Bumpus, and even Mrs. Whipple was not hard-hearted enough to think of merely putting them out into the cold. The upshot of it was that, Delia having been given the evening off, Romulus and Remus were banished to the kitchen for the night, with a bed prepared in a box and another box of sand placed hopefully near by. The boys insisted on serving their supper in two separate saucers with the idea that each would recognize his own and observe the rights of the other.
Occasional stealthy visits to the kitchen that evening disclosed two remarkably wakeful and active puppies engaged in unexpected explorations, but at last they curled up together in their new bed, two innocent little balls of fluff, and Ernest and Jack bade them goodnight with much ceremony.
On Christmas Day there was trouble from the start. In fact, it was one of the liveliest Christmas Days in the history of the Whipple household. In the first place, when Delia came back early in the morning to get things started for the Christmas dinner, she discovered the two little strangers in her kitchen, and promptly made known the fact that they were puppies whose manners were not at all what they should be. Mr. Whipple averted a domestic storm by taking the puppies out into the yard, where he had his hands full to keep them out of the snow.
By this time the boys had finished the examination of their bulging stockings and the larger contributions of St. Nicholas which stood beside the fireplace, and bethought themselves of Romulus and Remus. They dashed pell-mell out into the yard where their father was pondering what he should do with them next. The boys promptly solved this problem by picking up the puppies, each taking his own, and carrying them forthwith into the house.
Mrs. Whipple was in a good humor that Christmas morning, and she really wanted her boys to be happy all day, so although she added one admonition to another, she allowed the boys to play with the puppies in the sitting-room. They would have to part with them soon enough, she thought, and meanwhile they might as well have as much fun as they could.
But as the day wore on her good nature and kind intentions were sorely tried. Romulus and Remus appeared to think that the house was some sort of hunting ground especially provided for little dogs, and that it was their duty to pursue, worry, and kill every sort of strange creature they could find. Evidently they were imaginative puppies, for they discovered enemies in overlooked corners of the room, on closet floors, and everywhere. These enemies might be the discarded paper wrappings of Christmas presents, or they might be perfectly good balls of darning cotton. It mattered not to Romulus and Remus so long as their primitive impulse to catch and slay was satisfied. They were very bloodthirsty little dogs.
But it ceased to be a joke, even to the boys, when Mrs. Whipple, for awhile put off her guard by a period of unusual quiet, discovered Romulus and Remus engaged in the joint pastime of reducing to small woolly bits a new gray felt slipper which she herself had presented to her husband that very morning. Hastily she cleared out the bottom of a closet, thrust the puppies inside, and ruthlessly closed the door, deaf alike to the piteous little squeaky whines