Mr. Cheeseman picked up a handful of
short white sticks. "These is good goods; try one!"

Calvin crunched a stick. "Chocolate fillin'?" he said.

"Yes; with just a dite of peanut butter to give it a twist. Children
like 'em; like the name, too; makes 'em think of the turkey that's
comin'. Two or three pounds of them? That's right! All the sticks, I
s'pose? and all the drops? That's it! I expect you to make your fortune
this time, and no mistake. Now we come to gum drops! how about them?"

"Well," said Calvin, "I never found gum drops what you'd call real
amusin' myself; I like something with a mite more snap to it, don't
you?"

"Did, when I had teeth like yours!" Mr. Cheeseman replied. "But you take
old folks, or folks that's had their teeth out, and say, 'gum drops' to
'em, and they'll run like chickens. They like something soft, you see.
How's your route off for teeth?"

"Why--I don't know as I've noticed specially!" said Calvin, his brown
eyes growing round.

"Fust thing a candy man ought to notice! Well, you take a good stock of
gum drops, that's my advice. Now come to the animals--what is it,
Lonzo?"

Lonzo shambled in from the shop; the tears were running down his platter
face, and his huge frame shook with sobs.

"She--she won't give me the el'phant!" he said.

"What elephant? Cheer up, Lonzo! don't you cry, son; Christmas is
comin', you know."

"You said--you said--if I cleaned the dishes all up good for Christmas I
could take my pick, and I picked the el'phant, and she won't give it to
me!"

At this juncture the pretty girl appeared, flushed and defiant.

"Mr. Cheeseman, he wants that big elephant, the handsomest thing in the
window; and it's a shame, and he sha'n't have it. I offered him the one
you made first, that got its leg broke, and he won't look at it. There's
just as much eatin' to it, for I saved the leg."

"I don't want to eat it!" sobbed Lonzo. "I want to love it a spell
fust."

Mr. Cheeseman looked grave. "Well!" he said, "we'll see, son! You stop
cryin', anyhow."

He went into the shop, Calvin following him, and they looked over the
low green curtain into the show-window. In the very centre, towering
above the lions, camels and rabbits, stood a majestic white elephant
fully a foot high. His tusks were of clear barley sugar; he carried a
gilded howdah in which sat an affable personage with chocolate
countenance and peppermint turban; the whole was a triumph of art, and
Mr. Chee