Both the Santas jumped as if some one had let off a cannon cracker under their very noses.
"Well, I declare!" said the one that had carried Jimmieboy up through the chimney. "We're discovered. Here I've been in this business whole centuries, and I've never been discovered before."
"That's so," assented the other. "We know now how America must have felt when Columbus came sailing in. What'll we do about it?"
"We'll have to take him into partnership, I guess," rejoined the first. "It'll never do in this world not to. Would you like to be one of our concern, Jimmieboy?"
"Well, I say we let him help us this time anyhow," said the roof Santa Claus. "You're so fat, I'm afraid you can't get down some of these small chimneys, and Jimmieboy is just about the right size."
"Good scheme," said the other; "but he isn't dressed for it, you know."
"He can get a nice black soot down in the factory chimney," said the roof Santa Claus, with a wink.
"That's so; and as the factory fires are always going, it will be a nice warm soot. What do you say, Jimmieboy?" said the other.
"It's lovely," replied the boy. "But how did there come to be two of you?"
"There had to be," said the first Santa Claus Jimmieboy had seen. "The world is growing so fast that my work has nearly doubled in the last twenty years, so I had to get an assistant, and he did so well, I took him into partnership. He's my brother."
"And is his name Santa Claus, too?" asked Jimmieboy.
"Oh no, indeed. His name is Marmaduke. We call him Marmy for short, and I can tell you what it is, Jimmieboy,
"He is as fine a fellow As ever you did spy; He's quite as sweet and mellow, Though not so fat as I."
"And that's a recommendation that any man has a right to be proud of," said Marmy Claus, patting himself on the back to show how proud he felt. "But, Santa, we must be off. It would not do for the new firm of Santa, Marmy, and Jimmie Claus to begin business by being late. We've got to leave toys in eighteen flat-houses, forty-two hotels, and an orphan asylum yet."
"That's a fact," said Santa, jumping into the sleigh and grasping the reins. "Just help Jimmieboy in here, Marmy, and we'll be off. We can leave his things here on our way back."
[Illustration: JIMMIEBOY AND THE BROTHERS CLAUS.]