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Updated: May 24, 2025
"You fellows might have seen, if any one fetched him down the trail. You're foolin'. Some of you took him for a joke!" "It wouldn't be no joke," answered Lufkins, the teamster. "We 'ain't got him, Jim, on the square." "Of course we 'ain't got him. We 'ain't took him for no joke," said Field. "Nobody'd take him away like that."
"S'posen we don't have turkey and cranberry sauce and a big mince-pie?" "I'd like that rich brown gravy," murmured the carpenter "good and thick and rich and brown." "We could rig up a big, long table in the shop," planned the blacksmith, "and put a hundred candles everywhere, and have the tree all blazin' with lights, and you bet things would be gorgeous." "If we git the tree," said Lufkins.
"You got anything to say about the biz?" "Jim's got a call on me and my cash," replied the brawny Webber. "Jim, you tell him what you need, and I'll foot the bill." "I'll settle half, myself," added Lufkins. "Thanks, boys, not this evenin'," said Jim, whose pride had singular moments for coming to the surface.
The boots of the men could be heard, as they creaked on the crisply frozen snow, before the visitors arrived at the door. Keno let them in, and with them an oreole of chill and freshness flavored spicily of winter. There were three the carpenter, Bone, and Lufkins. "How's the little shaver?" Bone inquired at once. "About the same," said Jim. "And how's the tree?" "All ready," answered Lufkins.
That is, you fellers can, for little Skeezucks ain't a-feelin' right well to-day, and I reckon I'll stay close beside him till he spruces up." "What about your mine?" inquired Lufkins. "It ain't agoin' to run away," said the old philosopher, calmly. "I'll let it set there for a few more days, as long as I can't hang it up on the tree. It's just my little present to the boy, anyhow."
The tired youngsters, all but little Skeezucks, fell asleep, and were tucked into bed. Even the pup was exhausted. Field and the blacksmith, Lufkins, Bone, Keno, and the others thought eagerly of the morrow, which would come so soon, and go so swiftly, and leave them with no little trio of girls romping with their finally joyous bit of a boy.
"Let's git the parson back right off," cried the carpenter. "I kin build the finest steeple ever was!" "Send a gang to fetch him here to-day!" said Webber. "I wouldn't lose no time, or he may git stuck on Fremont, and never want to budge," added Lufkins. Field and half a dozen more concurred. "I'll be one to go myself," said the blacksmith, promptly.
It's got to be done with honor and glory to the camp, even if we have to take the kid away from Jim complete." "He found the little skeezucks, all the same," the blacksmith reminded them. "That counts for somethin'. He's got a right to keep him for a while, at least, unless the mother should heave into town." "Or the dad," added Lufkins. "Shoot the dad!" answered Bone.
"Wait till he sees them blocks," said the carpenter, with a knowing wink. "I ain't sayin' nothin'," added Lufkins, with the most significant smile, "but you jest wait." "Nor me ain't doin' any talkin'," said Bone. "Well, the boys will all be waitin'," was the teamster's last remark, and slowly down the whitened hill they went, to join their fellows at the shop of the smith.
Lufkins, starting to climb once more to the cabin, beheld him from afar. With all his speed he darted back to the blacksmith-shop and the tree. "He coming!" he cried, when fifty yards away. "Light the candles quick!" In a fever of joy and excitement the rough fellows lighted up their home-made tree. The forge flung a largess of heat and light, as red as holly, through the gloom of the place.
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