"GET A HORSE!"
"Hello there, Coz!" shouted Nat White, as Dorothy stepped from the train.
"And there's Tavia--and well! If it isn't Bob Niles!"
"Yes," said Dorothy, postponing further greetings until the train should
pull out, and Tavia's last hand-wave be returned. "We met him coming up,
and he goes to Dalton."
"Well I'll be jiggered! And he has Tavia for company!" exclaimed the
young man, who for years had regarded Tavia as his particular property,
as far as solid friendship was concerned.
"And Tavia has already vowed to be mean to him," said Dorothy, as she now
pressed her warm cheek against that of her cousin, the latter's being
briskly red from the snowy air. "She would scarcely speak to him on the
train."
"A bad sign," said Nat, as he helped Dorothy with her bag. "There are the
Blakes. May as well ask them up; their machine does not seem to be
around."
The pretty little country station was gay with holiday arrivals, and
among them were many known to Dorothy and her popular cousin. The Blakes
gladly accepted the invitation to ride over in the _Fire Bird_, their
auto having somehow missed them.
"You look--lovely," Mabel Blake complimented Dorothy.
"Doesn't she?" chimed in Mabel's brother, at which Dorothy buried her
face deeper in her furs. Nat cranked up; and soon the _Fire Bird_ was on
its way toward the Cedars, the country home of Mrs. Nathaniel White, and
her two sons, Nat and Ned. Mrs. White was the only sister of Major Dale,
Dorothy's father, and the Dale family, Dorothy and her brothers, Joe and
little Roger, had lately made their home with her.
It lacked but a few days of Christmas, and the snowstorm added much to
the beauty of the scene, while the cold was not so severe as to make the
weather unpleasant. All sorts of happy remembrances were recalled between
the occupants of the automobile, as it bravely made its way through
drifts and small banks.
"Oh, there's old Peter!" exclaimed Dorothy, as a man, his stooped
shoulders hidden under a load of evergreens, trudged along.
"And such a heavy burden," added Mabel. "Couldn't we give him a lift?"
Nat slowed up a little to give the old man more room in the roadway.
"Those Christmas trees are poor company in a machine," he said. "I have
tried them before."
"But it is so hard for him to travel all the way to the village?" pleaded
Dorothy. "We could put his trees on back, and he could----"
"Sit with you and Mabel?" and Ted Blake laughed at the idea.
"No, you could do that?" retorted Dorothy, "and Peter could ride with
Nat. Please, Nat----"
"Oh, all right, Coz, if it will make you happy. I wish, sometimes, I were
lame, halt and old enough--to know." Whereat he stopped the machine and
insisted on old Peter doing as the girls had suggested.
It was no easy matter to get the trees, and the bunches of greens,
securely fastened to the back of the auto, but it was finally
accomplished. Peter was profuse in his thanks, for the greens had been
specially ordered, he said, and he was already late in delivering them.
"Which way do you go?" asked Nat.
"Out to the Squire's," replied Peter. "But that road is soft, I wouldn't
ask you take it."
"Oh, I guess we can make it," proposed Nat. "The _Fire Bird_ is not quite
a locomotive."
"She goes like a bird, sure enough," affirmed Peter. "But that road is
full of ditches."
"We will try them, at any rate," insisted Nat, as he turned from the main
road to a narrow stretch of white track that cut through woods and farm
lands.
"If we are fortunate enough not to meet anything," said Dorothy. "But I
have always been afraid of a single road, bound with ditches."
"Of course," growled Nat, "there comes Terry with his confounded cows."
Plowing along, his head down and his whip in hand came Terry, the
half-witted boy who, Winter and Summer, drove the cows from their field
or barn to the slaughter house. He never raised his head as Nat tooted
the horn, and by the time the machine was abreast of the drove of cattle,
Nat was obliged to make a quick swerve to avoid striking the animals.
"Oh!" gasped both Dorothy and Mabel. The car lunged, then came to a
sudden stop, while the engine still pounded to get ahead.
"Hang the luck!" groaned Nat, vainly trying to start the car, which was
plainly stalled.
"I told you," commented Peter, inappropriately. "This here road----"
"Oh, hang the road!" interrupted Nat. "It was that loon--Terry."
As the young man spoke Terry passed along as mutely as if nothing had
happened.
"I'd like to try that whip on him, to see if I could wake him up," said
Ted, as he leaped out after Nat to see what could be done to get the car
back on the road.
But it was an impossible task. Pushing, pulling, prying with fence
rails--all efforts left the big, red car stuck just where it had
floundered.
"I know," spoke Peter, suddenly. "I'll get Sanders's horse."
"Sanders wouldn't lend his horse to pull a man out of a ditch," said Nat.
"I've asked him before."
"That's where you made a mistake," replied Peter. "I won't ask him," and
he awkwardly managed to get out of the car, and was soon out on the road
and making his way across the snow-covered fields.
"We may be tried for horse-stealing next," remarked Ted, grimly. "Girls,
are you perishing?"
"Not a bit of it," declared Dorothy. "This snow is warm rather than
cold."
"My face is burning," insisted Mabel. "But I do hope old Sanders does not
set his dogs on us."
"He's as deaf as a post," Ted said. "That's a blessing--this time, at
least."
"There goes Peter in the barn," Dorothy remarked. "He has got that far
safely, at any rate."
A strained silence followed this announcement. Yes, Peter had gone into
the barn. It seemed night would come before he could possibly secure the
old horse, and get to the roadway to give the necessary pull to the
stalled _Fire Bird_. They waited, eagerly watching the barn door. Finally
it opened. Yes, Peter was coming, leading the horse.
"Now!" said Peter, standing with an emergency rope ready, "if only he
gets past the house----"
He stopped. The door of the snow-covered cottage opened, and there stood
the unapproachable Sanders.
"Oh!" gasped Mabel. "Now we are in for it!"
"Then," said Dorothy, "let us be ready for it. I'll prepare the defence,"
and before they realized what she was about to do she had selected one of
the very choicest Christmas trees, and with it on her fur-covered
shoulder, actually started up the box-wood lined walk to where the
much-dreaded Sanders was standing, ready to mete out vengeance on the man
who had dared to enter his barn, and take from it his horse.
"Oh Mr. Sanders!" called Dorothy. "Have you that dear little
grand-daughter with you? The pretty one we had at the church affair last
year?"
"You mean Emily?" he drawled. "Yep, she's here, but----"
"Then, you wonder why we have taken your horse? And why we were stalled
here?" The others could hear her from the roadway. They could see, also,
that Sanders had stopped to listen. "Now we want Emily to have a
Christmas tree, all her own," went on Dorothy, "and Peter is good enough
to donate it. But our machine--those cars are not like horses," she
almost shouted, as Sanders being deaf, and watching the inexorable Peter
leading his horse away, had cause to be aroused from his natural
surprise. "After all," persisted Dorothy, "a horse is the best."
By this time Peter was outside the big gate. Sanders made a move as if to
follow, when Dorothy almost dropped the clumsy tree.
"Oh, please take it!" she begged. "I want to see Emily while they are
towing the machine out. It's a lucky thing it happened just here, and
that you are kind enough to let us have your horse."
"Well what do you think of that!" exclaimed Ted, in a voice loud enough
for those near him to hear. "Of all the clever tricks!"
"Oh, depend on Doro for cleverness," replied Nat, proudly. "You just do
your part, Ted, and make this rope fast."
Mabel stood looking on in speechless surprise. She saw now that Dorothy
and old Sanders were entering the cottage. Dorothy was first, and the
man, with the Christmas tree, followed close behind her. The boys with
Peter were busy with rope, horse and auto. Soon they had the necessary
connection made, with Nat at the wheel, and all were tugging with might
and main to get the _Fire Bird_ free from the ditch.
If there is anything more nerve-racking than such an attempt, it must be
some other attempt at a balking auto. Would it move, or would it sink
deeper into the mud that lay hidden beneath the newly-fallen snow?
Nat turned the wheel first this way and then that. Ted had his weight
pressed against the rear wheel of the machine, while Peter coaxed and led
the horse. Suddenly the old horse, as if desperate, gave a jerk and
pulled the _Fire Bird_ clear out into the roadway!
"Hurrah!" yelled Ted, bounding through the snow.
"Great stunt!" corroborated Nat. "Peter, you are all right!"
"Peter did some," replied the old man, freeing the horse from the rope
that held him to the machine; "but that young lady--if she hadn't kept
Sanders busy--we might all have been arrested for horse-stealing."
"She knew his weak spot," agreed Nat. "That little Emily seems to be the
one weak and soft spot in old Sanders's life."
"I had better go up and see what's going on," suggested Mabel, as
everything seemed about in readiness to start off again.
"Good idea," assented her brother, "he might be eating her up."
Mabel rather timidly found her way up to the cottage. It was already
dusk, but the light of a dim lamp showed her the way, as it gleamed
through a gloomy window, onto the glistening snow.
"Won't it be perfectly lovely, Emily?" she heard Doro saying, as she saw
her with her arms about a little red-haired girl, both sitting on a sofa,
while Sanders attempted to prop the Christmas tree up in a corner,
bracing it with a wooden chair. Mabel raised the latch without going
through the formality of knocking. As she entered the room, all but
Dorothy started in surprise.
"This is my friend," Dorothy hurried to explain, "it is she who is going
to help me trim the tree up for Emily. We will come to-morrow," and she
rose to leave. "Mabel will fetch the doll, Emily. That is, of course, if
we can persuade Santa Claus to give us just the kind we want," she tried
to correct.
"A baby dolly--with long hair and a white dress," Emily ordered. "And I
want eyelashes."
"Perticular," said Sanders, with a proud look at the child, who, as the
boys had said, made up the one tender spot in his life. "If her ma's cold
is better, she is coming up herself."
"Is she sick?" Emily ventured, glad to be able to say something
intelligent.
"Yep," replied the old man, sadly. "She's been sick a long time. I
fetched Emily over this afternoon in the sleigh."
"Well, we are so much obliged," remarked Dorothy. "And good-bye, Emily.
You'll have everything ready for Santa Claus; won't you?"
"I've got my parlor set from last year," said the child, "and mamma says
Santa Claus always likes to see the other things, to know we took care of
them."
"Thanks, Sanders," called Peter, at the window. "The horse is as good as
ever. Don't sell him without giving me a chance. I could do something if
I owned a mare like that."
"All right," called back Sanders, whose pride was being played upon. "He
might be worse. Did you put her in the far stall?"
"Just where I got her. And I tell you, Sanders, even a horse can play at
Christmas. Only for him I never could get those trees to town."
"And only for Peter," put in Dorothy, "we could not have gotten Emily her
tree. Now that's how a horse can turn Santa Claus. Good-bye, Mr. Sanders,
you may expect us before Christmas."
And then the two girls followed the chuckling Peter back to the _Fire
Bird_, where the boys impatiently awaited them, to complete the delayed
party bound for home, and for the Christmas holidays.