The next night the Packer farmhouse stood in the winter landscape
under the full moon, just as it had stood always, with a light in the
kitchen window, and a plume of smoke above the great, square chimney.
It was about half past seven o'clock. A group of men were lurking at
the back of the barn, like robbers, and speaking in low tones. Now and
then the horse stamped in the barn, or a cow lowed; a dog was barking,
away over on the next farm, with an anxious tone, as if something were
happening that he could not understand. The sea boomed along the shore
beyond the marshes; the men could hear the rote of a piece of pebble
beach a mile or two to the southward; now and then there was a faint
tinkle of sleigh-bells. The fields looked wide and empty; the unusual
warmth of the day before had been followed by clear cold. Suddenly a
straggling company of women were seen coming from the next house. The
men at the barn flapped their arms, and one of them, the youngest,
danced a little to keep himself warm.
"Here they all come," said somebody, and at that instant the sound of
many sleigh-bells grew loud and incessant, and far-away shouts and
laughter came along the wind, fainter in the hollows and loud on the
hills of the uneven road. "Here they come! I guess you'd better go in,
Joe; they'll want to have lights ready."
"She'll have a fire all laid for him in the fore room," said the young
man; "that's all we want. She'll be expectin' you, Joe; go in now, and
they'll think nothin' of it, bein' Saturday night. Just you hurry, so
they'll have time to light up." And Joe went.
"Stop and have some talk with father," whispered Lizzie affectionately
to her lover, as she came to meet him. "He's all worked up, thinking
nobody'll respect him, an' all that. Tell him you're glad he beat."
And they opened the kitchen door.
"What's all that noise?" said John Packer, dropping his weekly
newspaper, and springing out of his chair. He looked paler and thinner
than he had looked the day before. "What's all that noise, Joe?"
There was a loud sound of bells now, and of people cheering. Joe's
throat had a lump in it; he knew well enough what it was, and could
not find his voice to tell. Everybody in the neighborhood was coming,
and they were all cheering as they passed the landmark pines.
"I guess the neighbors mean to give you a little party to-night, sir,"
said Joe. "I see six or eight sleighs comin' along the road. They've
all heard about it; some o' the boys that was here with the riggin'
went down to the store last night, and they was all tellin' how you
stood right up to Ferris like a king, an' drove him. You see, they're
all gratified on account of having you put a stop to Ferris's tricks
about them pines," he repeated. Joe did not dare to look at Lizzie or
her mother, and in two minutes more the room began to fill with
people, and John Packer, who usually hated company, was shaking hands
hospitably with everybody that came.
Half an hour afterward, Mr. Packer and Joe Banks and Joe's friend
Chauncey were down cellar together, filling some pitchers from the
best barrel of cider. The guests were tramping to and fro overhead in
the best room; there was a great noise of buzzing talk and laughter.
"Come, sir, give us a taste before we go up; it's master hot up
there," said Chauncey, who was nothing if not convivial; and the three
men drank solemnly in turn from the smallest of the four pitchers;
then Mr. Packer stooped again to replenish it.
"Whatever become o' that petition?" whispered Chauncey; but Joe Banks
gave him a warning push with his elbow. "Wish ye merry Christmas!"
said Chauncey unexpectedly to some one who called him from the
stairhead.
"Hold that light nearer," said Mr. Packer. "Come, Joe, I ain't goin'
to hear no more o' that nonsense about me beatin' off old Ferris." He
had been king of his Christmas company upstairs, but down here he was
a little ashamed.
"Land! there's the fiddle," said Chauncey. "Le' 's hurry up;" and the
three cup-bearers hastened back up the cellar-stairs to the scene of
festivity.
The two Christmas trees, the landmark pines, stood tall and strong on
the hill looking down at the shining windows of the house. There was a
sound like a summer wind in their tops; the bright moon and the stars
were lighting them, and all the land and sea, that Christmas night.