"I might as well dress up a little," she had thought,
"and I guess he'll like colours best."

Almost before she spoke they put in her hands the telegram. They were
pressing toward her, dreading, speechless, trying to hear what should be
read. She stepped nearer to the light of the candles on the little tree,
read, and reread in the stillness. When she looked up her face was so
illumined that she was strange to them once more.

"Oh," she said, "it's his train. It was late for the Local. They've put
him on the Express, and it'll drop him at the draw."

The tense air crumpled into breathings, and a soft clamour filled the
rooms as they told one another, and came to tell her how glad they were.
She pulled herself together and tried to slip into her natural manner.

"It did give me a turn," she confessed; "I thought he'd been--he'd
got...."

She went into the dining room, still without great wonder that they were
all there; but when she saw the women in white aprons, and the table
arrayed, and on it Ellen Bourne's Christmas rose blooming, she broke
into a little laugh.

"Oh," she said, "you done this a-purpose for _him_."

"I hope, Mary, you won't mind," Mis' Mortimer Bates said formally, "it
being Christmas, so. We'd have done just the same on any other day."

"Oh," Mary said, "_mind_!"

They hardly knew her, she moved among them so flushed and laughing and
conformable, praising, admiring, thanking them.

"Honestly, Mary," said Mis' Moran, finally, "we'll have you so you can't
tell Christmas from any other day--it'll be so nice!"

The Express would be due at the "draw" at
eight-thirty--eight-thirty-three, Affer told her when he came back,
"washed up." Mary watched the clock. She had not milked or fed the cows
before she went, because she had thought that _he_ would like to watch
the milking, and it would be something for him to do on that first
evening. So, when she could, she took her shawl and slipped out to the
shed for the pails and her lantern, and went alone to the stable.

Mary opened the door, and her lantern made a golden room of light within
the borderless shadow. The hay smell from the loft and the mangers, the
even breathing of the cows, the quiet safety of the place, met her. She
hung her lantern in its accustomed place, and went about her task.

Her mind turned back to the time that had elapsed since the Local came
in at the Old Trail Town station. She had stood there, with the children
about h