Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 2).djvu/586

 we had not come by the train. The station-master was a good man, and did his best to get us out of our trouble. He had doubts about another train coming down that day—it was a branch road with one track—and he thought it would be a great pity if the Dollivers should be deprived of the company of two of their Christmas guests; a lot of them had come up the day before. Nobody in the village made a business of hiring out vehicles or carrying passengers, but an idea had struck the station-master, and he had gone out to see what he could do with it.

In about a quarter of an hour he returned.

"Well, sir," he said, "there is just one thing you can do. There isn't anybody in this village who will go to Dollivers' to-day, for there is no chance of getting back to-night, but the man who keeps the store here, Mr. Peter Chase, has got a horse and sleigh, and if you choose to hire that of him, and do your own driving, I think you can get it, if you are willing to pay him something extra, for he'll have to send a man over to-morrow with the stage driver to bring it back; and besides, in rough times like these, people always charge something extra."

I put the matter before Miss Welden, and she did not hesitate to say that, rather than take the risk of being obliged to remain in the village, where there were no accommodations for strangers, she would take the risk of letting me drive her to the Dollivers'.

"It is only seven miles," she said, "and if the horse is good enough, I don't see what there is to happen."

I tramped through the snow to Peter Chase's store, and quickly arranged with him for the hire of his horse and sleigh.

"Five dollars may seem a good deal, sir," he said, "for a trip like that, but this is a pretty deep snow, and we all ought to remember that Christmas comes but once a year. I'll have the sleigh round at the station in ten minutes.'

In half an hour a little sleigh, drawn by a big brown horse, came up to the back door of the station.

"I would have been here sooner," said Mr. Chase, "but it was a good while before I could find the bells, and I knowed you wouldn't want to take a Christmas sleigh-ride without bells."

I did not complain of the delay, although I had been getting dreadfully impatient. The station-master had had a telegram from up the line, stating that a down train with a snow-plough was on its way, and I was very much afraid that Miss Welden would conclude to wait, and take this train back to the city, so without loss of time we bundled in. The Christmas-minded Mr. Chase had brought two heavy fur robes; our valises were packed in behind, the sleigh being of the box variety, and we were ready.