Christmas came so suddenly that they wondered where the month had gone. Christmas Eve the Happy Family spent in arranging a round-up camp out behind the house where the hill rose picturesquely, and in singeing themselves heroically in the heat of radium flares, while Luck took his camp-fire scenes that were triumphs of lighting-effects and photography,—scenes which he would later tone red with aniline dyes.
Annie-Many-Ponies and Rosemary brought out the two-gallon coffee boiler and a can of cream and a small lard pail of sugar, with cups and tin spoons and a pan of boiled-beef and cold-bean sandwiches. Rosemary called "Merry Christmas!" when the dying radium flares betrayed her approach, and the Happy Family jumped up and shouted "Merry Christmas!" to her and one another, just as exuberantly as though they had been celebrating instead of adding six hours or so to a hard day's work.
"That was beautiful, Luck Lindsay," Rosemary declared, giving him a bean sandwich for which he declared himself "strong," and holding the sugar bucket steady while he dipped into it three times.
"We were watching from the house; and the boys' faces, the way you had them placed, looked—oh, I don't know, but it just sent shivers all over me, it was so beautiful. I just hope it comes out that way in the picture!"
"Better," mumbled Luck, taking great, satisfying bites into the sandwich. "Wait till you see it—after it's colored—with the chuck-box end of the wagon showing, and the night horses standing back there in the shadows; she will sure look like a million dollars!"
"She'll shore depict me cookin' and the smoke bilin' up," poor old Applehead remarked lugubriously. "Last five minutes er so I could hear grease a-fryin' on my shins, now I'm tellin' yuh!"
"Well, they don't use radium flares in cold-storage plants," Luck admitted reflectively.
"I know, by cripes, I'm goin' to mend my ways," Big Medicine declared meaningly. "I never realized b'fore how fire 'n brimstone's goin' to feel!"
"Well, I've got to hand it to you, boys," Luck praised them with a smile. "You sat tight, and when I said 'Hold,' you sure held the pose. You dissolved perfectly—you'll see."
"Aw, gwan!" contradicted Happy Jack with his mouth full. "I never dissolved; I plumb melted!"