“And sure, when we met the doctor, by chance, with news of this meat, the little cap’n told us to come in and eat, but he wouldn’t. He went on—him and the doctor—hungry as he was, to find the camp below,” mumbled John. “They’ll send hosses. How many did you kill? Four?”
“Four,” assured Baroney. “Stub one, the doctor one, I myself had the fortune to kill two. Stub, he found them; but it was the good God who put them there, waiting for us.”
“I suppose we might have a bit of a fire, and eat like Christians, whilst waiting?” Terry proposed wistfully.
“The marrow is strong; we must not get sick,” Baroney wisely counseled. “Let us butcher, and be ready for the horses; and to-morrow we will all have a big Christmas dinner.”
“To-morrow Christmas?” exclaimed John. “Right you are! Hooray for Christmas!”
They cheered for Christmas; and with aching brain Stub puzzled over the new word.
Toward the last of their butchering Corporal Jerry Jackson and Hugh Menaugh arrived with two horses. The camp was famished, the lieutenant and the doctor had toiled in, and now everybody there was waiting for the buffalo meat. The camp had been out of food for two days.
“I told the doctor that the boy an’ his pistol would fetch him luck,” Hugh declared. “An’ it surely did. Faith, a fine little hunter you be, Stub, me lad.”
They loaded the horses, at full speed, and made for the starving camp. It was a joyous place. John Sparks had come in with more good news—he had discovered another buffalo herd and had killed four, himself! Men and horses were out, to get the meat.
Now with eight buffalo on hand, Christmas Eve was to be celebrated to-night, and Christmas Day to-morrow. They were American feasts—feasts for the Spanish and French and all white people, too, the doctor and Sergeant Bill said. Stub had heard the names before, somewhere; perhaps from the French traders. But he quit thinking and bothering. He was an American, they were his feasts now; Lieutenant Pike looked happy, and that was enough.