A great laugh greeted this sally: they are so grateful for the smallest of jokes on winter afternoons up North.
Doc Giddings subsided, but the discussion went on without him.
“Well, he’ll have easy going in from Carcajou; the Indians coming in and out have beaten a good trail.”
“Oh, when he gets to Carcajou he’s here.”
“If it don’t snow. That bit over the prairie drifts badly.”
“The barometer’s falling.”
And so on. And so on. They made the small change of conversation go far.
In the midst of it they were electrified by a shout from the land trail and the sound of bells.
“Here he is!” they cried, jumping up to a man, and making for the door.
Ben Causton, conscious of his importance, made a dramatic entrance with the mail-bags over his shoulder, and cast them magnificently on the counter. Even up north, where every man cultivates his own peculiarities unhindered, Ben was considered a “character.” He was a short, thick man of enormous physical strength, and he sported a beard like a quickset hedge, hence his nickname. He was clad in an entire suit of fur like an Eskimo, with a gaudy red worsted sash about his ample middle.