“You will be asleep,” explains Testament. “The lamp will be turned low and have a cover over it. Everything will be still. I’ll have somebody behind the curtain to take off the cover of the moon, and slowly turn up the lamp. One of you wise men wakes up and sees the dim light. You wakes up the rest of the bunch, and you all stands up, looking at the light.
“Then you—Magpie. I reckon we better have the mule layin’ down, hadn’t we? Well, you wakes up the mule, and then you all starts walking slow-like toward the back of the stage, and then we drops the curtain. That’s all there is to it.”
“We’ll have to throw that mule,” opines Wick. “Better hawg-tie it, too, and let somebody cut the ropes when they’re ready to go. The humps are all ready to be cinched on.”
“What do we wear?” I asks.
“My wife is makin’ the costumes out of gunny-sacks,” says Wick.
“We’ve got to have something what looks like presents,” opines Testament. “I’ve got a picture, which shows a lot of vases and stuff like that.”
“My wife’s got some stuff that will be just the cheese,” says Wick. “We’ll use some of her chiny vases.”
“What do we have to say?” asks Scenery.
“Ike will do the sayin’,” says Magpie. “He’ll be the one what wakes up first and he will say—uh—what was it, Testament?”
“Lo, there shineth a bright light. Let’s go to it.”