The club was in full session. Everybody was there, with Sam Parker fully restored to his old position of influence. A fortnight had passed since the rescue of the injured woodsman and Varley’s little lunch, two incidents which had restored Sam’s relations with Step and Poke and made easy his return to the fellowship of the club. There it was understood that Parker didn’t like to be joked about runaway horses or mince pies, and these topics being placed under taboo, things were going much as they had gone in the days before Mrs. Grant’s horse chose to bolt and before Varley came upon the scene.
Sam enjoyed the renewed companionship. It had needed a brief denial of it to realize what it meant to him. So he had been as little disposed to take offense as the others had been to give it; and there had been hardly a ripple of bickering anywhere until the Shark, of a sudden, developed a case of nerves and a yearning for squabbles.
“You’re the most useless crowd!” he grumbled. “Why don’t you do something? Why don’t you get a move on? You’re loafing on the job, every one of you!”
There was a long silence after this outburst, which took the others completely by surprise. Finally Sam spoke.
“Well, what do you want to have us do?”
“Oh, anything!”
“But what is there to do?” Step inquired.
“What is there to do?” the Shark echoed scornfully. He sprang from his chair and came forward. “Look here, all of you! You make me tired! Why, right in this room a while ago I heard Step going on about this being the meanest, slowest, stupidest part of the year.”
“So it is,” Step insisted.
“That’s what you said. There’s no skating, and the snow-shoeing and sleighing and coasting are not worth having—wasn’t that your argument?”