"No, I didn't sign," Ellen said. "I voted against it that night at the town meeting, but I guess nobody heard me."
"Well," said Simeon, "and so here you've got a Christmas of your own going forward, neat as a kitten's foot—"
"Ain't you coming over to Mary Chavah's?" Abel broke in with a kind of gentleness. "All of you?"
Ellen smote her hands together.
"I meant to go over later," she said, "and take—" She paused. "I thought we'd all go over later," she said. "I forgot about it. Why, yes, I guess we can go now, can't we? All three of us?"
Abel Ames stood looking at the tree. He half guessed that she might have dressed it for no one who would see it. He looked at Ellen and ventured what he thought.
"Ellen," he said, "if you ain't going to do anything more with that tree to-night, why not take some of the things off, and have Matthew set it on his shoulder, and bring it over to Mary's for the boy that's coming?"
Ellen hesitated. "Would they like it?" she asked. "Would folks?"
Abel smiled. "I'll take the blame," he said, "and you take the tree." And seeing Simeon hesitate, "Now let's stop by for Mis' Moran's coffee-pot," he added. "Hustle up. The Local must be in."
So presently the tree, partly divested of its brightness, was carried through the streets to the other house—in more than the magic which attends the carrying in the open road of a tree, a statue, a cart filled with flowers,—for the tree was like some forbidden thing that still would be expressed.