The Christmas Brides: A McKettrick Christmas. Linda Miller Lael

have to do better than that.” She jabbed at his chest with the tip of one index finger. “And kindly do not shake your finger at me!”

      The peddler chuckled.

      “Wild!” Woodrow called shrilly. “Wild!”

      The door at the rear of the caboose opened, and Morgan came in, stomping snow off his boots. He carried several broken tree branches in his arms, laid them down near the stove to dry, so they could be burned later. His gaze came directly to Lizzie and Whitley.

      “I’m leaving!” Whitley said, forcing the words between his teeth.

      “That might be difficult,” Lizzie pointed out dryly, “since we’re stranded.”

      “I won’t stay here and be insulted!”

      “You’d rather go out there and die of exposure?”

      “You think I’m a coward? I’m selfish? Well, I’ll show you, Lizzie McKettrick. I’ll follow the tracks until I come to a town and get help—since your highfalutin family hasn’t shown up!”

      “You can’t do that,” Morgan said, the voice of irritated moderation. “You wouldn’t make it a mile, whether you followed the tracks or not. Anyhow, in case you haven’t been listening, the tracks are buried under snow higher than the top of your head.”

      “Maybe you’re afraid, Dr. Shane, but I’m not!” Whitley looked around, first to the peddler, then to poor John Brennan. “I think we should all go. It would be better than sitting around in this caboose, waiting to fall over the side of a mountain!”

      Ellen raised a small hand, as though asking a question in class. “Are we going to fall over the mountain?” she asked. Jack nestled close against his sister’s side, pale, and thrust a thumb into his mouth.

      “You’re frightening the children!” Lizzie said angrily.

      Morgan raised both hands in a bid for peace. “We’re not going to fall off the mountain,” he told the little girl and Jack, his tone gentle. But when he turned to Whitley, his eyes blazed with temper. “If you want to be a damn fool, Mr. Carson, that’s your business. But don’t expect the rest of us to go along with you.”

      Little Jack began to cry, tears slipping silently down his face, his thumb still jammed deep into his mouth.

      “Stop that,” Ellen told him, trying without success to dislodge the thumb. “You’re not a baby.”

      Whitley grabbed up his blanket, stormed across the car and flung it at Ellen and Jack. Then he banged out of the caboose, leaving the door ajar behind him.

      Lizzie took a step in that direction.

      Morgan closed the door. “He won’t get far,” he told her quietly.

      “Come here to me, Jack,” Mrs. Halifax said. She’d finished feeding and burping the baby, laid her gently on the seat beside her; Nellie Anne was asleep, reminding Lizzie of a cherub slumbering on a fluffy cloud.

      Jack scrambled to his mother, crawled onto her lap.

      Lizzie felt a pinch in her heart. She’d held her youngest brother, Doss, in just that way, when he was smaller and frightened by a thunderstorm or a bad dream.

      “I have some goods in the freight car,” the peddler said, tucking away the pistol, securing his case under the seat and rising. He buttoned his coat and went out.

      Lizzie helped Ellen gather the scattered cards from their game. Mrs. Halifax rocked Jack in her lap, murmuring softly to him.

      Morgan checked the fire, added wood.

      “He’ll be back,” he told Lizzie, when their gazes collided.

      He was referring to Whitley, of course, off on his fool’s errand.

      Lizzie nodded glumly and swallowed.

      When the peddler returned, he was lugging a large wooden crate marked Private in large, stenciled letters. He set it down near the stove, with an air of mystery, and Ellen was immediately attracted. Even Jack slid down off his mother’s lap to approach, no longer sucking his thumb.

      “What’s in there?” the little boy asked.

      The peddler smiled. Patted the crate with one plump hand. Took a handkerchief from inside his coat and dabbed at his forehead. Remarkably, in that weather, he’d managed to work up a sweat. “Well, my boy,” he said importantly, straightening, “I’m glad you asked that question. Can you read?”

      Jack blinked. “No, sir,” he said.

      “I can,” Ellen piped up, pointing to a label on the crate. “It says, ‘Property of Mr. Nicholas Christian.’”

      “That,” the peddler said, “would be me. Nicholas Christian, at your service.” He doffed his somewhat seedy bowler hat, pressed it to his chest and bowed. He turned to Jack. “You ask what’s in this box? Well, I’ll tell you. Christmas. That’s what’s in here.”

      “How can a whole day fit inside a box?” Ellen demanded, sounding at once skeptical and very hopeful.

      “Why, child,” said Nicholas Christian, “Christmas isn’t merely a day. It comes in all sorts of forms.”

      Morgan, having poured a cup of coffee, watched the proceedings with interest. Mrs. Halifax looked troubled, but curious, too.

      “Are you going to open it?” Jack wanted to know. He was practically breathless with excitement. Even John Brennan had stirred upon his sickbed to sit up and peer toward the crate.

      “Of course I am,” Mr. Christian said. “It would be unthinkably rude not to, after arousing your interest in such a way, wouldn’t you say?”

      Ellen and Jack nodded uncertainly.

      “I’ll need that poker,” the peddler went on, addressing Morgan now, since he was closest to the stove. “The lid of this box is nailed down, you know.”

      Morgan brought the poker.

      Woodrow leaned forward on his perch.

      The peddler wedged one end of it under the top of the crate and prized it up with a squeak of nails giving way. A layer of fresh wood shavings covered the contents, hiding them from view.

      Lizzie, preoccupied with Whitley’s announcement that he was going to follow the tracks to the nearest town, looked on distractedly.

      Mr. Christian knelt next to the crate, rubbed his hands together, like a magician preparing to conjure a live rabbit or a white-winged dove from a hat, and reached inside.

      He brought out a shining wooden box with gleaming brass hinges. Set it reverently on the floor. When he raised the lid, a tune began to play. “O little town of Bethlehem…”

      Lizzie’s throat tightened. The works of the music box were visible, through a layer of glass, and Jack and Ellen stared in fascination.

      “Land,” Ellen said. “I ain’t—” she blushed, looked up at Lizzie “—I haven’t never seen nothin’ like this.”

      Lizzie offered no comment on the child’s grammar.

      “It belonged to my late wife, God rest her soul,” Mr. Christian said and, for a moment, there were ghosts in his eyes. Leaving the music box to play, he plunged his hands into the crate again. Brought out a delicate china plate, chipped from long and reverent use, trimmed in gold and probably hand-painted. “There are eight of these,” he said. “Spoons and forks and butter knives, too. We shall dine in splendor.”

      “What’s ‘dine’?” Jack asked.

      Ellen elbowed him. “It means eating,” she said.

      “We ain’t got nothin’ to eat,” Jack pointed out. By then, the crackers and cheese Lizzie had found in the cupboard were long gone, as were the canned foods pirated from the freight