E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, Dave Morgan,
and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
It was Christmas Eve on Lonesome. But nobody on Lonesome knew that itwas Christmas Eve, although a child of the outer world could haveguessed it, even out in those wilds where Lonesome slipped from one lonelog cabin high up the steeps, down through a stretch of jungled darknessto another lone cabin at the mouth of the stream.
There was the holy hush in the gray twilight that comes only onChristmas Eve. There were the big flakes of snow that fell as they neverfall except on Christmas Eve. There was a snowy man on horseback in abig coat, and with saddle-pockets that might have been bursting withtoys for children in the little cabin at the head of the stream.
But not even he knew that it was Christmas Eve. He was thinking ofChristmas Eve, but it was of the Christmas Eve of the year before, whenhe sat in prison with a hundred other men in stripes, and listened tothe chaplain talk of peace and good will to all men upon earth, when hehad forgotten all men upon earth but one, and had only hatred in hisheart for him.
"Vengeance is mine! saith the Lord."
That was what the chaplain had thundered at him. And then, as now, hethought of the enemy who had betrayed him to the law, and had sworn awayhis liberty, and had robbed him of everything in life except a fiercelonging for the day when he could strike back and strike to kill. Andthen, while he looked back hard into the chaplain's eyes, and now, whilehe splashed through the yellow mud thinking of that Christmas Eve, Buckshook his head; and then, as now, his sullen heart answered:
"Mine!"
The big flakes drifted to crotch and twig and limb. They gathered on thebrim of Buck's slouch hat, filled out the wrinkles in his big coat,whitened his hair and his long mustache, and sifted into the yellow,twisting path that guided his horse's feet.
High above he could see through the whirling snow now and then the gleamof a red star. He knew it was the light from his enemy's window; butsomehow the chaplain's voice kept ringing in his ears, and every time hesaw the light he couldn't help thinking of the story of the Star thatthe