“Well, I vow I hardly know.  One thing first, anyhow—­we must get Mrs. Durham and the kids into the warm waiting-room, and then look after your traps.”

The room was already crowded, but we squeezed them in, white from scarcely more than a moment’s exposure to the storm.  Then we took hold and gave the deck-hands a lift with my baggage, Merton showing much manly spirit in his readiness to face the weather and the work.  My effects were soon piled up by themselves, and then we held a council.

“Mrs. Durham’ll hardly want to face this storm with the children,” began Mr. Jones.

“Are you going home?” I asked.

“Yes, sir.  I’d rather travel all night for the sake of being home in the morning.”

“To tell the truth I feel the same way,” I continued, “but reason must hold the reins.  Do you think you could protect Mrs. Durham and the children from the storm?”

“Yes, I think we could tuck ’em in so they’d scarcely know it was snowin’, and then we could sled your things up in the mornin’.  ‘Commodations on the landin’ to-night will be pretty crowded.”

“We’ll let her decide, then.”

When I explained how things were and what Mr. Jones had said, she exclaimed, “Oh, let us go home.”

How my heart jumped at her use of the word “home” in regard to a place that she had never seen.  “But, Winifred,” I urged, “do you realize how bad a night it is?  Do you think it would be safe for Mousie?”

“It isn’t so very cold if one is not exposed to the wind and snow,” she replied, “and Mr. Jones says we needn’t be exposed.  I don’t believe we’d run as much risk as in going to a little hotel, the best rooms of which are already taken.  Since we can do it, it will be so much nicer to go to a place that we feel is our own!”

“I must say that your wishes accord with mine.”

“Oh, I knew that,” she replied, laughing.  “Mr. Jones,” she added, sociably, “this man has a way of telling you what he wishes by his looks before asking your opinion.”

“I found that out the day he came up to see the place,” chuckled my neighbor, “and I was half a mind to stick him for another hundred for being so honest.  He don’t know how to make a bargain any more than one of the children there.  Well, I’ll go to the shed and get the hosses, and we’ll make a pull for home.  I don’t believe you’ll be sorry when you get there.”

Mr. Jones came around to the very door with the rockaway, and we tucked my wife and children under the buffalo robes and blankets till they could hardly breathe.  Then we started out into the white, spectral world, for the wind had coated everything with the soft, wet snow.  On we went at a slow walk, for the snow and mud were both deep, and the wheeling was very heavy.  Even John Jones’s loquacity was checked, for every time he opened his mouth the wind half filled it with snow.  Some one ahead of us, with a lantern, guided our course for a mile or so