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swept into the kitchen when Tagg departed via the side door. Leslie shivered in a reflexive action to the sudden chill. In addition to her winter coat and scarf, she’d need a ski hat and her furlined gloves—and a couple of wool socks for her bare toes.

CHAPTER
3

    H OLLY WAS IN perpetual motion in the front seat of the station wagon, too excited to sit still. Leslie had the entire back seat to herself, sitting sideways with her legs stretched over the seat and leaning against the locked, rear passenger door. The used dogsled was stowed on its side in the back, surrounded by the blanket robes so it couldn’t slide all over.
    “How much farther now, Daddy?” Holly wanted to know.
    They were traveling down one of the many unpaved backroads that laced the rural countryside of Vermont. A brief snowfall the night before had coated mountain, tree, and valley with a pristinewhiteness. It was a scene of picture-postcard perfection.
    “It’s the next farm just up the road,” Tagg replied patiently to her oft-repeated question. He partially turned his head in Leslie’s direction without taking his eyes off the road. “Abe Bellows gave us permission to take a tree from his woods.”
    “I wasn’t going to accuse you of trespassing on someone else’s property,” she responded dryly.
    “Come spring, he’s going to brush-hog most of it so he can use it as a pasture for his dairy cattle,” he informed her. “Most of the smaller trees will be cleared out of the valley area when that happens.”
    Leslie made no reply. She understood the reason Tagg was telling her this. He wanted her to know the tree they’d be cutting down for Christmas would be one that would be bulldozed out when the land was cleared the following spring. There was a degree of consolation in that knowledge, yet it didn’t change the fact that she found this whole business of Christmas deplorably overdone.
    Slowing the station wagon, he turned it into the farm lane already snow-packed from the comings and goings of other vehicles. There was a crunch of tires in the hard snow and the metallic rattle of chains with each rotation of the wheels.
    A big collie came bounding out from a red barnto announce their arrival and escorted them past the buildings to a far gate. It continued to bark when Tagg stopped the car, but its flag of a tail waved the air in a manner that seemed more friendly than threatening. The minute Tagg opened the driver’s door, the dog was pushing its cold nose inside to have its head scratched.
    “Some watchdog,” Leslie laughed.
    “He told everybody we were here, didn’t ya, fella.” Tagg rubbed its ears, then gently pushed it out of the way to step outside. “You might as well stay in the car until I get things unloaded.”
    “I’ll help.” Holly shot out of her side, certain her father wasn’t talking to her.
    Unless someone opened the rear door by her feet, Leslie had very little choice but to stay in the car. It wouldn’t do any good to open the door she was leaning against because she couldn’t possibly swing her left leg with its rigid cast around—and going out backward didn’t exactly appeal to her. There wasn’t any way she could reach the other door handle without a lot of wriggling and twisting. So she resigned herself to sit and wait until they had unloaded the things from the back.
    Tagg lowered the tailgate of the station wagon and pulled the sled out. Holly was so busy playing with the brown and white collie that she forgot shehad volunteered to help. Righting the sled, Tagg set it on its runners and tossed the fur robes onto it. Only two items remained in the back, an axe with its blade encased in a leather pocket and a leather rifle case. When he started to remove both, Leslie frowned in confusion.
    “Why are you taking the rifle?” she asked, then arched a dryly mocking eyebrow. “Don’t tell me you’re going to shoot the tree before you chop it down.”
    “No,” he chuckled, his warm breath