Tom opposed our taking Addison into our
confidence.
"He's older, and he'd get all the credit for it," he objected.
Addison, moreover, had driven to the village that morning; and after
some discussion we decided to take the sleigh on our own responsibility.
It was partly buried in a snowdrift; but we dug it out, and then drew it
across the fields on the snow crust--lifting it over three stone
walls--to a little knoll below the Edwards barn.
We concluded to lay the dead lamb on the top of the knoll at a little
distance from the woods; the sleigh we left on the southeast side about
fifteen paces away. Tom thought that he could shoot accurately at that
distance, even at night.
For my own part I thought fifteen paces much too near. Misgivings had
begun to beset me.
"What if you miss him, Tom?" I said.
"I shan't miss him," he declared firmly.
"But, Tom, what if you only wounded him and he came rushing straight at
us?"
"Oh, I'll fix him!" Tom exclaimed. But I had become very apprehensive;
and at last, Tom helped me to bring cedar rails and posts from a fence
near by to construct a kind of fortress round the sleigh. We set the
posts in the hard snow and made a fence, six rails high--to protect
ourselves.
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