"It would take you two days to make that trip with old Buck and Bright," Spoof protested. "Perhaps more; they're soft with being stall-fed and may quit altogether on the road, and you may not find a convenient armful of hay with which to _fix_ them. Fancy having to send word, 'Wedding postponed on account of the indisposition of Buck and Bright!' No, you must leave all these things to me. You boys are too busy with--much more important business--to be worried about details." Spoof made his plans joyously. If he was not happy at heart over the fact that Jean was to marry me no one could have read it in his face. He would have a minister, he would have licenses, he would have wedding rings--leave it all to him. A week later he came puffing across the crusted prairie, not in leggings this time, but in broad-soled Canadian felts. "Admire my scows," he commanded, as he hove them into view. "Twin schooners of the deep--" "Travelling in ballast," Jack interrupted. "Nay, laden with good tidings. Ah, there she breaks out a line of signals," and Spoof started to wig-wag a message which none of us could decipher. "'I fear thee, Ancient Mariner,'" said Jean, "but what are you driving at?" "Just this, that the contract is let to one John Locke, minister, the lowest, and, in fact, the only bidder. He will be aided and abetted by an individual called Reddy, for reasons which will be obvious when you see him. Reddy, like Jake, appears to harbor no surname, although no doubt for official purposes he signs something to the marriage license. They will be out by mid-afternoon Christmas Day, and the ceremony will take place in the main drawing room of my country residence on section Two. Carriages at four-thirty. You see, I lost no time in going to town----" "You to town, with those 'bullocks' of yours!" Jack exclaimed. "And you libelled Buck and Bright by suggesting----" "I went to town, but not behind my bullocks. There are _some_ things I will not do, even for so great a friendship as I bear for thee. I had a driver and a spanking team of mules." "Mules? Whose?" "Our American friend, Burke, lent his team and himself for the occasion. The fact is he had misgivings about lending the team without himself, so he came along. He was afraid I would not treat the mules diplomatically. Nothing, I assure you, was, or is, further from my intention. But, my word, such language! Driving bullocks is only a beginner's course compared with the demands made upon a muleteer. . . Burke rose very greatly in my estimation."