Christmas at Stony Creek

Chapter One
• Pip, Short for Pipsqueak

Chapter Two
• When Will Papa Be Home?

Chapter Three
• “I’m Still Hungry”

Chapter Four
• Two Days to Christmas

Chapter Five
• One Step at a Time

Chapter Six
• Owl!

Chapter Seven
• “It Was the Trap”

Chapter Eight
• “I’ll Go Tonight”

Chapter Nine
• Pip’s First Step

Chapter Ten
• Land’s End

Chapter Eleven
• It Might Just Work

Chapter Twelve
• The Best Christmas Ever

Postscript

About the Author and Illustrator

Credits

Copyright

About the Publisher

T
hey roasted the last chestnut the night Papa left home.

He sat in his chair in front of the fireplace with Nibs and Nan tucked in on either side. Mama knitted in her chair across from him, her foot rocking Baby Finny asleep in the cradle.

The three older children sprawled on the floor. The glow of the fire flickered over their faces. Will, with his injured leg, stared silently into the flames.
Kit lay beside him, whittling his newest carving.

Pip was the one with her head in a book.

Pip was always the one with her head in a book.

“Better look sharp, Pip,” Papa warned in his deep voice as he cracked the warm chestnut open, “or the greedy beggars you call your brothers and sisters won’t leave you a crumb.”

“When is a mouse a bookworm?” said Kit. “When her name is Pip.”

“Pip’s a worm. Pip’s a worm,” chanted Nibs and Nan, and giggled.

Pip looked up at her father and smiled. He was the one who had named her Pip, short for Pipsqueak, when she was born.

“You were so small we made a nest for you in a
teacup,” he told her, again and again because she never got tired of hearing it. “We thought we had lost you until we heard a tiny squeak and saw two huge brown eyes looking up at us.”

Pip was still small. She was quiet, too. It used to be that she was sometimes lonely in the midst of her boisterous family. She felt as if no one saw, or heard, her. Then, one day, Papa said, “You may not speak in a big voice, Pip, but I hear you, loud and clear.”

Pip never felt lonely again.

“It’s all right,” she told him now. “I don’t like chestnuts that much.”

Papa knew she didn’t mean it. Everyone in the family loved the dense meat of the glossy nuts. They were a special treat. But there had been so few of
them this winter. So little food of any kind.

Pip would be glad to give her share to Will if it would help bring his old smile back.

“Nonsense,” Papa said. He held the shell with the meat cut into equal pieces out to her. “There’s plenty to go around.”

Pip took a morsel and held it up to her nose. The rich smell made her empty stomach grumble. She tucked it into her pocket for later.

Papa looked around at his family, his kind face wreathed in a reassuring smile. “I’ll be home in two days with more food than you’ve ever seen,” he said. “Three days at the most. We’ll have a Christmas feast. Invite everyone we know.”

“Hip, hip, hooray!” squealed Nibs and Nan.

Papa tickled them, making them shriek with delight. Then Mama took them off to bed. Soon it was Pip’s bedtime, too.

“Your brother may need your help finding food while I’m gone,” Papa said as he tucked the blankets snugly around her. “This snow is giving his leg a devil of a time.”

I can’t!
Pip wanted to cry.
You have to be strong and brave to find food! I’m afraid!

She longed to ask Papa about the spots of blood she had seen dotting his paws when he came home from digging for food in the deep snow that had covered the woods for weeks.

And about the stories she had heard of the hungry animals roaming through the trees, stealing any
food you were lucky enough to find.

The look she saw in her father’s eyes stopped her.

“Don’t worry, Papa,” she said. She patted his huge paw with her tiny one. “If Will can’t do it, I can.”

“I know you can, my girl,” Papa said. He kissed her and stood up. “You can do anything in the world.”

Pip clutched at a corner of his jacket. Papa was like a tall and gentle giant. Her very own gentle giant, who kept her safe.

“Three days at the most?” she asked.

“Three days at the most,” he promised.

P
ip, come back!” the other skaters called. “Come back!”

“I can’t,” Pip cried. “I’m late!”

She tucked her chin into her chest and ran. The wind sliced through her thin coat. Sleet pricked her face like icy nails.

The last light of the day was fading from the sky.

Pip never should have stopped to skate. She should have found food and gone straight home. But
it had been so wonderful to glide and twirl across the pond, to whip around at the end of a long chain, happy and carefree like the tail of a kite.

To forget, even for an hour.

Pip had been having so much fun she hadn’t realized the time. Now she was late. Mama would be worried.

And all Pip had found for dinner were a few seeds and a small piece of corncob.

She started up the hill in front of her. The thin layer of ice covering the snow made the going treacherous. Suddenly Pip slipped and banged her head. Tears rushed to her eyes.

Oh,
where
was Papa? she thought, as she struggled to her feet. Why didn’t he come home? Three days had
become eight, and there was still no word from him.

And where was Will? Why wasn’t he helping her?

He was the oldest. And the bravest.

At least he used to be brave. But not anymore.

Not since his trip to the house perched at the edge of the cliff, overlooking the woods. Land’s End, it was called. Will had gone there with Uncle Hank last fall.

When he came back, he was changed.

He dragged his wounded leg behind him. He jumped every time he heard a loud noise. Will, the family joker, no longer laughed.

And Uncle Hank was dead.

Pip gave herself an angry shake. What would Uncle Hank have said if he had seen her standing here, crying? What about her promise to Papa?

Pip struggled on.

The sleet-covered snow made the going treacherous. For every two steps she took forward, she slid one step back.
Oh, why didn’t you bring your walking stick?
she scolded herself fiercely.
You’ll never get home at this rate.
The thought brought a sob to her throat.

Then miraculously, through the gloom, Pip spotted a patch of bright green against the white. It was the tip of a Christmas fern, poking its head through the ice. Pip grabbed it and pulled herself forward.

There was another fern, and another.

Slowly she inched her way to the top of the slippery bank. A small, round window nestled in the roots of a tree was straight ahead. It was lit by a single candle.

Home.

Pip’s heart soared as she ran toward it. She could hardly wait to get inside. She’d throw herself into her mother’s arms and ask the questions that had been running through her mind all week.
Where’s Papa? Why doesn’t he come back?

What if he’s dead, like Uncle Hank?

Mama would tell her not to be silly. She’d say nothing would ever happen to Papa. That he’d be home tomorrow, for sure. They would feast on barley soup and hot corn fritters.

Everything would be all right.

The comforting warmth of home wafted over Pip’s face as she opened the front door. She heard her mother’s anxious voice.

“Where have you been, Pip?” she called. “I’ve been worried sick.”

And Pip knew that everything wasn’t all right, after all.

“Sorry, Mama!”

Pip hung her wet scarf on a peg beside the door and curved her mouth into a smile. Then she closed the door and shut out the night.

I
’m still hungry,” said Nibs.

“Me, too,” said Nan.

“Here. Have mine.” Pip pushed her plate across the table. “I’ve had enough,” she lied.

Next to them, Will was eating with his head down. Kit was busy licking his plate.

Finny pounded her cup on her high chair. “More! More!” she squealed.

Her sweet face was so indignant Pip had to laugh.

“Now, you hush.” Mama came out from the kitchen and stood wiping her paws on her apron as she looked around the table. “That’s all the food there is. You should be grateful for it.”

“I know where there’s more,” Kit said in a low voice.

“Kit…” Mama said quietly.

“I do,” he insisted. “And
I’m
not afraid to go there.”

“That’s enough!”

Mama’s sharp voice echoed around the room like a shot. Nan and Nibs froze. Kit lowered his plate silently to the table. Only Will kept eating, bowing his head even lower.

The rest of them stared at their mother, astonished.

Mama never raised her voice to them. Never.

“If anyone says another word about food, I don’t know what I’ll do,” she said. Her voice was shaking.

No one said a word until Finny started to cry. The sound unfroze them all.

Mama scooped Finny out of her high chair and carried her from the room. Pip stood up quietly. “Let’s do the dishes,” she said.

Will pushed his chair away from the table and limped into the living room without looking back. Nan, Nibs, and Kit followed Pip into the kitchen.

When the dishes were washed and put away, Pip helped the little girls into their nightgowns and read them a book. Then she went into her own room and shut the door. Her walking stick was lying in its place
on the floor beside her bed. Pip picked it up.

It was her special stick, long and straight, with a fork at the top like a
Y
. Uncle Hank had helped her make it last summer.

He had shown Pip how to peel off the bark to reveal the slippery, silky wood underneath. How to sand it over and over again until the sharp knots became smooth humps and the stick was as smooth as glass.

It looked delicate, but it was strong. Uncle Hank said there wasn’t another stick like it.

“It’s hickory wood,” he told her as he turned it over in his gnarled paws. “Nothing’s stronger than hickory. This stick will come in mighty handy, you’ll see.”

He was right.

It had saved Pip from falling into Stony Creek when she slipped on Twig Bridge during the flood. It was the perfect thing to use when she played the proud king in games with Nan and Nibs. It had helped her scare off nasty Badger when he poked his nose into her hiding place during a game of hide-and-seek.

One sharp
rap!
had sent him running.

Uncle Hank never knew how right he had been, but Pip thanked him silently each time she felt the stick’s smooth strength. She ran her paws along it now as she thought about what Kit had said at dinner.

She knew where she could find more food, too.

At Land’s End. The people had built it last
summer, cutting down trees and destroying the homes of countless animals to make room for it.

Pip had never seen it, but she’d heard stories.

The people who lived there had more food than they could eat, everyone said. They covered their tables with food. What they couldn’t eat, they threw into huge metal cans with locks.

It was hard for Pip to imagine such riches. Having so much food you would throw some away.

Uncle Hank and Will had gone up there to see it for themselves. When Will came back alone, Mama had made the rest of them, including Papa, promise they wouldn’t go near it.

Promising had been easy for Pip. She never wanted to
see
Land’s End as long as she lived. But in
the quiet of her room, holding the stick that gave her strength, she knew she might have to break her promise.

If she didn’t go, Kit would.

Pip couldn’t bear it if something were to happen to her other brother because she was afraid. If her father didn’t come home soon, she knew she would have to go.