The meadow was dotted with many trees, but Clay-Boy went directly to one of them. The tree was six feet tall, a perfectly symmetrical eastern hemlock. Even in the brisk winter air, Clay-Boy could smell its pungent evergreen scent. He and Mama and the children had come upon it last summer on a berry-picking expedition. They had agreed, even that long ago, that this particular hemlock was to be this year’s Christmas Tree. Whenever some chance brought them to the mountain, they had visited it and envisioned it standing in the corner of the living room, festooned with ropes of silver tinsel and
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