heir hands; and they're as poor as
death. They were going to give her in charge to the authorities. The
woman said she couldn't feed her another day. That's about the whole of
it. If Tim don't bring her back, they'll know where she is, and be
thankful."

"Do you want to go home with me, and hang up your stocking, and have a
Christmas?"

"My golly!" ejaculated Tim, staring.

The little one smiled shyly, and was mute. She didn't know what
Christmas was. She had been cold, and she was warm, and her mouth and
hands were filled with sweet cake. And there were pleasant words in her
ears. That was all she knew. As much as we shall comprehend at first,
perhaps, when the angels take us up out of the earth cold, and give us
the first morsel of heavenly good to stay our cravings.

This was how it ended. Tim had a paper bag of apples and cakes, with
some sugar pigs and pussy cats put in at the top, and a pair of warm
stockings out of Glory's bag, to carry home, for himself; and he was to
say that the lady who came to see his mother had taken Jo away into the
country. To Miss Henderson's, at Kinnicutt. Glory wrote these names upon
a paper. Tim was to be a good boy, and some day they would come and see
him again.

Then Nurse Sampson's plaid shawl was wrapped about little Jo, and pinned
close over her rags to keep out the cold of Christmas Eve; and the bell
rang presently; and she was taken out into the bright, warm car, and
tucked up in a corner, where she slept all the hour that they were
steaming over the road.

And so these three went out to Kinnicutt to keep Christmas at the Old
House.

So Glory carried home the Christ gift that had come to her.

Tim went back, alone, to number ninety-three. He had his bag of good
things, and his warm stockings, and his wonderful story to tell. And
there was more supper and breakfast for five than there would have been
for six. Nevertheless, somehow, he missed the "little brick."

Out at Cross Corners, Miss Henderson's Home was all aglow. The long
kitchen, which, by the outgrowth of the house for generations, had come
to be a central room, was flooded with the clear blaze of a great pine
knot, that crackled in the chimney; and open doors showed neat adjoining
rooms, in and out which the gleams and shadows played, making a
suggestive pantomime of hide and seek. It was a grand old place for
Christmas games! And three little bright-faced girls sat round the knee
of a tidy, cheery old wom