smiled at him. She felt as if she were smiling from a great
distance--and she had to look at him over a perfect thicket of orchids.
"Shall I always have to sit so far away from you, Derry?" she asked in
a very small voice.

"My dearest, no--" and he came and stood behind her, and reached for
her little coffee cup and drank where her lips had touched,
shamelessly, before the eyes of the sympathetic and romantic Miss Emily.

And now Emily had gone! And at last Jean and Derry were alone in the
bridal bower, and Jean was telling Derry again what his father had
said. "He begged me to stay--"

Their eyes met. "Dearest, dearest," Derry said, "what is life doing to
me?"

"It has given you me, Derry"--such a little, little whisper.

"My beloved--yes."

The next morning they talked it over.

"What am I to do? He needs me more than ever--"

"There must be some way out, Derry."

But what way? The Tin Soldier had jumped from the shelf, but he had
fallen through a crack! And the war was going on without him--!

CHAPTER XXII

JEAN PLAYS PROXY

Christmas morning found the General conscious. He was restless until
Jean was brought to him. He had a feeling that she had saved him from
Hilda. He wanted her where he could see her. "Don't leave me," he
begged.

She slipped away to eat her Christmas dinner with Derry and Emily and
Margaret. It was an early dinner on account of the children. They ate
in the big dining room, and after dinner there was a tree, with Ulrich
Stoelle playing Father Christmas. It had come about quite naturally
that he should be asked. It had been unthinkable that Derry could
enter into the spirit of it, so Emily had ventured to suggest Ulrich.
"He will make an ideal Santa Claus."

But it developed that he was not to be Santa Claus at all. He was to
be Father Christmas, with a wreath of mistletoe instead of a red cap.

Teddy was intensely curious about the change. "But why isn't he Santa
Claus?" he asked.

"Well, Santa Claus was--made in Germany."

"Oh!"

"But now he has joined the Allies and changed his name."

"Oh!"

"And he wears mistletoe, because mistletoe is the Christmas bush, and
red caps don't really mean anything, do they?"

"No, but Mother--"

"Yes?"

"If Santa Claus has joined the Allies what will the little German
children do?"

_What indeed_?

Jean had trimmed a little tree for the General, and the children
carried it up to him carefully and sang