o see what miracle had been wrought in the night.

"_Father_!"--Her voice caught in her throat.... What was all this?...
By some mysterious influence her husband learned that she was calling
him, though he had not really heard. He came to the door and looked at
her, then at the chimneypiece where the stockings hung--a long row of
them, as they had not hung since the children grew up--stockings of
quality: one of brown silk, Nan's; a fine gray sock with scarlet
clocks, Ralph's,--all stuffed to the top, with bundles overflowing
upon the chimneypiece and even to the floor below.

"What's this--what's this?" John Fernald's voice was puzzled. "Whose
are these?" He limped closer. He put on his spectacles and stared hard
at a parcel protruding from the sock with the scarlet clocks.

"'_Merry Christmas to Ralph from Nan_,'" he read. "'To Ralph from
Nan,'" he repeated vaguely. His gaze turned to his wife. His eyes were
wide like a child's. But she was getting to her feet, from the chair
into which she had dropped.

"The children!" she was saying. "They--they--John--they must be
_here_!"

He followed her through the chilly hall to the front staircase, seldom
used now, and up--as rapidly as those slow, stiff joints would allow.
Trembling, Mrs. Fernald pushed open the first door at the top.

A rumpled brown head raised itself from among the pillows, a pair of
sleepy but affectionate brown eyes smiled back at the two faces
peering in, and a voice brimful of mirth cried softly: "Merry
Christmas, mammy and daddy!" They stared at her, their eyes growing
misty. _It was their little daughter Nan, not yet grown up!_

They could not believe it. Even when they had been to every room;--had
seen their big son Ralph, still sleeping, his yet youthful face, full
of healthy colour, pillowed on his brawny arm, and his mother had
gently kissed him awake to be half-strangled in his hug;--when they
had met Edson's hearty laugh as he fired a pillow at them--carefully,
so that his father could catch it;--when they had seen plump pretty
Carol pulling on her stockings as she sat on the floor smiling up at
them;--Oliver, advancing to meet them in his bath-robe and
slippers;--Guy, holding out both arms from above his blankets, and
shouting "Merry Christmas!--and how do you like your children?"--even
then it was difficult to realise that not one was missing--and that no
one else was there. Unconsciously Mrs. Fernald found herself looking
about for t