Sitting on the arm of her father's chair, Patricia told her story.

"Have--you been in your room, Aunt Julia?" she asked.

"I have, Patricia."

"I am sorry about Custard, Aunt Julia; but Archibald wouldn't be
comforted without him; he wanted his--mother."

Miss Kirby thought of the long dining-room down at the hotel, turned
into a hospital ward; where on this Christmas eve more than one mother
was lying very near the borders of the undiscovered country.

"And I had to take your room, Aunt Julia," Patricia went on, "so as to
have two communicating ones. I hope you don't mind much?"

And Miss Kirby had not the heart to admit how much, in her present
weariness of mind and body, she did care.

The doctor patted Patricia's cheek. "I thought Mrs. Brown was keeping
those children wonderfully out of the way. I wish their poor mothers
could have known how well they were being cared for."

Patricia drew a quick breath of pleasure. "And we'll keep them over
Christmas, Daddy?"

"That depends--upon various things. By the way, where do you sleep
to-night, Pat?"