"No Christmas at all?" quavered Lydia. "Won't we even hang up our
stockings?"

"If you'll be contented just to put a little candy in them. Come,
Lydia, you're too big to hang up your stocking, anyhow."

Lydia left her father and walked over to the window. She pressed her
face against the pane and looked back to the lake. The sun was sinking
in a gray rift of clouds. The lake was a desolate plain of silvery
gold touched with great shadows of purple where snow drifts were high.
As she looked, the weight on her chest lifted. The trembling in her
hands that always came with the mention of money lessened. The child,
even as early as this, had the greatest gift that life bestows, the
power of deriving solace from sky and hill and sweep of water.

"Anyhow," she said to her father, "I've still got something to look
forward to. I've got the doll house to give baby, and Mr. Levine
always gives me a book for Christmas."

"That's a good girl!" Amos gave a relieved sigh, then went on with his
brooding over his unlighted pipe.

And after all, this Christmas proved to be one of the high spots of
Lydia's life. She had a joyous 24th. All the morning she spent in the
woods on the Norton farm with her sled, cutting pine boughs. As she
trudged back through the farmyard, Billy Norton called to her.

"Oh, Lydia!"

Lydia stopped her sled against a drift and waited for Billy to cross