That night after supper Norman insisted on taking his mother down into the village to look at the lighted windows. After they had gone Mary took out her Good Times book to record the happenings of the day. She had a few more notes of acknowledgment to write also, and was glad that Jack was busy with his own writing. She noticed that he was using India ink and a crow-quill pen, but thought nothing of that as he was always experimenting with them.
Joyce was not the only one of the children who had inherited artistic ability. Jack never attempted pictures, but he did beautiful lettering; odd initials and old English script, and had copied verses for calendars and fly-leaf inscriptions. Joyce said some of his pen-and-ink work was as beautifully done as the letters she had seen in old missals, made by the monks.
Nearly an hour went by. Mary addressed her last envelope. He laid down his pen and pushed a narrow strip of cardboard towards her.
"I've made you one more present to end the day with, Mary," he said jokingly. "It's a bookmark."
Inside a narrow border of conventional scrollwork was one line, and the line was from the verse which she had quoted so disastrously that day at the creek-bank:
"Close all the roads of all the world, Love's road is open still!"
As she looked up to speak he interrupted her hurriedly:
"Yes, I know how miserable I made you that day with my outburst against fate, and I've felt that you've never believed me since when I laughed and joked and said that I enjoyed things. But that was only one time that I gave way, just once that I got down in the dumps and I don't want you to think that is my usual state of feelings. Really I'm getting more out of life than you imagine. I'm putting up the best fight I can. I just wanted you to know that although every other road in the world is closed against me I can still scrape along pretty comfortably because that last line is true. Love's road is open still. You all have made it a good wide one for me, and made it worth while for me to travel it with you cheerfully to the end. I'm perfectly willing to, now."
"Oh, Jack!" cried Mary in a voice that trembled with both joy and tears. "I've had a happy Christmas, but knowing you feel that way is the very best part of all!"