The moments seemed very long to Bertie, but he did not speak again.
“My child,” said the Squire at last, “why do you ask for that story to-night?”
Bertie hardly knew himself.
“You have never told it me,” he answered, shyly; “and to-night—”
“Well, to-night?”
“To-night seems a happy time. It is Christmas, you know, and the angels are always glad at Christmas. I think they are always nearer us then, because, you know, the shepherds saw them once, as if they liked to fly nearer to us at Christmas-time—”
Bertie paused again, hardly knowing how to frame the thought, and again the Squire said,—
“Well?”
“I thought, perhaps, they might be nearer to us to-night—Tom and Charley and all of them, you know. Perhaps they are helping the angels to sing; and if they are, I’m sure they would try to come near us to-night. I thought you would not mind telling me about them, when perhaps they are not so very far away. Don’t you think it is rather nice to think that they are up there—so happy helping the angels to sing, ‘Peace on earth and glory to God’?”
There was another long silence, which again the Squire broke.