"You are right, Fritz," said the wife, wiping a tear from her eyes. "For Olaf's sake I will dress the tree and bake a cake." So saying, she tidied up her best parlor, and took from a brass-bound chest the gay ribbons and trinkets which had not been used since the Christmas eve her little one last spent on earth.
Very lonely and sad would these two people have been but for Olaf, the son of their nearest neighbor. It was he whose clear ringing voice might be heard in the forest when returning from his work, and Fritz said that it made labor light but to hear him. It was he, too, who, when Fritz had been lamed by the fall of a tree, had borne him home on his strong young shoulders; so it was no wonder that the good wife was grateful to him. Often at evening he made their
fireside bright with his songs and merry stories, and now it was but just that they should shake off their sorrow for his sake; so the good wife drew out her spotless board, and kneaded spice-cakes, and spread her best damask, and set out the fine china.
"Ah, if I had my little one!" murmured the good woman. "but God knows best," she quickly added, as she remembered many blessings.
"Here comes Olaf!" shouted Fritz from below. "Come quickly, lest he think thee tardy."
"Yes, yes, I come. I see him," was her reply. "but what is that he carries—something he has picked up on the way?"
"A Christmas gift for thee," was the merry answer from Olaf's ringing voice, as he laid a strange bundle in her arms.
CHAPTER III
Little Flax-Flower had been with St. Nicholas a whole long week. In that time she had been in every nook and corner of his dwelling. She had seen all his elves and dwarfs