Bird stood quite still in the little open space by a side door back of the pews; it was the first really peaceful time she had known since the day that she and Lammy carried the red peonies to the hillside graveyard, and as she thought of it, she seemed to smell the sweet spruce fragrance of those runaway Christmas trees that watched where her parents slept.
A flock of little choir boys trooped in from an opposite door for the final practice of their Christmas carols and grouped themselves in the stalls. Next a quiver of sound rushed through the church as the great organ drew its breath and swelled its lungs, as if humming the melody before breaking into voice. Then above its tones rang a clear boy-soprano.
“Watchman! tell us of the night
What the signs of promise are.”
and the chorus answered—
“Traveller! o’er yon mountain height,
See that glory-beaming star.”
The answering echo quivered in Bird’s throat, suffocating her, and as, unable to stand, she knelt trembling upon the floor the odour of spruce again enveloped her, and groping, she found that she was really leaning against a pile of small trees that had been brought there to decorate the church for Christmas Eve, and as the door opened, men came in bringing more—dozens and dozens of them, it seemed.
Bird picked up a broken twig, and in spite of its sharpness pressed it against her face, kissing it passionately, never noticing that she was directly in the passage between the door and aisle, where presently a gentleman coming hurriedly in stumbled over her.
He was about to pass on with a curt apology, but glancing down, he saw that it was a little girl, and that though comfortably dressed and not actually poor, her face showed signs of distress and tears, so he stopped.
“What is it, my child?” he said. “Have you lost your way, or what? Come here and sit in this pew while you tell me about it. I’ve a daughter at home only a couple of years older than you, and she doesn’t like to have any one sad at Christmas time.”
It was months since any one had spoken to Bird in the gentle tongue that had been her father’s and was her own, and though the tears started anew, she made haste to obey, lest he should suddenly disappear like all her pleasant dreams.