“So long as mother lived, we did pretty well,” Daisy said. “She took in sewing and I went for and carried home the work; but when she died and we sold the things to pay the doctor’s bill, and keep us from starving, it was so hard; then I peddled in the street and tried to earn a living, and tried to be good and remember all mother had taught me, but sometimes, when I was so cold, and nobody bought, and the ladies held their purses tight if I came near them, and the newsboys halloed after me, and Rena was home so hungry waiting for me, I thought God had forgotten us; but Rena never did. Her faith was always strong, and her sweet, baby words of comfort kept my heart from breaking.”
They were all sobbing but Daisy, who alone was calm, as she went over the dreadful past which was now done with forever. Cold, nor hunger, nor insult, would ever touch Daisy again, and, as some great shock frequently unsettles the mind, so, contrarywise, it sometimes restores it, and the excitement and surprise of finding her sister and friends seemed to restore Daisy’s reason wholly, and after a moment she said, as she put her hand to her head and turned to her husband with one of her brightest smiles, “It is all gone,—the confusion and uncertainty. Every thing is clear as it was before baby died. I am myself once more. Thank God for giving me back my mind with all the other blessings.”
She did seem perfectly sane, and never was there a happier family group than that at the farm-house on that Christmas eve. They did not go to the church, for they felt that their joy was something with which strangers had nothing to do, and they kept the festival at home and talked together of all the wonderful ways through which God had led them, until the bell of the church across the common rang for twelve and another Christmas morn was ushered in.
Rena had her book at last,—the story of Bethlehem,—and though many costlier presents have been given her since, she prizes none of them so much as that “sweet story of old” which came to her with the sister she had believed to be dead. Her home proper is in the city now, with Daisy, where her winters are spent, and where Grandpa and Grandma Harris often come; but, all through the summer months, she stays at the old farm-house with Daisy and the sturdy boy who has taken the place of the little Irene. Uncle Obed always goes to the Christmas festival in the old church, and though his voice trills and shakes a little, he does not stop for that, but with a silent thanksgiving in his heart for the children restored to him, joins heartily in the “Peace on earth, and good will toward men,” which goes up to Heaven from so many tongues on that, night of nights—that “wonderful night” when—
“Down o’er the stars to restore us,
Leading His flame-winged chorus.
Comes the Eternal to sight:—
Wonderful, wonderful night!”
THE END
OF