CHAPTER LIII.
“Baby darling, you are one year old to-day, and only see what Santa Claus has brought you—gifts splendid enough for a little prince!” cried Thea, kneeling down on the nursery floor in her white cashmere morning-dress, to clasp the little toddling boy in her eager arms.
He sprung eagerly to her breast, and when Norman de Vere entered a minute later, he found them thus—Thea on a rug upon the floor, her little son in her arms, their faces so close together that the rich gold of her curls blended with the fairer gold of the baby’s lying in silken curls all over his shapely head. The child’s beauty was cherubic, and while he had hair and eyes like his mother, he had the proud De Vere features, making him strangely like his father in spite of the fact that his eyes were blue, his hair golden, and his skin the loveliest white and red. Alan Arthur they had named him—the Alan for Norman’s father, the brave soldier who had died in battle, and the Arthur was for Lady Edith’s dead husband. She had written and asked that his second name should be Arthur, and promised to come to the christening of the child, but the sudden illness of her brother had prevented the journey, and she had not come yet, although her husband’s namesake was a year old. But she had not forgotten, and many rich gifts had come across the sea to her husband’s namesake from both her and Lord Stuart.
Thea was right in thinking that her boy had gifts splendid enough for a prince, for the Christmas-tree standing over against the window was laden with costly things enough to gladden the heart of a little king. Many had come from friends in the city and many from across the sea. It made the girlish mother very proud and happy to know that her boy was held in so much esteem, and as she clasped and kissed him she whispered to him in the most approved baby-talk, that it was no wonder people fell in love with him—he was so sweet and lovely they simply could not help it.
Norman laughed gayly at her maternal vanity, as he knelt down and took mother and child into his strong, loving embrace, and so his mother found them when she, too, came in to see how Master Alan liked his Christmas-tree.
Baby did not know how to appreciate anything yet. When they put anything into his dimpled little hands, he poked it into his mouth like a little pig. Thea vowed in despair that he would have to be quite five years old before she could allow him to have half of his beautiful playthings, lest he should choke himself to death.
“How strange, dear, it seems to see your child sitting there with its toys at play,” cried grandmamma, smilingly. “Why, it seems but yesterday that you were a child at play yourself, and Norman bringing you new toys every day. On a shelf in my closet now there is a great box of your broken dolls and playthings.”
“Oh, I must look at them some time,” Thea cried, with almost childish delight at the thought; and the very next day she had her maid lug in the big box to her room and leave it on the floor. Alan was out in the grounds with his nurse, Norman was at his desk in the library, Mrs. de Vere was directing the maids about some housework. Thea thought it would be a good time to look over the store of toys Norman had given her. Norman—yes, that was the charm—had loved her in her innocent childhood—had selected these toys for her with his own hands. There was a thought of him in every headless doll, every piece of battered doll furniture, every dog’s-eared book with gayly painted pictures, and the fond heart thrilled with tender thoughts of him.
“My own, own love, my darling who loves me so!” murmured the beautiful red lips; and pausing for a moment in a happy dream, she absently turned the leaves of a torn picture-book.
Ah, what was that that fell out from between the leaves?—a crumpled letter, a little pair of stub-pointed scissors.