“What are you doing here?” he asked, breathless with astonishment. She shook her head wearily and her lips moved as if to say, “I didn’t mean any harm.” But no sound came. She only tried to fold the babe more warmly in her shawl. He took off his overcoat and wrapped it around her. “Come,” he said firmly. “You must come with me,” he added kindly; then, as she did not rise, he put out his hand to lift her, but, instead, suddenly set down the lantern and took the babe gently into his arms. She let him take the child, and rose slowly, her eyes still on him. He motioned for her to take the lantern and she did so. And they came to the door. He turned up the walk, the babe in his arms, and she going before him with the lantern. The ground was softly carpeted with snow, the wind had died down, but the clouds had disappeared and the trees were all white, softly gleaming, like dream-trees in a dream-land. The old man shivered slightly, but not now with cold. He felt as if he had gone back and held once more in his arms one of those babes he had given back to God. He thought of the shepherds who watched by night on the Judean hills. “It must have been such a night as this,” he thought.
As they reached his door he saw that some one had been there in his absence. A large box stood on the little porch and beside it a basket filled with things. So he had not been forgotten after all. The milkman also had called and for his customary small bottle of milk had left one of double the usual size. When he let himself in at the door, he took the milk with him. So the shepherds might have done, he thought.
It was long before he could get the fire to burn; but in time this was accomplished; the room grew warm and the milk was warmed also. The baby was quieted and was soon asleep in its mother’s lap. And as the firelight fell from the open stove on the child, in its mother’s arms before the stove, the old man thought of a little picture he had once seen in a shop window. He had wanted to buy it, but he had never felt that he could gratify such a taste. There were too many calls on him. Then, as she appeared overcome with fatigue, the old man put her with the child in the only bed in the house that was ready for an occupant and, returning to the little living-room, ensconced himself in his arm-chair by the stove. He had meant to finish his sermon, but he was conscious for the first time that he was very tired. But he was also very happy. When he awoke he found that it was quite late. He had overslept and though his breakfast had been set out for him, he had time only to make his toilet and to go to church. The mother and child were still asleep in his room, the babe folded in her arm, and he stopped only to gaze on them a moment and to set the rest of the milk and his breakfast where the young mother could find it on awaking. Then he went to church, taking his half-finished sermon in his worn case. He thought with some dismay that it was unfinished, but the memory of the poor woman and the midnight communion, and of the young mother and her babe, comforted him; so he plodded on bravely. When he reached the church it was nearly full. He had not had such a congregation in a long time. And they were all cheerful and happy. The pang he had had as he remembered that he was to announce his resignation that day was renewed, but only for a second. The thought of the babe and its mother, warmed and fed in his little home, drove it away. And soon he began the service. He had never had such a service. It all appeared to him to have a new meaning. He felt nearer to the people in the pews than he ever remembered to have felt. They were more than ever his flock and he more than ever their shepherd. More, he felt nearer to mankind, and yet more near to those who had gone before—the innumerable company of the redeemed. They were all about him, clad all in white, glistering like the sun. The heavens seemed full of them. When he turned his eyes to the window, the whole earth seemed white with them. The singing sounded in his ears like the choiring of angels. He was now in a maze. He forgot the notice he had meant to give and went straight into his sermon, stumbling a little as he climbed the steps to the pulpit. He repeated the text and kept straight on. He told the story of the shepherds in the fields watching their flocks when the Angel of the Lord came upon them, and told of the Babe in the manger who was Christ the Lord. He spoke for the shepherds. He pictured the shepherds watching through the night and made a plea for their loneliness and the hardship of their lives. They were very poor and ignorant. But they had to watch the flock and God had chosen them to be His messengers. The wise men would come later, but now it was the shepherds who first knew of the birth of Christ the Lord. He was not reading as was his wont. It was all out of his heart and the eyes of all seemed to be on him—of all in pews and of all that innumerable host about him.
He was not altogether coherent, for he at times appeared to confuse himself with the shepherds. He spoke as if the message had come to him, and after a while he talked of some experiences he had had in finding a child in a stable. He spoke as though he had really seen it. “And now,” he said, “this old shepherd must leave his flock; the message has come for him.”
He paused and looked down at his sermon and turned the leaves slowly, at first carefully and then almost aimlessly. A breath of wind blew in and a few leaves slid off the desk and fluttered down to the floor. “I have been in some fear lately,” he said, “but God has appeared to make the way plain. A friend has helped me, and I thank him.” He looked around and lost himself. “I seem to have to come to the end,” he said, smiling simply with a soft, childish expression stealing over and lighting up his wan face. “I had something more I wanted to say, but I can’t find it and—I can’t remember. I seem too tired to remember it. I am a very old man and you must bear with me, please, while I try.” He quietly turned and walked down the steps, holding on to the railing. As he stooped to pick up a loose sheet from the floor he sank to his knees, but he picked it up. “Here it is,” he said with a tone of relief. “I remember now. It is that there were shepherds abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night, and the light came upon them and the glory of the Lord shone round them and they were sore afraid, and the Angel said unto them:
“‘Fear not, for behold, I bring unto you good tidings of great joy which shall be unto all people; for unto you is born this day in the City of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord.’”
They reached him as he sank down and, lifting him, placed him on a cushion taken from a pew. He was babbling softly of a babe in a stable and of the glory of the Lord that shone round about them. “Don’t you hear them singing?” he said. “You must sing too; we must all join them.” At the suggestion of some one, a woman’s clear voice struck up,
“While shepherds watched their flocks by night,” and they sang it through as well as they could for sobbing. But before the hymn was ended the old shepherd had joined the heavenly choir and gone away up into Heaven.
As they laid him in the chamber on the hill opening to the sunrise, the look in his face showed that the name of that chamber was Peace.