“Mother—oh, Mother! Come here!” he shouted excitedly. When she ran to him he was sitting up—his face as near to the window as he could get.
“Look at! Look at!” he said. “They’ve brought home their Christmas tree! They’ve hid it on the fire-escape!”
And there, leaning against the wall of the fire-escape, outside the Window Across, was a beautiful, tapering evergreen tree, sent home for Christmas and hidden outside there, unquestionably to surprise the Dear Child.
Anthony and his mother sat on the bed and looked at this tree. And presently they began to plan. On the very tip-top would be the star—or would it be the angel? They decided on the star. Below would come the ornaments, the candles, the nuts wrapped in silver paper, the pink hanging bags of candy, the pop-corn strings. All this Mother Margaret arranged, because she had seen many Christmas trees, and Anthony never had seen any. But there was one thing that he could plan.
“And then,” he said, “right close under the tree, would be the box all full of clay and things to model with!”
“Yes,” Mother Margaret agreed, with a catch in her voice. “That should be there, without a doubt.” Then she whispered to him.
“Tony, dear,” she said. “I’ve no Christmas for you. But I have got a little surprise.”
Her heart ached at the leaping delight in his eyes as he looked up at her.
“Not a gift, dear,” she hastened to say. “Just a little something for us to look at—oh, Tony, it isn’t much at all!” she broke off.
“Why, Mother,” Tony said, “a little much is almost as nice as a great big much, you know!”