"What! You married, Rand! Why, I supposed you were a confirmed bachelor living in a desolate boardinghouse. Well, you certainly have been quiet about it! Why, if I'd known that, you'd have had a wedding present and a good deal larger raise. You knew we always look after our married men. I'll have to see about that! Here, just wait a minute--"
The editor seized a slip of paper and scribbled something on it, handing it over to Rand.
"There! Take that down to the desk and cash it in with your other check. A baby, too! And his first Christmas! Of course! Well, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all!"
"Thank you, Mr. Bigelow, and very many Happy New Years to you and all of yours. Goodnight!" With a light step and a lighter heart Rand went down to the cash desk and then home to Dale and the baby.
Dale met him with a happy face.
"The doctor says we can take him over tonight," she said breathlessly. "He says it had better be tonight while the weather is good. He thinks there's going to be a big snow tomorrow perhaps, and he wouldn't want to risk his going out in that, not so soon. So if we are anxious to be moved for Christmas we'd better go tonight!"
"Hurrah!" said Rand. "Isn't that great! What say, little fella? Ready to move on? But--are you sure the furniture has come yet, Dale?"
"Oh, yes," said Dale, smiling. "It came about ten this morning. I went over and told the man where to put everything, and it all looks wonderful! I'm glad we got the walnut set for our room. It's beautiful, and the beds just fit. There's plenty of room. And the chairs look so pretty in the living room. The leaf table came, too, and it fits perfectly into the little corner where you said it would when it's not in use. I'm glad you got it. The chairs are very nice. I don't see why you thought you couldn't buy them without me. In fact, I think perhaps you're almost extravagant when you go shopping alone. Because we really don't need to be so very grand when we first start out, you know."
"Well, I believe in getting good things when we get them, because I hope we'll be using them a long time, and we don't want to begin to dislike them before they are half worn out! But say! You don't need to worry about money just now. My editor came across when he found out I was married."
"Oh, tell me about it!" she said eagerly. "How did he know? Did you go and tell him?"
"Not I!" said Rand decidedly. "I didn't think it was any of his business. But I finally had to own up because he was inviting me to a bachelor dinner, girls and me, and I couldn't see staying away from you on Christmas night, so I told him. And then what did he do but raise my pay! It's a regular salary now, instead of just so much a column, you know!"
"Isn't that grand!" said Dale. "Well, I guess I won't scold you this time for buying such a handsome table and chairs. You got six, didn't you? I thought you said four would be enough."
"Well, I thought we might need that many if we had guests sometime, and perhaps we couldn't match them."
"Yes, I suppose that's wise. But say! If we're going to take that baby over we'd better go at once, hadn't we? I'm all packed up." She pointed to a pile of baggage over by the door. "And how about the crib? Oughtn't it to go first? He can't lie in it until it is thoroughly warmed, you know. I had Sarah go over this morning and dust the furniture and make up the beds. Wasn't it nice the sheets and blankets came yesterday? I sent down to the store and got a big clothes basket, and had the hall boy carry them over. They baby can lie on our bed till his own gets warm."
"Fine!" said Rand, stooping to touch his lips to Dale's. "You're a real little housewife, aren't you? Well, I'll call up that man who promised to come with his truck. I only hope he doesn't say his working hours are over. However, I guess we can find somebody who wants to earn a dollar or two more."
He went eagerly off to the telephone, and soon was back.
"He's just come in for supper and says he will come right away. Is this everything? We can't keep him waiting."
"Yes, be careful of that basket. It has the baby's bottles packed in it. And that other basket has the saucepan for heating the milk. Now, I'll get his coat and bonnet on!"
"Well, the truck will be here in a minute. Is this everything? Are you sure? Hasn't Sarah Morton got some things?"
"No, she took them over this morning. She took something every time she went over. She's a treasure, George!"
"Well, that's great! Now, young fella, do you realize we're going to move?"
"A-h-h-h!" said the baby, giving one of his little steps in the air with his small blue booties.
"So, you like the idea, do you?"
"O-o-o-o!"
"Well, that's good you approve! Now, all set?"
"Wait just a minute till I get his veil."
"All right! Here comes the man to get the things!" as a knock sounded. "By the way, Dale, I suppose we ought to lay in a supply of food for Christmas Day when Sarah is gone."
"Oh, that's all attended to," said Dale. "I went out this morning and got a lot of necessities, and they are over in the electric refrigerator. I found there is a very nice caterer only three blocks away and I've ordered our Christmas dinner served in our apartment. We haven't dishes, you know, except what we got for the baby, and we don't want to buy dishes in a hurry. We haven't kitchen cooking things, either. And if we want more than we can get here, on Sunday, we can have our dinner sent in then, too. Do you think that was extravagant? I thought there would be so much to do getting settled, and with Sarah away."
"Extravagant? No! I think that is just the right thing to do. It's going to be fun, isn't it? Ah, there's the porter!"
He gave the directions about the baggage and then they started, Rand carrying the baby again, the crib cleared of its blankets by Sarah, traveling down by the baggage elevator.
The baby seemed to enjoy it all hugely. He cooed softly to himself, and his bright eyes searched the beloved faces that hung over him anxiously. Then he gave a little crow of wonder, a sort of question when the taxi stopped at the other apartment house and Rand carried him out. He seemed to search the sky over his head, and the walls and doorway he entered into, and study with wonder the elevator that took him up, to scan the walls of his new home and chuckle with glee when the veil was taken away and he was laid carefully on another bed. Gradually he was unfolded from the chrysalis of soft woolly things, one at a time, and presently he drowsed into a sweet little nap, well guarded by pillows on every side. Cautiously closing the door against sound, the rest of the family went into action.
"You and I ought to go out together a few minutes," said Rand. "The little fellow's got to have a tree and a few doodads."
"Certainly!" said Dale. "He won't know the different of course, but we can tell him about them next year or the year after."
"Why, sure," said Rand. "And we'll get some dinner, too, while we're out. I don't want much but a bowl of soup and some coffee. Then Sarah can go down to the restaurant and get herself something."
They bought a lovely tree and had it sent up to the apartment. They bought some balls of red and silver and blue and some tinsel. They bought a few strings of light. And then they went to a toy store and got a lovely bright rattle, all little jingly silver bells, with a light handle that the baby could hold pretty soon. Dale found a beautiful dancing dolly, on a music box with a stick that could be rolled in the hands to make it play a happy tune and whirl the dolly around, her bright pointed skirt flying wildly in time with the tune. Rand was so charmed with it that Dale said she was buying it for him. And then all the traditional things like candy canes, and Santa Claus stockings, and stars they bought to put on the tree.
"George," said Dale, "we're not buying these things for the baby, we're buying them because we are big children ourselves and want to go back to our childhood again. The baby's only an excuse."
"Well," grinned George, "call it that if you like. I'm having fun, aren't you?"
"Yes," giggled Dale, and bought three lonely tan camels and a handful of little woolly sheep.
"Get an angel or two, sweetheart," he said wat
ching her amusedly. "They all belong. Let's have all the trimmings. And I know where I can get a lovely electric star. We need to teach the baby the shape of a star right at the beginning of his life. He'll likely be able to understand a star before anything else."
When they got back to the apartment they looked like Santa Claus himself, with all their packages, and Rand went right to work putting up the tree, stringing the lights around it, hanging the balls and bright things they had bought, even the camels and sheep, and then the great star.
Joyously they worked like two children, with Sarah Morton standing by and helping, running errands for tacks and wire and tissue paper, cutting a few little tricks herself from memories of her childhood.
Then when it was finished they stood and looked around the room.
"It still looks bare in spite of that big tree," said Rand. "We'll have to get to work after Christmas and get the rest of the things we need. We should have a rug, a nice bright one, soft and warm for the baby to creep about on. And I have a grand bookcase full of books in storage. It belonged to my father and I've never had any place to put it since Mother died and we gave up the old home. I think it will about fit on that bare wall over there. Do you like the idea? It has sliding glass doors and reaches up about as high as a mantelpiece, or perhaps a little higher."
"That will be just the thing," said Dale. "And I have my piano! I forgot all about that. It's a good one. Father bought it for me the year before he died, and it's the one thing of all our goods that Mother wouldn't let them sell. She said I would want it someday. A friend of Mother's is keeping it for me. She's an invalid and lives alone, and had a room where she could put it, so it hasn't been used for several years. I can get it any time I want to."
"That's great!" said Rand. "It will be nice to have something out of your childhood. I wish it were here tonight. I'd like some music right now."
Then as if in answer to the thought, suddenly the bells in the steeple sprang into action, clear and sweet across the lovely park, and they drew near the window and looked out across the fairy scene, as the bells chimed on:
Joy to the world the Lord is come,
Let earth receive her King,
Let every heart prepare Him room
And heaven and nature sing.
It seemed some wondrous charmed spell that it flung over the many-colored park and the brilliant city in the distance, and they listened with thrilling hearts to the old, old story as song after song rang out, songs that they had known all their lives, and yet whose beauty they had never felt before.
Oh, come all ye faithful, joyfully triumphant,
To Bethlehem hasten now with glad accord. . .
"But I haven't been faithful--" said Rand sorrowfully. "Oh why, I wonder? I had a Christian father and mother."
"Yes, and so had I," said Dale with a hint of tears in her voice. "But I haven't been faithful, either."
Rand leaned over and pulled her to her feet.
"Come, let's go to Bethlehem together, and start all over again," he said, and he slipped his arm about her and drew her down to her knees beside him. And there in the quiet of their new living room, with the baby asleep in the bedroom, and Sarah Morton asleep in the little room beyond the kitchen, they reconsecrated themselves together to their Lord, asking for help to bring up the little child He had sent to their door.
Then they rose and stood with their arms about each other, looking at the fairy loveliness of the scene before them, while the last notes of "Silent Night" were pealing out their midnight music. Suddenly they knew there was a soft blur of whiteness coming down, sprinkling the sky and dimming the lights, and Rand said softly, "It is snowing again, dearest. Snowing just as it did that awful night the little boy came to us. How thankful we ought to be that we got here before it came! It might have been days before we could have moved him, and look here now how cozy we are! And he is safe and getting strong. You don't think he could have got any harm from being brought here, do you?"
"No indeed!" said Dale. "Not a breath of cold air got to him, and he is sleeping like a little lamb. Don't you think God will show us how to take care of him? We don't know anything, but He seems to have been arranging things for us."
"Yes, of course," said Rand. "We know as much perhaps as most earthly parents do at the start, don't we? They all have to learn step by step. If we just go day by day asking His guidance I guess we'll make the grade somehow."
"Of course we will!" said Dale, and her heart was singing softly.
"All is calm, all is bright--"
And so singing together they went away to their rest. One glance they took as they left the window. Many of the colored lights were out, and the great white stone steeple that looked like lace in the daytime had disappeared into the white feather blending that the sky was sending down to make its own Christmas decorations.
Steadily, softly, noiselessly it drifted down through the night, dressing all the trees in cleanest white again, touching roof and turret and pinnacle, and leaving them unsullied once more, as if to make a world befitting the coming festival, the birthday of a King.
And when the morning broke once more and the sun arose and took command, the snow as quietly ceased as it had begun, and there was the world, deep in snow and glistening as the rosy light came more and more upon it and made a glory out of the softly dropping flakes that had so incredibly soon covered up the world and made it new.
Christians awake, salute the happy morn,
Whereon the Savior of the world was born;
Bells rang on the snow-muted air, and Dale and Rand lay listening and thinking their sweet thoughts. Christmas was going to mean more to them than it ever had before.
"How about going to church today?" said Rand. "I wonder what the weather is like?"
He sprang up and went to the window.
"That would be wonderful!" said Dale. "And I don't care what the weather is like. I have galoshes, and I love to be out in weather. Let's go anyway. It isn't far, and I think we should. Worshipping in the sweet place where we were married would be lovely!"
"Well, it has stopped snowing," announced Rand. "The snowplows and shovels are hard at work on the sidewalks. I guess it won't be so bad even if it snows some more."
So they eagerly prepared for church, and after seeing the baby serenely settled with his bottle, and cheerfully accepting the aid of Sarah Morton as if she had always belonged, they started out, amid sweet carols from the bells.
The sermon that morning made very clear that the coming of the Lord had been for the definite purpose of taking sin upon His sinless Self, that those who accepted Him as their personal Savior might go free from the burden and penalty of their sins.
"I don't think I ever quite understood it when I was a boy," said Rand thoughtfully, as after a pleasant greeting from the young minister they started back to their apartment. "Most of the ministers I ever heard left it all so vague and kind of indefinite that it seemed only a form that one must go through, like making out papers for taxes or something of that sort. It never entered my head that I hadn't done everything I ought to when I stood up before people and 'joined the Church'! I thought that was all that was required, and I had sort of bought a ticket to heaven. But now I see that there was to be a definite decision of your very innermost soul to accept what Christ has done for you, or His work is of no effect for you personally. I'm glad we went to church this morning. That wasn't a Santa Claus sermon, it was a Christ message."
"Yes," said Dale, "it was very clear. I feel as if this was a very happy Christmas, and a wonderful beginning for our life together. A real Christmas beginning."
Chapter 20
They had a pleasant dinner down at the restaurant and then hurried back to the apartment, finding the baby just wakened from a nice long sleep and smiling at their coming. That was a definite thing now, that he could really smile and show actual dimples.
Rand, still thoughtful, stood looking down at him.
"Well, now, boy," he
said, "it's about time you and I had a talk. Could I hold him in my lap, Dale, or would that be too much of an experiment?"
"Why, of course you can hold him," said Dale, coming smiling to his assistance. "Here, let me fix him in your arms!"
She gathered him up with a little blue blanket about him, and Rand sat down and held the little fellow carefully, as if he were china and might break.
The baby lay there and stared up at him, fixedly, earnestly, and then suddenly broke into a real, happy smile.
"Why, he likes me, Dale! Just look at that. He almost acts as if he knew me!"
"Yes, of course," said Dale happily. "Why wouldn't he know you? See! He looks as if he was remembering back to that time in the Beck front hall when his overcoat came off beside a bank of snow and you picked him up and carried him to comfort. Certainly he remembers you! He's getting it across to himself that you are the head of this little family he's come to live with, and he likes it."
And then suddenly Rand bent his head and touched his lips lightly to the little forehead.
"Yes!" he said, and there was a sound of tears in his voice and a look like moisture in his eyes. So much so that Dale stooped over and kissed her man on the forehead and then brushed her lips lightly over the baby's hand.
"And now, boy," said Rand soberly when he could get the huskiness out of his voice, "I've got something to tell you. It's a story, a really truly story. Will you listen to me?"
"A-h-h-h-g-g-g-o-o-o!" said the baby quite distinctly.
Dale laughed softly and turned away to hide the quick happy tears that had sprung to her own eyes.
"That's right!" said Rand. "I'm glad to know you're listening, son. Now, this story, son, that I'm going to tell you is very important. It's about the most important thing in this life, and I want you to remember it. I'm going to tell you again and again, over and over, but this is the first time, and it's the beginning of it all. Now, listen! Long ago there was a baby born. A Christmas baby! His name was Jesus, and He was born in a manger, where the cows eat their hay, because there wasn't any palace or mansion ready for Him, just a manger! And God set a big bright star over the stable where the manger was, to let the world know God's Son was born. It was a star something like that one up there on the wall. See? And everybody wondered about the star that night. God had told the world He was going to send His Son sometime, but nobody thought He would be born in a stable with just a manger for His crib, so they didn't recognize Him. Not even when that great big oversize star came out to show where He was, they didn't know. They just wondered.