The Christmas Angel | Page 9

believe in me. I am the
Christmas Angel."
"I know it." Miss Terry's voice was hoarse and unmanageable, as of
one in a nightmare. "I remember."
"You remember!" repeated the Angel. "Yes; you remember the day
when you and Tom hung me on the Christmas tree. You were a sweet
little girl then, with blue eyes and yellow curls. You believed the
Christmas story and loved Santa Claus. Then you were simple and
affectionate and generous and happy."
"Fiddlestick!" Miss Terry tried to say. But the word would not come.
"Now you have lost the old belief and the old love," went on the Angel.
"Now you have studied books and read wise men's sayings. You
understand the higher criticism, and the higher charity, and the higher
egoism. You don't believe in mere giving. You don't believe in the
Christmas economics,--you know better. But are you happy, dear
Angelina?"

Again Miss Terry thrilled at the sound of her name so sweetly spoken;
but she answered nothing. The Angel replied for her.
"No, you are not happy because you have cut yourself off from the
things that bring folk together in peace and good-will at this holy time.
Where are your friends? Where is your brother to-night? You are still
hard and unforgiving to Tom. You refused to see him to-day, though he
wrote so boyishly, so humbly and affectionately. You have not tried to
make any soul happy. You don't believe in me, the Christmas Spirit."
There is such a word as Fiddlestick, whatever it may mean. But Miss
Terry's mind and tongue were unable to form it.
"The Christmas spirit!" continued the Angel. "What is life worth if one
cannot believe in the Christmas spirit?"
With a powerful effort Miss Terry shook off her nightmare sufficiently
to say, "The Christmas spirit is no real thing. I have proved it to-night.
It is not real. It is a humbug!"
"Not real? A humbug?" repeated the Angel softly. "And you have
proved it, Angelina, this very night?"
Miss Terry nodded.
"I know what you have done," said the Angel. "I know very well. How
keen you were! How clever! You made a test of Chance, to prove your
point."
Again Miss Terry nodded with complacency.
"What knowledge of the world! What grasp of human nature!"
commented the Angel, smiling. "It is like you mere mortals to say, 'I
will make my test in my own way. If certain things happen, I shall
foresee what the result must be. If certain other things happen, I shall
know that I am right.' Events fall out as you expect, and you smile with
satisfaction, feeling your wisdom justified. It ought to make you happy.
But does it?"

Miss Terry regarded the Angel doubtfully.
"Look now!" he went on, holding up a rosy finger. "You are so
near-sighted! You are so unimaginative! You do not dream beyond the
thing you see. You judge the tale finished while the best has yet to be
told. And you stake your faith, your hope, your charity upon this blind
human judgment,--which is mere Chance!"
Miss Terry opened her lips to say, "I saw--" but the Angel interrupted
her.
"You saw but the beginning," he said. "You saw but the first page of
each history. Shall I turn over the leaves and let you read what really
happened? Shall I help you to see the whole truth instead of a part? On
this night holy Truth, which is of Heaven, comes for all men to see and
to believe. Look!"
CHAPTER VIII
JACK AGAIN
The Christmas Angel gently waved his hand to and fro. Gradually, as
Miss Terry sat back in her chair, the library grew dark; or rather, things
faded into an indistinguishable blur. Then it seemed as if she were
sitting at a theatre gazing at a great stage. But at this theatre there was
nothing about her, nothing between her and the place where things
were happening.
* * * * *
First she saw two little ragamuffins quarreling over something in the
snow. She recognized them. They were the two Jewish boys who had
picked up the Jack-in-the-box. An officer appeared, and they ran away,
the bigger boy having possession of the toy; the smaller one with fists
in his eyes, bawling with disappointment.
Miss Terry's lips curled with the cynical disgust which she had felt
when first witnessing this scene. But a sweet voice--and she knew it

was the Angel's--whispered in her ear, "Wait and see!"
She watched the two boys run through the streets until they came to a
dark corner. There the little fellow caught up with the other, and once
more the struggle began. It was a hard and bloody fight. But this time
the victory was with the smaller lad, who used his