All this did not come to Mary in words. She could not have expressed it to any one else, but it sent her on her way, deeply, quietly glad.
Next morning while she was stooping before the oven, basting the turkey which the Barnabys had sent with their greetings, Jack called her to the front window where he was sitting.
A covered wagon was creaking slowly by, drawn by a big horse and a little burro. The cover was looped up, and in the back end, carefully tied to the tail-gate, stood the tree which had taken them fifty-eight minutes to prepare, but whose memory would not be effaced in that many years from the minds of the two children, seated on the quilts beside it.
"I'm so glad you got to see them," said Mary. "Aren't they dear? And oh, look! Goldilocks is still holding Lady Agatha, and the other one's hugging the woolly lamb!"
When the wagon was entirely out of sight Mary started back to her turkey basting, but stopped a moment to take another look at the gifts spread out on the side table. Several things had been added to them that morning; a dissected puzzle picture which Norman had made for her, a spool case that Jack had whittled out, and a strip of exquisitely embroidered rosebuds that Mrs. Ware had wrought to be put into a white dress. There was also a pot of white hyacinths from the rectory, and Mary held her face down against the cool snow of their blossoms, taking in their sweetness in long breaths.
"It's been a pretty full Christmas, hasn't it!" exclaimed Jack as he watched her.
"It's really been one of the nicest I ever had," she answered, "for one reason because it's lasted so long. Norman's plan is a success."
That night after supper Norman insisted on taking his mother down into the village to look at the lighted windows. After they had gone Mary took out her Good Times book to record the happenings of the day. She had a few more notes of acknowledgment to write also, and was glad that Jack was busy with his own writing. She noticed that he was using India ink and a crow-quill pen, but thought nothing of that as he was always experimenting with them.
Joyce was not the only one of the children who had inherited artistic ability. Jack never attempted pictures, but he did beautiful lettering; odd initials and old English script, and had copied verses for calendars and fly-leaf inscriptions. Joyce said some of his pen-and-ink work was as beautifully done as the letters she had seen in old missals, made by the monks.