So Price was to take his father’s practise!  How it must gall the old Doctor!  And mother was lonely, eh?—­and Dad’s rheumatism getting the best of him—­Why Great Guns! mother and dad were growing old!  And some of those snow-white hairs of theirs had come from worrying over him—­John had said so.  Ralph’s dark face burned in the chill night wind.  Well, for all old John’s cutting sarcasm, his father still had faith in him and the trust in young Roger’s eloquent eyes had fairly hurt him.  God! they did not know!  And then this queer Christmas heart-glow.  How Griffin and Edwards and the rest of his gay friends would mock him for it? Friends! After all—­had he any friends in the finer sense of that finest of words?  Such warm-hearted loyal friends for instance as these neighbors of his father’s who had been dropping in all day with a hearty smile and a Christmas hand-shake.  And black-eyed Sister Madge—­this brave, little fighting gipsy-poet here—­where—­But here Ralph frowned again and looked away and even when the cheerful lights of home glimmered through the trees he was still thinking—­after an impetuous burst of confidence to Sister Madge.

So, later, when Doctor Ralph entered his father’s study—­his chin was very determined.

“I was ashamed to tell you this morning, sir,” he said steadily, “but I—­I’m no longer on the staff of St. Michael’s.  My hand was shaking and—­and the chief knew why.  And, dad,” he faced the old Doctor squarely, “I’m coming back home to keep your practise out of Price’s fool hands.  You’ve always wanted that and my chief has preached it too, though I couldn’t see it somehow until to-day.  And presently, sir, when—­when my hand is steadier, I’m going to make the little chap walk and run.  I’ve—­promised Sister Madge.”  And the old Doctor cleared his throat and gulped—­and finally he wiped his glasses and walked away to the window.  For of all things God could give him—­this surely was the best!

“Oh, grandpop,” cried little John Leslie 3rd, bolting into the study in great excitement—­“Come see Roger!  We kids have made him the Christmas king and he’s got a crown o’ holly on and—­and a wand and he’s a-tappin’ us this way with it to make us Knights.  And I’m the Fir-tree Knight—­and Bob—­he’s a Cedar Knight and Ned’s a spruce and Roger—­he says his pretty sister tells him stories like that smarter’n any in the books.  Oh—­do hurry!”

The old Doctor held out his hand to his son.

“Well, Doctor Ralph,” he said huskily, “suppose we go tell mother.”

So while the Doctor told Aunt Ellen, Ralph bent his knee to this excited Christmas King enthroned in the heart of the fire-shadows.

“Rise—­” said Roger radiantly, tapping him with a cedar wand, “I—­I dub thee first of all my knights—­the good, kind Christmas Knight!”

“And here,” said Ralph, smiling, “here’s Sister Madge.  What grand title now shall we give to her?” But as Sister Madge knelt before him with firelit shadows dancing in her sweet, dark eyes, Roger dropped the wand and buried his face on her shoulder with a little sob.