‘Do you want to stay a little longer, Mr. Boddy,’ she said, ’or will you go home with me?’

‘I’d rather walk home in good company than alone, Miss Mary,’ he replied.  ‘I call it walking, but it’s only a stump-stump.’

‘But it would he worse if you couldn’t walk at all,’ Mary said.

’Right, my dear, as you always are.  I’ve no call to grumble.  It’s a bad habit as grows on me, I fear.  If Lyddy ’ad only tell me of it, both together you might do me good.  But Lyddy treats me like a spoilt child.  It’s her old way.’

‘Mary shall take us both in hand,’ said Lydia.  ’She shall cure me of my sharp temper and you of grumbling, grandad; and I know which ’ll be the hardest job!’

Laughing with kindly mirth, the old man drew on his woollen gloves and took up his hat and the violin-bag.  Then he offered to say good-bye.

‘But you’re forgetting your top-coat, grandad,’ said Lydia.

‘I didn’t come in it, my dear.’

‘What’s that, then?  I’m sure we don’t wear such things.’

She pointed to a chair, on which Thyrza had just artfully spread the gift.  Mr. Boddy looked in a puzzled way; had he really come in his coat and forgotten it?  He drew nearer.

‘That’s no coat o’ mine, Lyddy,’ he said.

Thyrza broke into a laugh.

‘Why, whose is it, then?’ she exclaimed.  ’Don’t play tricks, grandad; put it on at once!’

‘Now come, come; you’re keeping Mary waiting,’ said Lydia, catching up the coat and holding it ready.

Then Mr. Boddy understood.  He looked from Lydia to Thyrza with dimmed eyes.

‘I’ve a good mind never to speak to either of you again,’ he said in a tremulous voice.  ’As if you hadn’t need enough of your money!  Lyddy, Lyddy!  And you’re as bad, Thyrza; a grown-up woman like you, you ought to teach your sister better.  Why there; it’s no good; I don’t know what to say to you.  Now what do you think of this, Mary?’

Lydia still held up the coat, and at length persuaded the old man to don it.  The effect upon his appearance was remarkable; conscious of it, he held himself more upright and stumped to the little square of looking-glass to try and regard himself.  Here he furtively brushed a hand over his eyes.

’I’m ready, Mary, my dear; I’m ready!  It’s no good saying anything to girls like these.  Good-bye, Lyddy; good-bye, Thyrza.  May you have a many happy Christmas, children!  This isn’t the first as you’ve made a happy one for me’

Lydia went down to the door and watched the two till they were lost in darkness.  Then she returned to her sister with a sigh of gladness.  For the moment she had no trouble of her own.

Upon days of festival, kept in howsoever quiet and pure a spirit, there of necessity follows depression; all mirth is unnatural to the reflective mind, and even the unconscious suffer a mysterious penalty when they have wrested one whole day from fate.  On the Saturday Lydia had no work to go to, and the hours dragged.  In the course of the morning she went out to make some purchases.  She was passing Mrs. Bower’s without intention of entering, when Mary appeared in the doorway and beckoned her.  Mrs. Bower was out; Mary had been left in charge of the shop.