You told me once to choose between you and it--and I chose, I suppose; at least, I ran away.

Yet in the face of all that, I ask you again, may I not come to you at Christmas?
I want you, father, and I want mother.

And I want you to see my boy.
"Well ?" said Simeon Holly, trying to speak with a steady coldness that would not show how deeply moved he was.

"Well, Ellen ?" "Yes, Simeon, yes!" choked his wife, a world of mother-love and longing in her pleading eyes and voice.

"Yes--you'll let it be--'Yes'!" "Uncle Simeon, Aunt Ellen," called David, clattering down the stairs from his room, "I've found such a beautiful song in my violin, and I'm going to play it over and over so as to be sure and remember it for father--for it is a beautiful world, Uncle Simeon, isn't it?
Now, listen!" And Simeon Holly listened--but it was not the violin that he heard.