too soon. "Dear me, Nora, if you think so well of me, I shall find it hard to live up to your expectations. I am afraid I shall disappoint you. I have a little gimcrack to put in your stocking to-night; but I 'm rather ashamed of it now."
"A gimcrack more or less is of small account. I have had my stocking hanging up these three years, and everything I possess is a present from you."
Roger frowned; the conversation had taken just such a turn as he had often longed to provoke, but now it was disagreeable to him. "O, come," he said; "I have done simply my duty to my little girl."
"But, Roger," said Nora, staring with expanded eyes, "I am not your little girl."
His frown darkened; his heart began to beat. "Don't talk nonsense!" he said.
"But, Roger, it is true. I am no one's little girl. Do you think I have no memory? Where is my father? Where is my mother?"
"Listen to me," said Roger, sternly. "You must not talk of such things."
"You must not forbid me, Roger. I can't think of them without thinking of you. This is Christmas eve! Miss Murray told us that we must never let it pass without thinking of all that it means. But without Miss Murray, I have been thinking all day of things which are hard to name,—of death and life, of my parents and you, of my incredible happiness. I feel to-night like a princess in a fairy-tale. I am a poor creature, without a friend, without a penny or a home; and yet, here I sit by a blazing fire, with money, with food, with clothes,
