He stood bowed over his little books, his hands trembling as he turned the pages. Then he looked up, the old fear upon his face again.
“That sound!” he said. “Listen! It is guns—I hear them!”
“No, no,” I said, “it is nothing. Only a car passing in the street below.”
“Listen,” he said. “Hear that again—voices crying!”
“No, no,” I answered, “not voices, only the night wind among the trees.”
“My children’s voices!” he exclaimed. “I hear them everywhere—they come to me in every wind—and I see them as I wander in the night and storm—my children—torn and dying in the trenches—beaten into the ground—I hear them crying from the hospitals—each one to me, still as I knew him once, a little child. Time, Time,” he cried, reaching out his arms in appeal, “give me back my children!”
“They do not die in vain,” Time murmured gently.
But Christmas only moaned in answer:
“Give me back my children!”
Then he sank down upon his pile of books and toys, his head buried in his arms.
“You see,” said Time, “his heart is breaking, and will you not help, him if you can?”
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