In the city far beyond the wood, festivity was on the wing. No sound of such reached Oscar’s home. The trees were banked by heavy snow. Bright shining icicles hung from the ledges. Sunsets of brilliant red, and stars like diamonds made a glory of the sky.

Inside the cottage all was warm. The huge log cracked merry stories in the stove. Oscar remained up late on Christmas Eve. His father had retired upstairs. He never understood the boy, though he felt happy in his presence. Sickness he thought had made him fanciful and full of dreams.

Oscar was waiting, for he knew not what. He was living in the memory of ten years ago.

It did not surprise him when he heard the sound of footsteps, nor when the visitor walked in without an invitation.

The coffee was still hot upon the stove. The supper things were on the table.

“You came to visit me,” Oscar said, gently, as the guest hung up his hat and coat. “You are welcome. Ten years ago, a stranger came like this into our house.”

And then he stopped. His face looked beautiful and pensive. He stopped because he wondered why he had spoken upon the thing of which he spoke to no one. But yet, he somehow felt the stranger knew the story too.

“Ten years is a long time,” the man replied. “Ten years makes many changes. Did it never strike you that the guest might come again?”

“I have been very conscious of his presence,” Oscar said. “Though in the body He has never come.”

The stranger leaned across the table. There was something so familiar in his eyes, that Oscar started. The light the woman saw was shining round his face.

“Ten years ago,” he whispered, softly, “I was not what I am today. Ten years ago I was a thief and robber, flying from the hands of the police; hungry and starving I broke into your home. Ten years ago you, as a little child, received and fed me, saw