nothing to say to her about those winter twilight lamps? Did he, too,
not remember?

His head and face were hidden; a thousand small spears of Nature
bristled between him and her; but he laughed out to her from behind
the rampart of the green spears.

At that moment a low sound in the distance drew her attention, and
instantly alert she paused to listen. Then, forgetting everything
else, she called to him with a rush of laughter like that of her
mischief-loving girlhood:

"Quick! There they are! I heard the gate shut at the turnpike! They
must not catch us! Quick! Quick!"

"Hurry, then!" he cried, as he ran forward, joining his laughter to
hers. "Open the door for me!"

After this the night fell fast. The only sounds to be heard in the
valley were the minute readjustments of the ice of the brook as it
froze tighter and the distressed cries of the birds that had roosted
in the fir.

So the Tree entered the house.



III. THE LIGHTING OF THE CANDLES