Christmas Eve at Swamp's End, Norman Duncan [e book reader pdf .TXT] 📗

the basket.

Pattie Batch jumped away.

"Well, well!" cried John Fairmeadow; "what's the row?"

Row, indeed! Pattie Batch was gone white; and she swayed a little, and shivered, too, and clenched her little hands to restrain her amazing hope. "Oh," she moaned, at last, far short of breath enough, "tell me quick: ith it--ith it a--a----"

John Fairmeadow threw back the blanket in a most dramatic fashion; and there, wrapped in the neglected fawn-skin cloak, all dimpled and smiling, lay--

THE BABY!

"By George!" screamed Pattie Batch; "it _ith_ a baby!"

"Your baby," John Fairmeadow whispered. "God's Christmas gift--to you."

Pattie Batch--adorable, young mother!--reverently approached, and, bending with parted lips, eyes shining, and hands laid upon her trembling heart, for the first time gazed content upon the little face. She lifted, then--and with what awe and tenderness!--the tiny mortal from the warm basket, and pressed it, with knowing arms, against her warmer, softer young breast. "My baby!" she crooned, her lips close to its ear; "my little baby--my own little baby!"
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Publication Date: 06-01-2010

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