The Christmas Tree Read Online Free Page A

“there” was, but I was excited at the prospect of an outing, after so many days and weeks of stillness, watching Father get sicker and sicker. Though I missed him, I was too young to comprehend that I would never see him again and I thought he would be pleased for me to be out and about.
    â€œWe’re great roamers, you and I,” he would say to me. We used to take long walks together, sometimes all the way to Central Park from our little apartment in Greenwich Village.
    I packed my few things into a bag, as Mrs. Ellis told me to and we were about to leave when I spotted my father’s old satchel hanging on a hook by the stove. After he died it became my most prized possession—it was all that I had left of him.
    â€œOh, wait just a minute,” I asked Mrs. Ellis, who was always patient with me. “I mustn’t forget my satchel for collecting things.”
    I heard Mrs. Ellis sniffle and mutter under her breath, “Poor little thing. All she’s collected so far has been trouble.”
    When I asked her what she meant, Mrs. Ellis patted my face. “Nothing, dear,” she said. “Nothing at all. Now let’s hurry along.”
    I had only recently learned how to skip and as I skipped alongside Mrs. Ellis I felt happy, especially when I heard we were going to a Children’s Home. Much as I’d loved Father, I didn’t have any friends my age and I yearned to play games and whisper secrets like the children in the books Father used to read to me.
    So when we arrived at the home and Mrs. Ellis asked me if I’d like her to stay awhile I said no. I do remember how hard she hugged me before she left and how eager I was to go inside.
    Until that day, I had always been a happy child. How could I not have been with a father who used to greet every morning by peering out the window and asking: “What lies out there for us today?”
    We were almost never disappointed. We always found something I had never seen before, something new and wonderful.
    Unfortunately, at the Children’s Home I found something I’d never experienced before—something I wish I hadn’t.
    Gloom.
    It wasn’t just the darkness. Our apartment had gotten sun only in the late afternoon, when the sun moved across the sky to the west. Father had explained that to me one day when I asked how one place could be both light and dark.
    Nor was I put off by the home’s cavernous appearance, or the noise of so many children. I was a city child and a poor one at that. Comfort and quiet were things I’d read about but not experienced. And the home was well-maintained, under the circumstances.
    No, the gloomy feeling came from something that happened just after I arrived.
    A soft-spoken lady showed me to my bed, which was the fifth in a long line of beds with their corners neatly tucked in. “You can put your things away and then get to know the other girls,” said the lady, who seemed to be in a great hurry. At the time I took her briskness for coldness. In retrospect I realize the poor thing must have been overworked. There simply weren’t enough adults to take care of all the children.
    I placed my bag and satchel underneath the bed and waited. Soon a girl with pretty dark hair came along. She was much taller than I was and seemed older, but I had always been small for my age. Father used to call me Sparrow.
    â€œHello!” I said, probably too brightly. I think I just assumed that she would be glad to see me. I had always been surrounded by loving people.
    â€œWhat’s in the funny bag with the straps?”
    That’s how she introduced herself. I learned later that her name was Doreen.
    I held out my hand like Father had taught me. “My name is Anna,” I said.
    â€œIs that what I asked you?” she replied in an angry voice.
    Though I suppose it should have been obvious, I still didn’t understand that she didn’t want to be friends. I