What Child Is This

by Rhys Bowen

“It’s hard to imagine there is a God at the moment, isn’t it?” he said. “If I was watching this from up in heaven, I’d want to step in and put a stop to it.”

Jack wasn’t a real bad boy but a typical Cockney, ready to take advantage of anything that might come his way, like that sugar falling off a pallet.

She tried not to think, but she could picture it so clearly—she and Peter, running across the fields, playing with dogs, feeding the chickens, and he growing strong and healthy. It was like a Christmas miracle.

“Don’t worry about it. We’re all having to wear old clothes these days.”

“I can see if you fit into something of mine, if you like. But you are much slimmer than me.” “Skinny, that’s what I am,” Maggie said. “Jack says I’m a bag of bones.”

“No, Jack,” she said. “I’m not leaving you. We’re all we’ve got in this whole stupid world, you and me. We have to stick together, watch out for each other. It can’t go on forever.”

“You saved Peter. You really care about him, I can tell,” Amelia replied. “And these days we don’t have to go through all the silly introductions and conventions. We could at least try it.

Perhaps there were Christmas miracles after all.