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From where he lay he could see a bright star shining through the window. He tried to look with one eye at the light and with the other eye at the star, both at the same time. The star seemed sort of blue, too.

“I wonder if the little light is the baby of the star,” he said to himself.

And when he looked at the star again, he saw a ray travel down from it into the window, right towards his eyes.

He blinked, and the light grew brighter. It made a pathway reaching from the sky to his bed. Something seemed to be traveling down the bright pathway, singing a song as it came.

First he thought it must be an angel, then a fairy with wings like a moth.

He shut his eyes a minute, to see what would happen, and he heard the voice singing a funny sort of song–no, not funny, but pretty.

And this was the song:

“Light, light
By day or night;
Stars in the skies,
Stars in the eyes.”

He opened his. And there before him, in front of the window, stood a little lady. He thought she was dressed in white, then he decided it was yellow, then gold and white.

She walked, yet she seemed to be pasted on a big, shiny star. The top point rose just above her head, making the peak of a crown. The two middle points stuck out beyond her shoulders like bright moth wings, and the two bottom points extended below her waist, and away from her, like the ends of a sash.

At first Marmaduke thought she must be a painted doll, such as you see in the magazines about Christmas time, made for little children to cut out. But her golden hair was not still like that, but was always in motion like crinkly water that flows over the stones in the brook when the sun shines on it. And there on the rag rug, his own rag rug, were her little feet–very white, with little toes, and she could sing, too. My, how she could sing! No, she was not any painted doll.

She was going on with that song now:

“Far and near,
Bright and clear,
On sky and sea,
And the Christmas tree.”

“‘Llo!” said Marmaduke–then he stopped, ashamed. That was the way he talked to the fellows at school. He mustn’t speak to such a beautiful lady that way. So–“How do you do?” he corrected himself.

But she only smiled and said–what do you think?

“‘Llo! little boy”–just like himself. That seemed to set her singing again:–

“Low and high,
In the lake or the sky;
High and low,
In the crystal snow.”

Then she stopped.

“Is there any more to it?” asked Marmaduke. “Oh, yes, one could go on forever”

“On the church spire,
Or in the fire;
On the wavelet’s tip,
Or the mast of a ship;
In the shining gem
Over Bethlehem;
In the little cradle,
With the ox in the stable,
A baby fair
It was brightest there!”

“Now is that all of it?” Marmaduke asked her.

“Oh, there’s lots more, but I’ll sing just the last part for tonight”–and she told him the end:

“And in Mother’s eyes,
Just as bright as the skies.”

Marmaduke thought she was right in the last part of the song, anyway. Of course, he didn’t understand exactly what it was all about, but it was a very pretty song, and he would think it over in the morning. But then his curiosity got the better of him.

“What did you come down here for?”

“Oh, I saw the light in your window,” she explained, “and I thought maybe it was a little lost star. You see, we have to look out for them. When we do find a star that has lost its way we take it back–“