Chapter 11

"Friends," he said, "for five winters, someone in this town has kept the children of St. Anne's warm in secret, asking for nothing. You call her the Blue Star. Tonight, I want to thank her."Mrs. Pratt was already on the steps of the stage in a new fur and a big smile. Cordelia was behind her in the blue hat. But before Mrs. Pratt could open her mouth, she looked out over the crowd, and she saw Lucy, and she could not help herself."Oh, Constable!" she cried, loud enough for the whole square. "There she is! The thief! How dare she show her face here tonight among honest people!"The constable was a big, slow man who did not like this job at all, but he pushed through the crowd and took Lucy by the arm. "Come along, miss. Quiet now."The children started to cry. Mrs. Green said, "Let her go, you great fool!"The crowd pressed in to see, and Lucy stood very straight with snow in her hair and said nothing at all.That was when the Earl came down from the stage. He walked straight through the crowd. People stepped back to let him pass. He stopped in front of Lucy and the constable. He put his hand into his coat, and he took out a tiny, worn gray mitten."Before anyone takes this woman anywhere," he said, "I want to ask her one question."The square went silent.He turned the little mitten inside out and held it up in the lamplight so everyone could see the faded blue star in the cuff."Miss Ward, one point of this star is longer than the others. Why?"Lucy looked at the mitten. Her eyes filled. She knew she could still say, I don't know. She could still stay safe and small and unseen. But he had carried it for twenty-five years."It points home," she said. Her voice was quiet, but in that silence it carried to every corner of the square. "So that a child always knows there is someone who cares if they are warm. My mother taught me. Her name was Mary Ward."

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