It was my hand of glory, I could tell. I alone had been allowed to find it. How many others had passed by that tree and failed to see it, before I came? And I found it right away. It was the first thing I saw beneath the tree, and what had there been to see but an old box? Who but me would have bothered to take it up and look inside? There was no doubt at all that the hand of glory had to be mine. Who gave it to me, though? Perhaps it gave itself to me... So, it’s not necessary to thank anyone else. The secrecy was another gift. Not a word to Mack about it. Not a word to Cousin Doris. Not a word to anyone.

That night—it had to have been that night—was the first of the... new nights for me, when I first learned what sleep really is. I was sleeping the deepest sleep of my life. I’d be gone, completely gone, the moment my head hit the pillow, no matter how my thoughts had been racing just a moment before. I found myself hurrying, rushing to think about all the things I had to think about before I got into bed, because I knew there would be no more thinking the moment I lay down. And, bear in mind, this is me I’m talking about—I used to lie awake for hours before sliding into an unsatisfying, shallow doze that broke and resettled, broke again over and over, all throughout the night, so that I never did get more than a quarter of an hour’s actual rest at a time. A dozen times each night, I would twitch myself awake, stir, turn, groan, and hear my own voice return to me, weirdly changed, from the wall. But in the new night, falling asleep was really like falling. Practically in the same moment I lay down on my bed, I would be released, falling asleep at once, and falling all night long.