ul is hard at work, I see. Can I help in any way?" he
asked, glancing at the display before him.

"No, thank you, unless you can make me as full of interest and pleasure
in these things as I used to be. Don't you think preparing presents a
great bore, except for those you love and who love you?" she added in a
tone which had a slight tremor in it as she uttered the last words.

"I don't give to people whom I care nothing for. Can't do it, especially
at Christmas, when goodwill should go into everything one does. If all
these 'pretties' are for dear friends, you must have a great many."

"I thought they were friends, but I find many of them are not, and
that's the trouble, sir."

"Tell me all about it, dear, and let the old glove go," he said, sitting
down beside her with his most sympathetic air.

But she held the glove fast, saying eagerly, "No, no, I love to do
this! I don't feel as if I could look at you while I tell what a bad,
suspicious girl I am," she added, keeping her eyes on her work.

"Very well, I'm ready for confessions of any iniquity and glad to get
them, for sometimes lately I've seen a cloud in my girl's eyes and
caught a worried tone in her voice. Is there a bitter drop in the cup
that promised to be so sweet, Rose?"

"Yes, Uncle. I've tried to think there was not, but it is there, and I
don't like it. I'm ashamed to tell, and yet I want to, because you will
show me how to make it sweet or assure me that I shall be the better for
it, as you used to do when I took medicine."

She paused a minute, sewing swiftly; then out came the trouble all in
one burst of girlish grief and chagrin.

"Uncle, half the people who are so kind to me don't care a bit for me,
but for what I can give them, and that makes me unhappy, because I was
so glad and proud to be liked. I do wish I hadn't a penny in the world,
then I should know who my true friends were."

"Poor little lass! She has found out that all that glitters is not
gold, and the disillusion has begun," said the doctor to himself, adding
aloud, smiling yet pitiful, "And so all the pleasure is gone out of the
pretty gifts and Christmas is a failure?"

"Oh, no not for those whom nothing can make me doubt! It is sweeter than
ever to make these things, because my heart is in every stitch and I
know that, poor as they are, they will be dear to you, Aunty Plen, Aunt
Jessie, Phebe, and the boys."

She opened a drawer where lay a pile of pretty gifts, wrough