ked like a best hat. One of
father's blue buds had bloomed. One of mother's red buds. They bloomed
very small. Small enough to be diamonds. Or collar-buttons. 'Way back on
the further side of the tree I could see that one of my green buds had
bloomed. It was a long little box. It was a narrow little box. I can
most always tell when there's a doll in a box. Young Derry Willard's
golden bud hadn't bloomed at all. Maybe it was a late bloomer. Some
things are. The tame coon's salt fish, I've noticed, never blooms at all
until just the very last moment before we go into the parlor Christmas
morning. Mother says there's a reason. We didn't bother much about
reasons. The parlor was very cold. It smelt very cold and mysterious. We
didn't see how we could wait!

Carol helped us to wait. Not being able to talk, Carol has plenty of
time to think. He can write, of course. But spelling is very hard. So he
doesn't often waste his spelling on just facts. He waits till he gets
enough facts to make a philosophy before he tries to spell it: He made a
philosophy about Christmas coming so slow. He made it on the blackboard
in the kitchen. He wrote it very tall.

"Christmas has _got_ to come," he wrote. "It's part of _time_.
Everything that's part of _time_ has _got_ to come. Nothing can stop it.
It runs like a river. It runs down-hill. It can't help itself. I should
worry."

Young Derry Willard never wrote at all. He telegraphed his "manners"
instead. "Thank you for Thanksgiving Day," he telegraphed. "It was very
wonderful." He didn't say anything else. He never even mentioned his
address.

"U--m--m," said my father.

"It's because of the hundred-dollar bill," said my mother. "He doesn't
want to give us any chance to return it."

"Humph!" said my father. "Do we _look_ poor?"

My mother glanced at the worn spot in the dining-room rug. She glanced
at my father's coat.

"We certainly do!" she laughed. "But young Derry Willard didn't leave us
a hundred-dollar bill to try and make us look any richer. All young
Derry Willard was trying to do was to make us look more Christmassy!"

"Well, we can't accept it!" said my father.

"Of course we can't accept it!" said my mother. "It was a mistake. But
at least it was a very kind mistake."

"_Kind?_" said my father.

"_Very_ kind," said my mother. "No matter how dark a young man may be or
how much cane-sirup and bananas he has consumed, he can't be absolutely
depraved as long as he goes