til the ruddy-faced little devil brought the
performance to a close in the time-honored way. Subdued laughter in the
doorway made them both look up with a start. There stood Mrs. Fletcher,
fully dressed, with a smile on her face.

"John senior," she ordered with mock severity, "go upstairs and dress
yourself for breakfast immediately. I do believe you're the biggest boy
of the two in spite of your age."

After the morning meal had been eaten, John devoured the contents of a
candy-filled cornucopia from the tree, and drew on his stocking cap,
coat, and mittens. Louise's presents were to be delivered, and that was
a matter which brooked no unseemly delay.

Mrs. Martin's sister answered his ring at the apartment.

"Louise home?" he inquired eagerly.

Her aunt explained that Louise had gone out of town with her mother for
a three-day Christmas visit.

"She'll be back, the day after tomorrow," she consoled him.

So he left the presents in her charge with instructions to give them to
his lady on the very moment of her arrival, and scampered down the
carpeted stairway again.

Sid DuPree met him in front of his house. John surveyed him warily.

"'Lo!"

"'Lo!"

"What'd your folks give you?"

"Oh, lots of things. What'd you get?"

Sid stopped a moment to recount his various gifts, lest one of them be
omitted in the effort to impress his neighbor.

"'Nother football," he boasted. "Cost five dollars, it did."

"I got a railway with forty-'leven pieces of track."

"My uncle sent me a peachy pair of boxing gloves," Sid continued.

"Just wait till you see what my uncle sends me. Always comes in the
mail, it does, but it hasn't come yet. Besides, I got a new sled."

"And I've got a punching bag."

"But you ought to see my 'lectric motor," retorted John, still
undaunted. "You just wait till you see the toys I make for it to run."

Sid had saved his last and most cherished possession until the last. "My
mother, she gave me a real gun, a Winchester. It'll shoot across the
lake, it shoots so far. I'm going hunting with it on the ranch, next
summer."

"That's all right." John was not in the least nonplussed. "But the cops
won't let you shoot it in the city, and you've got to wait until spring
comes before you can use it. I can go home and have all sorts of fun
with _all_ my things, _now_."

Silvey and Perry sauntered up.

"'Lo!" came the inevitable greeting.

"'Lo!" came the inevitable reply.

"What did you