Riddle Chap had had his tree to hold long ago, but as Polly pointed out, there was nothing on it.
“He needs a cheerful necktie,” Fred declared. “I’ll get him that red one with purple spots that Daddy never wears.”
“We’ll put suet in the tree for the birds,” said Jess. “They’ll like that. And we can hang a wreath around his neck.”
“We’ll trim him all over!” cried Polly, joyously. “Give him a wreath and wind ground pine around his body and stick a holly spray in his hat.”
They were as good as their word, and Riddle Chap, on Christmas Eve, was as gay as any snowman who ever had Christmas dreams. He wore a wreath about his throat, a fearfully bright necktie under his chin, holly in his hat, and his arms and legs were wound with ropes of ground pine.
Polly and Margy liked to consider themselves almost grown up—at times—and Fred was sure he was much older than Ward and Artie. Jess, who was a year older than Margy, liked to romp too well to desire “grown-upness,” as she called it. But when Christmas Eve came, each member of the Riddle Club discovered that hanging up one’s stocking was half the fun of Christmas, and Polly and Margy and Fred were just as eager as Artie and Jess and Ward.
“Come over early,” they told each other when they said good-night, after the snowman was arrayed. “Come over early and see our things.”
Artie may have started for Ward’s house—at least, that is what he always said he was doing, though his mother declared he must have been dreaming. Anyway, long before daylight, the Marley household was awakened by a tremendous crash.
Mr. and Mrs. Marley rushed out from their room, meeting Polly in the hall.
“Where’s Artie?” she gasped.