The party broke up finally. Julie took her husband and her delirious son home, and Mr. Carroll and Stacey were left with Catherine and her two boys. Jackie, exhausted with happiness, sat on his mother’s lap and played sleepily with a mechanical mouse; Carter leaned against Stacey’s knee; Mr. Carroll sat, relaxed, in a chair near his gifts, which he showed no eagerness to open. The tree was lifeless, all its little colored candles extinguished, and the floor was strewn with ribbon and tissue-paper. The room held the quiet sadness that broods over a festival that is finished.
Catherine spoke first, setting Jackie on his feet and rising. “Thank you, Mr. Carroll, for everything,” she murmured. “I cannot—express how good you have been. And you, Stacey.”
The men had risen, too. “Why, my dear girl,” Mr. Carroll returned, “you’ve given us far more happiness than we you.”
She shook her head. “I must take the boys up now,” she said. “I’ve promised, as it’s Christmas Eve, to stay with them just for once while they undress.”
“You’ll come back, Catherine?” Stacey asked.
“Yes,” she replied, without looking at him, “I’ll come back.”
“Well, sir,” said Stacey gaily, when he was left with his father, “aren’t you going to open all those bundles?”
“Presently! Presently!” Mr. Carroll replied. “I’ll carry them up to my study.”
“Oh, I say!” Stacey protested, “I want to see what you’ve got.”
His father shook his head. “There’s something better than that waiting for us,” he remarked, with a smile. “In the dining-room. A bottle of Pol Roger and some sandwiches and so forth. Come along!”