"I've forgotten for the moment what I want next, but meanwhile you'd better give me another box of Elvas plums."
"Another drum? Yes, sir," the shopman would reply, licking his pencil in a way that was at once obsequious and pedantic, though it was not intended to suggest more than perfect efficiency.
When the hall and the adjacent rooms at 36 Church Row had been turned into rolling dunes of brown paper, John rushed about London in a last frenzy of unbridled acquisitiveness to secure plenty of amusement for the children. To this end he obtained a few well-known and well-tried favorites like the kinetoscope and the magic lantern, and a number of experimental diversions which would have required a trained engineer or renowned scientist to demonstrate successfully. Finally he bargained for the wardrobe of a Santa Claus whose dignified perambulations round the Christmas Bazaar of a noted emporium had attracted his fancy on account of the number of children who followed him everywhere, laughing and screaming with delight. It was not until he had completed the purchase that he discovered it was not the exterior of the Santa Claus which had charmed his little satellites, but the free distribution of bags of coagulated jujubes.
"I expect I'd better get the Christmas tree in the country," said John, waist-deep in the still rising drift of parcels. "I dare say the Galton shops keep those silver and magenta globes you hang on Christmas trees, and I ought to patronize the local tradesmen."
"If you have any local shopping to do, I'm sure you would be wise to go down to-day," Miss Hamilton suggested, firmly. "Besides, Mrs. Worfolk won't want to arrive at the last minute."
"No, indeed, I shan't, Miss," said the housekeeper. "Well, I mean to say, I don't think we ever shall arrive, not if we wait much longer. We shall require a performing elephant to carry all these parcels, as it is."
"My idea was to go down in the last train on Christmas Eve," John argued. "I like the old-fashioned style, don't you know?"
"Yes, old-fashioned's the word," Mrs. Worfolk exclaimed. "Why, who's to get the house ready if we all go trooping down on Christmas Eve? And if I go, sir, you must come with me. You know how quick Mrs. Curtis always is to snap any one up. If I had my own way, I wouldn't go within a thousand miles of the country; that's a sure thing."
John began to be afraid that his housekeeper was going back on her word, and he surrendered to the notion of leaving town that afternoon.
"I say, what is this parcel like a long drain-pipe?" he asked in a final effort to detain Miss Hamilton, who was preparing to make her farewells and leave him to his packing.