"But I wish I had just one talent," Rose sighed. "If God had given me only one, I would have been content."
Mavis looked troubled for a minute; then her face brightened as she responded hopefully—
"I think you're sure to have one, Rosie, only you haven't found it out."
[CHAPTER IX]
CHRISTMAS TIME
"THERE, now I have all my presents ready," Mavis declared in a satisfied tone, one morning a few days before Christmas, as she dropped great splashes of red sealing-wax on the small parcel she had already secured firmly with cord. "I do hope Miss Tompkins will like the handkerchief sachet I'm sending her."
"I should think she will be sure to like it," said Rose, who was standing looking out of the parlour window at the birds she had been feeding with bread-crumbs. "I wonder when Miss Dawson's Christmas-box will arrive, Mavis."
"Soon, I expect. I should not be surprised if it came at any time now, for it's getting very near Christmas, isn't it?"
The little girls' holidays had commenced two days before, and since then, they had been very busy preparing for Christmas. Mr. Grey had kindly driven them into Oxford, one afternoon, to make their various purchases, and but a shilling or so remained of Mavis' pound, the rest having been spent in presents which were hidden in the bottom of her trunk in her bedroom, to be kept secret from every one but Rose, until Christmas Day. For kind Miss Tompkins she had bought a pink silk handkerchief sachet with birds painted on it, and this, with a carefully-written note, she had packed in readiness to send off that evening.
"I wonder what mother is doing in the kitchen," remarked Rose, presently. "She said at breakfast she would have a leisureable day, as the puddings are boiled and the mincemeat is made, and we're to have a cold dinner. But I've heard her bustling about as though she's very busy. Let us go and see what she's doing."