"They are all in the parlor. But, sir, won't you walk in?"
"I beg your pardon," said Davy, absently. "Oh! no; I am going back. Good-night, Charles."
"Oh, dear, Mr. Davy, do stay and see my present, please!"
Davy did not answer here, for the parlor door opened, and my mother appeared, benign and hospitable.
"Come in, come in!" she said, extending her hand, and I at least was in before she was out of the parlor. Fred was there, and Fred's wife—a pretty black-haired little matron, full of trivialities and full of sympathy with Lydia—was sitting by that respected sister at a little table. I ran to shake hands with Mrs. Fred, and knocked over the table. Alas! they were making bead purses, and for a few moments there was a restoration of chaos among their elements. Clo came from a dark corner, where she was wide awake over Dean Prideaux, and my mother had raised her hands in some dismay, when I was caught up by Fred and lifted high into the air.
"Well, and what do I hear," etc.
"Oh! Fred, where is my present?"
"Present, indeed! Such as it is, it lies out there. Nobody left it at the office, so Vincent tells me; but I found it there among the packages, and was strongly inclined to consider it a mistake altogether. Certainly 'Charles Auchester, Esq.,' was not 'known there;' but I smelt plum-cake, and that decided me to have it opened here."
I rushed to the chair behind the sofa, while the rest—except Millicent and Mr. Davy, who were addressing each other in the low voice which is the test of all human proprieties—were scolding in various styles. The fracas was no more to me than the jingling of the maternal keys. I found a large oblong parcel rolled in the thickest of brown papers, and tied with the thickest of strings round and round again so firmly that it was, or appeared to be, hopeless to open it unless I gnawed that cord.
"Oh! Lydia, lend me your scissors."