“Bet you don’t. Say, Ernest, please wake me up when you do. I’m awful tired and maybe I won’t wake up early. I want to help fix the presents.”
“All right, Sis, I will.” Ernest gave her a little pat. He was very fond of this only sister but didn’t care to show it in public.
But Ernest proved as sound a sleeper as Jane in the morning. Alice had breakfast almost ready and the family table bulged with numerous brown and white paper packages—this was before the epidemic of tissue paper and baby ribbon—when Dr. Morton’s cheery “Merry Christmas, Sleepy-heads!” routed them out.
A chorus of “Merry Christmases” responded. Ernest’s was vigorous and Chicken Little’s sleepy, but Frank and Marian, just coming in the side door, called lustily, and Mrs. Morton chimed in with one for each individual member of the family.
Chicken Little flew down the stairs in her nightgown to have a peep at the fascinating table. She entirely forgot her stocking, which was perhaps just as well, for when she did investigate it after breakfast, she found only a piece of kindling neatly wrapped inside.
“I told you Mother thought we were too old!” reminded Ernest.
But the table was all that could be desired. Chicken Little began cautiously feeling the packages at her place till her mother discovered her and sent her upstairs to dress.
“Oh, Ernest, there was one funny little flat box just like the one Katy’s bracelet came in. You don’t s’pose—do you?” And she gave one ecstatic jump in anticipation of the glorious possibility.
Chicken Little’s hair went back with a sweep under the round rubber comb, tangles and all. She really couldn’t take time to comb it—and her plaid dress had every other button carefully unfastened. Brother Frank remarked that the front elevation was more attractive than the rear, and Marian rushed her off upstairs to make her tidy.
Chicken Little’s own contributions to the pile of gifts were made triumphantly after she had driven every other member of the family out of the dining room. She tucked her packages clear down at the bottom of each pile with the exception of Ernest’s present. It crowned the heap because she couldn’t wait to have him open it. Her father had given her the money for a pocket microscope which Ernest had been coveting for months.