"There's one family fitted out with a lot of presents all naturally belonging together," she cried.
"I rather like that notion myself," announced James gravely, adjusting his lame leg to a more comfortable position. "Please hand me that brown and yellow tissue, somebody. I'm going to make a lot of bundles along the color lines that my auburn haired sister uses in her dress."
"Observant little Jimmy," commented Margaret.
"Here you perceive, ladies, that I am doing up the bundles with brown and yellow and burnt orange and tango, and lemon color, and I'm tying them with a contrast—brown with orange and buttercup yellow with brown and lemon yellow with white and so on. Good looking, eh?" he finished, pointing with pride to his group of attractive parcels.
"I'm going to do a bunch with a mixture of all sorts," announced Roger. "Here's a green tied with red and a white tied with green and a pink tied with white and a brown tied with tango, and violet tied with blue, und so weiter, as our Fräulein says when she means 'and so forth' and can't remember her English fast enough."
"Poor Fräulein! It will be a hard Christmas for her."
"She brought in the last of her work and Mrs. Hindenburg's yesterday. Such a mound of knitting!"
"Has any one been to the Old Ladies' Home to gather up what they have there?" asked James.
"Roger went early this morning before school. Perhaps those old ladies haven't been busy! See that pile?"
"All theirs? Good work," and James set about tying up the soft and comfortable knitted mufflers and wristlets and socks, first in tissue paper with a ribbon or a bright cord and then with a stouter wrapper of ordinary paper. He marked on each package what was in it.