"Shall I go away?" she asked, smiling.
"We'll tell you about it now, shan't we, Bess?" said Louise. "You know," she continued, as her sister nodded approval, "we thought perhaps Uncle Carl would be glad if we remembered him on Christmas, and we couldn't think of anything but flowers."
Bess had placed the vase on a bracket beneath her uncle's portrait, and now came down from the chair, adding anxiously, "You like it, don't you, Aunt Zélie?"
"The vase wouldn't hold them all, so you must wear the rest," and Louise put them into her hand.
Aunt Zélie silently kissed them both.
There was something about this kiss that for a moment clouded the brightness of the day for Bess. "I wish people did not die," she exclaimed with almost a sob, as they went downstairs.
"What makes you look so sober, I should like to know?" demanded Uncle William, who, with Aunt Marcia, was the first of the guests to arrive.
"I was just thinking," she replied, and then, as Aunt Zélie came in with her usual bright face and the roses on her breast, she felt reassured and danced away to be as merry as anybody.
Dora and Ikey were the only outsiders invited to the tree, which was much like other trees, and so does not need to be described. It was perfectly satisfactory, however, and they all had exactly what they wanted. Dora was amazed at the number of things that fell to her share, most of all at a small gold bracelet with a daisy on the clasp, from Aunt Marcia.
"You may be sure she likes you after that," whispered Aleck.