"Christmas gift! Who guesses this is a Christmas gift for me?"
"Everybody!" cried the Bartletts.
"I guess it's a book. I hope it's a book. I shall be disappointed if it isn't a book," continued Phil.
Fred blushed, and said it wasn't anything. The clerk in the bookstore had recommended it, and he thought Phil might like it. Phil tore off the wrapper and held up "The Gray Knight of Picardy." The sight of it sent a quick, sharp pain through her heart. It was no longer merely the best tale of the season that her father and one of her dearest friends had written, but a book her father and the woman he loved had written; and this, in the light of the day's events, was a very different matter.
"Thank you, Fred. It's nice of you to think of me. And I'm sure it's a good story."
"They say it's awfully funny," said Fred.
Nothing seemed funny to Phil; but she exerted herself to be entertaining. She was in a mood to be touched by his gift. Charles Holton had sent her a box of roses from Indianapolis and they were nodding from the tall vase on the mantel. She saw Fred eyeing them, and hastened to say that books made the finest possible gifts.
"It must be lonely in the country to-day," remarked Nan. "But I suppose you've spent the day in town."
"Only part of it," replied Fred. "I couldn't desert the live stock; and I have a man there with me. We had our Christmas feast and I hopped on the interurban."
"Turkey?" asked Phil.