Mrs. Fountain, capering about joyfully: "Oh, how funny you are, darling! But go on. I don't mind it, now. And you may be glad you've got off so easily. Only now if there are any more bath-robes—" A timid rap is heard at the door. "Come in, Maggie!" The door is slowly set ajar, then flung suddenly wide open, and Jim and Susy in their night-gowns rush dancing and exulting in.
IX
JIM, SUSY, THE FOUNTAINS
Susy: "We've caught you, we've caught you."
Jim: "I just bet it was you, and now I've won, haven't I, mother?"
Susy: "And I've won, too, haven't I, father?" Arrested at sight of her father in the hooded bath-gown: "He does look like Santa Claus, doesn't he, Jimmy? But the real Santa Claus would be all over snow, and a long, white beard. You can't fool us!"
Jim: "You can't fool us! We know you, we know you! And mother dressed up, too! There isn't any Mrs. Santa Claus, and that proves it!"
Mrs. Fountain, severely: "Dreadful little things! Who said you might come here? Go straight back to bed, this minute, or— Will you send them back, Clarence, and not stand staring so? What are you thinking of?"
Fountain, dreamily: "Nothing. Merely wondering what we shall do when we've got rid of our superstitions. Shall we be the better for it, or even the wiser?"
Mrs. Fountain: "What put that question into your head? Christmas, I suppose; and that's another reason for wishing there was no such thing. If I had my way, there wouldn't be."