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I'm sorry to be so late with mine; but you see
I just finished it."

Carolyn laughed. "How you ever had time
to _make_anything,_ I don't see, but I'll appre-
ciate it all the more."

"It isn't much, but I hope you'll like it. Yes,
we almost ought to be with Grandma tomorrow,
but you see she is going away herself. She's
already gone. They're packing her off to Flo-
rida for her own good, though some one is with
her. Well, Merry Christmas, Carolyn, and I'll
never forget you. Couldn't if I tried!"

Excited and hungry, the Lee children reached
home for a late lunch together. Dick and Doris
"gabbled" so fast Amy Lou couldn't tell a thing,
she said, and they had had such a beautiful
Christmas morning at their school. Amy Lou
almost felt hurt that her mother had gone to
the high school instead, or that she could not
have gone with her; but Mrs. Lee reminded her
that she had visited her school when they had
their "great Christmas program" and Amy Lou
had "spoken a piece," for that was what they
called it in the old days when she was a little
girl.

_"We_ read things," importantly said Amy
Lou, "or have a 'number.'" After that she took
her dolls into the front room to play school and

 [[147]]