"I always get all the things I want and _then_ some," said Roger, lazily, "so why worry?"
"You're a spoiled child," laughed Jeanne.
Mr. Fairchild, however, seemed to wear an air of pleased expectancy, quite different from Roger's calmness.
"Having a daughter to liven things up," said Mr. Fairchild, "is a new experience for us. You can see how well it agrees with us both. I hope, Jeanne, you're giving me a pipe just like Barney's--nobody _ever_ gave me one like that."
"I'm awfully sorry," said Jeanne, "but I haven't the price. That pipe cost sixty-nine cents, and I haven't that much in all the world. You'll have to wait till my kindergarten salary begins."
Mr. Fairchild looked at his wife, touched his breast pocket where a paper rustled, threw back his head, and _roared_.
"How perfectly delicious!" exclaimed Mrs. Fairchild. Then _her_ merry laugh rang out.
"What _is_ the joke?" asked Jeanne. "Can _you_ see it, Roger?"
"No, I can't--they're just havin' fun with us. But, if eleven cents would help you any--"
Roger's clothes fitted so snugly that it was rather a difficult task to extract the eleven pennies from his pocket; but he fished them out, one by one.
"There, as your Captain would say, 'Them's yourn.' I hope you won't be reckless with 'em because they're all I've got--except a quarter. You can't have that."
"Why!" said Jeanne, who had been counting on her fingers, "this makes just enough. I _had_ fifty-eight cents. I wonder what Uncle Charles would have done if I'd bought _him_ a pipe. He always smoked cigarettes--a smelly kind that I didn't like. I wouldn't have _dared_. He'd have been polite, but he would have looked at the pipe as if--as if it were a snail in his coffee!"
"Oh, Jeanne!" protested Mrs. Fairchild. "What a horrid thought!"
"_Isn't_ it? Now when can I buy that other pipe? Not tomorrow, because of that school entertainment. That'll last until dark. Not the next day morning---"
"Very late the day before Christmas," decided Mrs. Fairchild, quickly, "I'll take you downtown in the car. Then you can take your parcels to Bessie and Lucy and invite them to the Christmas night part of the tree, while I'm doing a few errands. Remember, Christmas _night_, not Christmas eve."