“Hello, you old scoundrel,” said Toby. “Merry Christmas to you.” He rubbed the parrot’s head with a finger and Mr. Murphy closed his beady eyes and enjoyed it. Toby was glad there was no one there, for it gave him an opportunity to place the packages he had brought around the table. Others, he saw, had been ahead of him, for already each plate held its quota of mysterious parcels tied with red ribbon. Then Phebe came in from the kitchen and Mr. Tucker stamped in from outdoors and Christmas greetings mingled, while Mr. Murphy, who loved excitement, bobbed about on his perch and cried “All hands stand by!” and “Come to breakfast! Come to breakfast! Come to breakfast!” And in the middle of the hubbub appeared Toby’s mother bearing a big platter, and a minute later they were all seated at the table.
That was a very merry meal. One after another the packages were undone and the contents exclaimed upon and passed from hand to hand to be admired and every one quite forgot to eat anything until all the presents had been opened. Mr. Tucker was very much pleased with his shaving set, and Phebe, who was thirteen and fast becoming a very pretty young lady, wound the blue-and-white silk scarf Toby had given her round her throat and refused to be parted from it. Toby’s gift to his mother was a pair of gloves which Mrs. Tucker declared very much too fine for her. The fact that they were a full size too small was not divulged. Toby’s own presents were simple and practical; a dressing-gown and handkerchiefs from his mother and sister, a five-dollar gold piece from his father, a pair of woolen mittens from Long Tim and a watch-fob of braided leather from Shorty Joe. Tim and Joe worked in Mr. Tucker’s boat yard. When, later in the day, Billy Plank, the postman, plowed up to the door, there was another gift for Toby. Of course he guessed right away who it was from, and his guess proved right. There was a card on top of the little blue box which read: “Merry Christmas to Toby from Arnold.” When the layer of cotton had been removed, as well as much white tissue paper, the gift resolved itself into a pair of gold cuff-links with the letters T. T. intertwined on them. Of course, as Toby said, they were much too expensive for his use, but they pleased him immensely and he carried them around in his pocket all day and viewed them proudly at intervals. By comparison, his gift to Arnold, an inexpensive little leather case for pins and studs, looked rather mean, but he was much too sensible to be worried over it.