"Some children don't get--anything," said my father. He looked solemn. "Money is very scarce," he said. "It always is," said my mother. "But that's no reason why presents ought to be scarce." My father jumped up. My father laughed. "Great Heavens, woman!" he said. "Can't anything dull your courage?" "Not my--Christmas courage!" said my mother. My father reached out suddenly and patted her hand. "Oh, all right," he said. "I suppose we'll manage somehow." "Of course we'll manage somehow," said my mother. I ran back as fast as I could to Carol and Rosalee. We thought a good deal about young Derry Willard coming. We talked about it among ourselves. We never talked about it to my father or my mother. I don't know why. I went and got my best story-book and showed the Fairy Prince to Carol. Carol stared and stared. There were palms and bananas in the picture. There was a lace-paper castle. There was a moat. There was a fiery charger. There were dragons. The Fairy Prince was all in white armor, with a white plume in his hat. It grasped your heart, it was so beautiful. I showed the picture to Rosalee. She was surprised. She turned as white as the plume in the Fairy Prince's hat. She put the book in her top bureau-drawer with her ribbons. We wondered and wondered whether young Derry Willard would come. Carol thought he wouldn't. I thought he would. Rosalee wouldn't say. Carol thought it would be too cold. Carol insisted that he was a tropic. And that tropics couldn't stand the cold. That if a single breath of cold air struck a tropic he blew up and froze. Rosalee didn't want young Derry Willard to blow up and freeze. Anybody could see that she didn't. I comforted her. I said he would come in a huge fur coat. Carol insisted that tropics didn't have huge fur coats. "All right, then," I said. "He will come in a huge _feather_ coat! Blue-bird feathers it will be made of! With a soft brown breast! When he fluffs himself he will look like the god of all the birds and of next Spring! Hawks and all evil things will scuttle away!" There certainly _was_ something the matter with the Christmas tree that year. It grew. But it didn't grow very fast. My father said that perhaps the fertilizer hadn't been rich enough. My mother said that maybe all Christmas trees were blooming rather late this year. Seasons changed so. My father and mother didn't go away to town at all. Not for a single day. Late at night after we'd gone to bed we heard them hammering things and running the sewing-machine. Carol thought it smelt like kites. Rosalee said it sounded to her like a blue silk waist. It looked like a worry to me. It got colder and colder. It snowed and snowed.