In the second place, she was spying on all her friends, listening to their talk, watching them closely in work and play to find just the right thing to give them. “Do you know, I never made a Christmas present in my life,” she said one day to Rosie. “You never made a Christmas present?” Rosie repeated. Maida’s quick perception sensed in Rosie’s face an unspoken accusation of selfishness. “It wasn’t because I didn’t want to, Rosie dear,” Maida hastened to explain. “It was because I was too sick. You see, I was always in bed. I was too weak to make anything and I could not go out and buy presents as other children did. But people used to give me the loveliest things.” “What did they give you?” Rosie asked curiously. “Oh, all kinds of things. Father’s given me an automobile and a pair of Shetland ponies and a family of twenty dolls and my weight in silver dollars. I can’t remember half the things I’ve had.” “A pair of Shetland ponies, an automobile, a family of twenty dolls, your weight in silver dollars,” Rosie repeated after her. “Why, Maida, you’re dreaming or you’re out of your head.” “Out of my head! Why, Rosie you’re out of _your_ head. Don’t you suppose I know what I got for Christmas?” Maida’s eyes began to flash and her lips to tremble. “Well, now, Maida, just think of it,” Rosie said in her most reasonable voice. “Here you are a little girl just like anybody else only you’re running a shop. Now just as if you could afford to have an automobile! Why, my father knows a man who knows another man who bought an automobile and it cost nine hundred dollars. What did yours cost?” “Two thousand dollars.” Maida said this with a guilty air in spite of her knowledge of her own truth. Rosie smiled roguishly. “Maida, dear,” she coaxed, “you dreamed it.” Maida started to her feet. For a moment she came near saying something very saucy indeed. But she remembered in time. Of course nobody in the neighborhood knew that she was “Buffalo” Westabrook’s daughter. It was impossible for her to prove any of her statements. The flash died out of her eyes. But another flash came into her cheeks—the flash of dimples. “Well, perhaps I _did_ dream it, Rosie,” she said archly. “But I don’t think I did,” she added in a quiet voice. Rosie turned the subject tactfully. “What are you going to give your father?” she asked. “That’s bothering me dreadfully,” Maida sighed; “I can’t think of anything he needs.” “Why don’t you buy him the same thing I’m going to get my papa,” Rosie suggested eagerly. “That is, I’m going to buy it if I make enough money at the fair. Does your father shave himself?” “Oh, Adolph, his valet, always shaves him,” Maida answered.