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While Polly answered: "I was just thinking about it, Ada?"

The next Christ, withof candy and nuts, and a doll for each girl, and a knife

for each boy of her grandchildren, all of whom she invited for

dinner Adam, 3d, sat at the head of the table, Mrs Bates at the

foot The tiniest tots that could be trusted without their

parents ranged on the Dictionary and the Bible, of which the Bates

family possessed a fat edition for birth records; no one had ever

used it for any other purpose, until it served to lift Hiram's

baby, Milly, on a level with her roast turkey and cranberry jelly

For a year before her party Mrs Bates planned for it The tree

was beautiful, the gifts a, the dinner, as Kate cooked and

served it, a revelation, with its big centre basket of red,

yellow, and green apples, oranges, bananas, grapes, and flowers

None of them ever had seen a table like that Then when dinner

was over, Kate sat before the fire and in her clear voice, with