Page:Frenzied Fiction.djvu/161

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The Errors of Santa Claus

Mrs. Brown. “Just the loveliest doll I’ve seen in years. I must get one like it for Ulvina. Won’t Clarisse be perfectly enchanted?”

“Yes,” answered Mrs. Jones, “and then she’ll have all the fun arranging the dresses. Children love that so much. Look, there are three little dresses with the doll, aren’t they cute? All cut out and ready to stitch together.”

“Oh, how perfectly lovely!” exclaimed Mrs. Brown. “I think the mauve one would suit the doll best, don’t you, with such golden hair? Only don’t you think it would make it much nicer to turn back the collar, so, and to put a little band—so?”

What a good idea!” said Mrs. Jones. “Do let’s try it. Just wait, I’ll get a needle in a minute. I’ll tell Clarisse that Santa Claus sewed it himself. The child believes in Santa Claus absolutely.”

And half and hour later Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Brown were so busy stitching dolls’ clothes that they could not hear the roaring of the little train up and down the dining table, and had no idea what the four children were doing.

Nor did the children miss their mothers.

“Dandy, aren’t they?” Edwin Jones was saying to little Willie Brown, as they sat in Edwin’s bedroom. “A hundred in a box, with

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