Page:Frenzied Fiction.djvu/163

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The Errors of Santa Claus

putting the money in when you play. I needn’t have got them with it—they’d have sold the rest separately—but I think it’s too utterly slow playing without money, don’t you?”

“Oh, abominable,” shuddered Ulvina. “But your mamma never plays for money, does she?”

“Mamma! Oh, gracious, no. Mamma’s far too slow for that. But I shall tell her that Santa Claus insisted on putting in the little money boxes.”

“I suppose she believes in Santa Claus, just as my mamma does.”

“Oh, absolutely,” said Clarisse, and added, “What if we play a little game! With a double dummy, the French way, or Norwegian Skat, if you like. That only needs two.”

“All right,” agreed Ulvina, and in a few minutes they were deep in a game of cards with a little pile of pocket money beside them.

About half an hour later, all the members of the two families were again in the drawing-room. But of course nobody said anything about the presents. In any case they were all too busy looking at the beautiful big Bible, with maps in it, that the Joneses had brought to give to Grandfather. They all agreed that, with the help of it, Grandfather could hunt

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