"Why, yes; but it seems too good to leave, doesn't it? Oh, by the way,
Miss Carr, I came across a man to-day and ordered your greens. They will
be sent on Christmas Eve. Is that right?"

"Quite right, and we are ever so much obliged to you." She turned for a
last look at the sea, and, unseen by Ned Worthington, formed her lips
into a "good-night." Katy had made great friends with the Mediterranean.

The promised "greens" appeared on the afternoon before Christmas Day, in
the shape of an enormous fagot of laurel and laurestinus and holly and
box; orange and lemon boughs with ripe fruit hanging from them, thick
ivy tendrils whole yards long, arbutus, pepper tree, and great branches
of acacia, covered with feathery yellow bloom. The man apologized for
bringing so little. The gentleman had ordered two francs worth, he said,
but this was all he could carry; he would fetch some more if the young
lady wished! But Katy, exclaiming with delight over her wealth, wished
no more; so the man departed, and the three friends proceeded to turn
the little _salon_ into a fairy bower. Every photograph and picture was
wreathed in ivy, long garlands hung on either side the windows, and the
chimney-piece and door-frames became clustering banks of leaf and
blossom. A great box of flowers had come with the greens, and bowls of
fresh roses and heliotrope and carnations were set everywhere; violets
and primroses, gold-hearted brown auriculas, spikes of veronica, all the
zones and all the seasons, combining to make the Christmas-tide sweet,
and to turn winter topsy-turvy in the little parlor.

Mabel and Mary Matilda, with their two doll visitors, sat gravely round
the table, in the laps of their little mistresses; and Katy, putting on
an apron and an improvised cap, and speaking Irish very fast, served
them with a repast of rolls and cocoa, raspberry jam, and delicious