Page:Ballinger Price--The Happy Venture.djvu/161

Rh .' And that was the most best gift of all!"

"Naughty person!" said Felicia. "After all those really nice gifts! But—but if you will have it that, she said, 'Take my kiss upon your heart of hearts.' Oh, Kirk—darling—I love you!"

Flowers twined Kirk's chair at the breakfast table—golden honeysuckle, a sweet, second blooming, and clematis from the Maestro's hedge. Kirk hung above it, touching, admiring, breathing the sweetness of the honeysuckle; aware, also, of many others of the Nine Gifts already perceptible about the room. But his fingers encountered, as he reached for his spoon, a number of more substantial presents stacked beside his plate. There was the green jersey which Felicia had been knitting at privately for some time. He hauled it on over his head at once, and emerged from its embrace into his sister's. There was, too, a model boat, quite beautifully rigged and fitted, the painstaking care with which it was fashioned testifying to the fact that Ken had not been quite so forgetful of his brother's approaching birthday as he had seemed to be.