As Patty stepped out of her room into the hall the next morning, at eight o’clock, she found Hal Ferris already tiptoeing down the stairs. He put his finger to his lip with a great show of secrecy, which made Patty laugh.

“Why must we be so careful?” she whispered. “We’re not doing anything wrong.”

“No; but it’s so much more fun to pretend we are. Let’s pretend we’re on a mysterious mission, and if we are discovered we’re lost!”

So they crept downstairs silently, and reached the breakfast-room, without seeing any one except one or two of the maids, who were dusting about.

Patty had on a trim, short skirt of white cloth and a blouse of soft white silk. Over this she wore a scarlet coat, and her golden curls were tucked into a little scarlet skating cap with a saucy, wagging tassel.

But in the warm, cheery breakfast-room she threw off her coat and sat down at the table.

“I didn’t intend to eat anything,” she said; “but the coffee smells so good, I think I’ll have a cup of it, with a roll.” She smiled at the waitress, who stood ready to attend to her wishes, and Hal took a seat beside her, saying he would have some coffee also.

“We won’t eat our breakfast now, you know,” he went on; “but we’ll come back with raging appetites and eat anything we can find. I say, this is jolly cosy, having coffee here together like this! I s’pose you won’t come down every morning?”

“No, indeed,” and Patty laughed. “I don’t mind admitting I hate to get up early. I usually breakfast in my room and dawdle around until all hours.”

“Just like a girl!” said Hal, sniffing a little.

“Well, I am a girl,” retorted Patty.

“You sure are! Some girl, I should say! Well, now, Girl, if you’re ready, let’s start.”

He held Patty’s scarlet coat for her while she slipped in her arms.

Then he disappeared for a moment, and returned wearing a dark red sweater, which was very becoming to his athletic figure and broad shoulders.

“Come on, Girl,” he said, gathering up their skates, and off they started.

“It’s nearly half a mile to the lake. Are you good for that much walk?” Ferris asked, as they swung along at a brisk pace.

“Oh, yes, indeed, I like to walk; and I like to skate, but I like best of all to dance.”

“I should think you would,—you’re a ripping dancer. You know, to-night we’ll have ‘Sir Roger de Coverley’ and old-fashioned dances like that. You like them?”

“Yes, for a change; but I like the new ones best. Are we going to have any dressing up to-night? I do love dressing up.”

“Glad rags, do you mean?”

“No; I mean fancy costumes.”

“Oh, that. Well, old Jim’s going to be Santa Claus. I don’t think anybody else will wear uncivilised clothes.”

“But I want to. Can’t you and I rig up in something, just for fun?”

“Oh, I say! that would be fun. What can we be? Romeo and Juliet, or Jack and Jill?”

“Oh, no, nothing like that. Something more like Christmas, you know. Well, I’ll think it over through the day, and we’ll fix it up.”

Skating on the lake so early in the morning proved to be glorious exercise. The ice was perfect, and the crisp, clear air filled them with exhilaration.

Both were good skaters, and though they did not attempt fancy figures, they spent nearly an hour skating around the lake.

“That’s the best skate I ever had!” declared Hal, when they concluded to return home.

“It certainly was fine,” declared Patty, “and by the time we’ve walked back to the house, I shall be quite ready for some eggs and bacon.”

“And toast and marmalade,” supplemented Ferris.

“I wonder if Daisy will be down. Does she come down to breakfast usually?”

“Sometimes and sometimes not,” answered Ferris, carelessly. “She’s a law unto herself, is Daisy Dow.”

“You’ve known her a long time, haven’t you?”

“Just about all our lives. Used to go to school together, and we were always scrapping. Daisy’s a nice girl, and a pretty girl, but she sure has got a temper.”

“And a good thing to have sometimes. I often wish I had more.”

“Nonsense! you’re perfect just as you are.”

“Oh, what a pretty speech! If you’re going to talk like that, I shall take the longest way home.”

“I’d willingly agree to that, but I don’t believe you’re in need of further exercise just now. Come, own up you’re a little bit tired.”

“Hardly enough to call it tired, but if there is a short cut home let’s take it.”

“And what about the pretty speeches I’m to make to you?”

“Leave those till after breakfast. Or leave them till this evening and give them to me for a Christmas gift.”

“Under the mistletoe?” and Ferris looked mischievous.

“Certainly not,” said Patty, with great dignity. “I’m too grown-up for such foolishness as that!”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Ferris.

The appearance of the two runaways in the breakfast-room was greeted with shouts of surprise.

AdÈle knew they had gone skating, but no one else did, and it was supposed they hadn’t yet come downstairs.

Patty’s glowing cheeks were almost as scarlet as her coat and cap, while Ferris was grinning with boyish enthusiasm.

“Top o’ the morning to you all,” he cried. “Me and Miss Fairfield, we’ve been skating for an hour.”

“On the lake?” cried Daisy, in surprise. “Why, you must have started before sunrise.”

“Oh, no, not that,” declared Patty, as, throwing off her wraps, she took a seat next to AdÈle; “but long enough to get up a ravenous appetite. I hope the Kenerley larder is well stocked.”

“Why didn’t you let us all in on this game?” asked the host. “I think a morning skating party would be just about right.”

“All right,” said Patty. “We’ll have one any morning you say. I shall be here for a fortnight, and I’ll go any morning you like.”

“I won’t go,” declared Mona. “I hate skating, and I hate getting up early, so count me out.”

“I doubt if any one goes very soon,” said AdÈle, “for I think there’s a storm coming. It looks bright out of doors, but it feels like snow in the air.”

“It does,” agreed her brother; “and I hope it will snow. I’d like a real good, old-fashioned snowstorm for Christmas.”

“Well, I hope it won’t begin before night,” said AdÈle. “We’ve a lot to do to-day. I want you all to help me decorate the tree and fix the presents.”

“Of course we will,” said Patty. “But, if I may, I want to skip over to the village on an errand. Can some one take me over, AdÈle, or must I walk?”

“I’ll go with you,” said Daisy, who was of no mind to be left out of Patty’s escapades, if she could help it.

“All right, Daisy, but you mustn’t tell what I buy, because it’s a secret.”

“Everything’s a secret at Christmas time,” said Mr. Kenerley; “but, Patty, you can have the small motor, and go over to the village any time you like.”

As there was room for them all, Daisy and Mona both accompanied Patty on her trip to the village, and Hal Ferris volunteered to drive the car. But when they reached the country shop, Patty laughingly refused to let any of the party go inside with her, saying that her purchases would be a Christmas secret.

She bought a great many yards of the material known as Turkey red, and also a whole piece of white illusion. Some gilt paper completed her list, and she ran back to the car, the shopkeeper following with her bundles. They attended to some errands for AdÈle, and then whizzed back to the house just in time to see the Christmas tree being put into place.

“We’re going to have the tree at five o’clock,” said AdÈle, “on account of baby May. It’s really for her, you know, and so I have it before dinner.”

“Fine!” declared Patty. “And where do we put our presents?”

“On these tables,” and AdÈle pointed to several small stands already well heaped with tissue-papered parcels.

“Very well, I’ll get mine,” and Patty went flying up to her room. Mona followed, and the two girls returned laden with their bundles.

“What fascinating looking parcels,” said AdÈle, as she helped to place them where they belonged. “Now, Patty, about the tree; would you have bayberry candles on it, or only the electric lights?”

“Oh, have the candles. They’re so nice and traditional, you know. Unless you’re afraid of fire.”

“No; all the decorations are fireproof. Jim would have them so. See, we’ve lots of this Niagara Falls stuff.”

AdÈle referred to a decoration of spun glass, which was thrown all over the tree in cascades, looking almost like the foam of a waterfall. This would not burn, even if the flame of a candle were held to it.

“It’s perfectly beautiful!” exclaimed Patty. “I never saw anything like it before.”

They scattered it all over the tree, the men going up on step-ladders to reach the top branches.

The tree was set in the great, high-vaulted hall, and was a noble specimen of an evergreen. Hundreds of electric lights were fastened to its branches; and the thick bayberry candles were placed by means of holders that clasped the tree trunk, and so were held firmly and safe.

AdÈle’s prognostications had been correct. For, soon after luncheon, it began to snow. Fine flakes at first, but with a steadiness that betokened a real snowstorm.

“I’m so glad,” exclaimed Patty, dancing about. “I do love a white Christmas. It won’t interfere with your guests, will it, AdÈle?”

“No; if Mr. Van Reypen and Mr. Farrington get up from New York without having their trains blocked by snowdrifts, I imagine our Fern Falls people will be able to get here for the dinner and the dance.”

The two men arrived during the afternoon, and came in laden with parcels and looking almost like Santa Claus himself.

“Had to bring all this stuff with us,” explained Roger, “for fear of delays with expresses and things. Presents for everybody,—and then some. Where shall we put them?”

AdÈle superintended the placing of the parcels, and the men threw off their overcoats, and they all gathered round the blazing fire in the hall.

“This is right down jolly!” declared Philip Van Reypen. “I haven’t had a real country Christmas since I was a boy. And this big fire and the tree and the snowstorm outside make it just perfect.”

“I ordered the snowstorm,” said AdÈle. “I like to have any little thing that will give my guests pleasure.”

“Awfully good of you, Mrs. Kenerley,” said Philip. “I wanted to flatter myself that I brought it with me, but it seems not. Have you a hill anywhere near? Perhaps we can go coasting to-morrow.”

“Plenty of hills; but I don’t believe there’s a sled about the place—is there, Jim?”

“We’ll find some, somehow, if there’s any coasting. We may have to put one of the motor cars on runners and try that.”

“They had sleds at the country store. I saw them this morning,” said Patty. “And that reminds me I have a little work to do on a Christmas secret, so if you’ll excuse me, I’ll run away.”

Patty ran away to the nursery, where FrÄulein, the baby’s governess, was working away at the materials Patty had brought home that morning.

“Yes, that’s right,” said Patty, as she closed the door behind her. “You’ve caught my idea exactly, FrÄulein. Now, I’ll try on mine, and then, afterward, we’ll call up Mr. Ferris to try on his.”

At five o’clock the sounding of a Chinese gong called everybody to come to the Christmas tree.

The grown people arrived first, as the principal part of the fun was to see the surprise and delight of baby May when she should see the tree.

“Let me sit by you, Patty,” said Philip Van Reypen, as they found a place on one of the fireside benches. “I’ve missed you awfully since you left New York.”

“Huh,” said Patty, “I’ve only been gone twenty-four hours.”

“Twenty-four hours seems like a lifetime when you’re not in New York.”

“Hush your foolishness; here comes the baby.”

The tree had been illuminated; the electric lights were shining and the candles twinkling, when little May came toddling into the hall. She was a dear baby, and her pretty hair lay in soft ringlets all over the little head. Her dainty white frock was short, and she wore little white socks and slippers. She came forward a few steps, and then spied the tree and stood stock still.

“What a booful!” she exclaimed, “oh, what a booful!”

Then she went up near the tree, sat down on the floor in front of it, clasped her little fat hands in her lap, and just stared at it.

“I yike to yook at it!” she said, turning to smile at Patty, in a friendly way. “It’s so booful!” she further explained.

“Don’t you want something off it?” asked Patty, who was now sitting on the floor beside the baby.

“Zes; all of ze fings. Zey is all for me! all for baby May!”

As a matter of fact, there were no gifts on the tree, only decorations and lights, but Patty took one or two little trinkets from the branches, and put them in the baby’s lap. “There,” she said. “How do you like those, baby May?”

“Booful, booful,” said the child, whose vocabulary seemed limited by reason of her excited delight.

And then a jingle, as of tiny sleighbells, was heard outside. The door flew open, and in came a personage whom May recognised at once.

“Santa Claus!” she cried. “Oh, Santa Claus!” And jumping up from the floor, she ran to meet him as fast as her little fat legs could carry her.

“Down on the floor!” she cried, tugging at his red coat. “Baby May’s Santa Claus! Sit down on floor by baby May!”

Jim Kenerley, who was arrayed in the regulation garb of a St. Nicholas, sat down beside his little girl, and taking his pack from his back, placed it in front of her.

“All for baby May!” she said, appreciating the situation at once.

“Yes, all for baby May,” returned her mother, for in the pack were only the child’s presents.

One by one the little hands took the gifts from their wrappings, and soon the baby herself was almost lost sight of in a helter-skelter collection of dolls and teddy bears and woolly dogs and baa lambs and more dolls. To say nothing of kittens and candies, and balls, and every sort of a toy that was nice and soft and pleasant.

The doll Patty had brought, with its wonderful wardrobe, pleased the baby especially, and she declared at once that the doll’s name should be Patty.

Having undone all her treasures, the baby elected to have a general romp with Santa Claus, whom she well knew to be her father. Jim had made no attempt to disguise lest it should frighten the child, and so his own gay young face looked out from a voluminous snow-white wig and long white beard. His costume was the conventional red, belted coat, edged with white fur, and a fur-trimmed red cap with a bobbing tassel.

Among the toys was a pair of horse lines with bells on it, and soon May had her good-natured father transformed into a riding-horse and galloping madly round the hall.

Then all present must needs play games suited to the calibre of the little one, and Ring around a Rosy and London Bridge proved to be her favourites.

After these unwonted exertions, everybody was ready for tea, which was then brought in. As a special dispensation, May was allowed to have her bread and milk at the same time, with the added indulgence of a few little cakes.

“Isn’t she a perfect dear?” said Patty, as she stood with the baby in her arms, after tea was finished.

“She is,” declared Philip, who stood near. “I’m not much up on kiddies, but she’s about the best-natured little piece I ever saw. I thought they always cried after a big racket like this.”

“She must say good-night now,” said AdÈle. “It’s quite time, and beside, I want her to go away while her reputation is good. Now, Maisie May, go to FrÄulein and go beddy.”

“Patty take May beddy.”

“No, dear, Patty must stay here with mother.”

“Patty take May beddy! Zes!” The finality of this decision was unmistakable. The most casual observer could see that unless it were complied with the scene might lose something of its sunshine and merriment.

“I should say,” judicially observed Philip, “that unless Miss May has her way this time, there will be one large and elegant ruction.”

“But I must make her obey me,” said AdÈle, a little uncertainly.

“Fiddlestrings, AdÈle,” returned Patty; “this is no time for discipline. The poor baby is about worn out with fatigue and excitement. You know, it has been her busy day. Let’s humour her this time. I’ll take her away, and I’ll return anon.”

“Anon isn’t a very long time, is it?” said AdÈle, laughing, and Hal remarked, “If it is, we’ll all come after you, Miss Fairfield.”

So Patty went away, carrying the now smiling baby, and FrÄulein went along with her, knowing the little thing would soon drop to sleep, anyway, from sheer fatigue.