`` It makes such a lot of show for the money , '' she explained . `` I am bankrupt , like Jean . '' `` Well , we 've got a lot of pretty things , '' said Jean in a tone of satisfaction . `` Now we must do them up nicely . Will you wrap them in tissue paper , girls , and tie them with baby ribbon -- here 's a box of it -- while I write that letter ? '' While the others chatted over their parcels Jean wrote her letter , and Jean could write delightful letters . She had a decided talent in that respect , and her correspondents all declared her letters to be things of beauty and joy forever . She put her best into Miss Allen 's Christmas letter . Since then she has written many bright and clever things , but I do not believe she ever in her life wrote anything more genuinely original and delightful than that letter . Besides , it breathed the very spirit of Christmas , and all the girls declared that it was splendid . `` You must all sign it now , '' said Jean , `` and I 'll put it in one of those big envelopes ; and , Nellie , wo n't you write her name on it in fancy letters ? '' Which Nellie proceeded to do , and furthermore embellished the envelope by a border of chubby cherubs , dancing hand in hand around it and a sketch of No. 16 Chestnut Terrace in the corner in lieu of a stamp . Not content with this she hunted out a huge sheet of drawing paper and drew upon it an original pen-and-ink design after her own heart . A dudish cat -- Miss Allen was fond of the No. 16 cat if she could be said to be fond of anything -- was portrayed seated on a rocker arrayed in smoking jacket and cap with a cigar waved airily aloft in one paw while the other held out a placard bearing the legend `` Merry Christmas . '' A second cat in full street costume bowed politely , hat in paw , and waved a banner inscribed with `` Happy New Year , '' while faintly suggested kittens gambolled around the border . The girls laughed until they cried over it and voted it to be the best thing Nellie had yet done in original work . All this had taken time and it was past eleven o'clock . Miss Allen had cried herself to sleep long ago and everybody else in Chestnut Terrace was abed when five figures cautiously crept down the hall , headed by Jean with a dim lamp . Outside of Miss Allen 's door the procession halted and the girls silently arranged their gifts on the floor . `` That 's done , '' whispered Jean in a tone of satisfaction as they tiptoed back .
`` And now let us go XXXXX bed or Mrs. Pickrell , bless her heart , will be down on us for burning so much midnight oil .
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