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Ryehampton had bestowed on the home. Erebus was for at once increasing their salaries to three shillings a week. The cautious Terror would only raise them to ninepence each. Then, keeping rather more than four pounds for current expenses, he put fifteen pounds in the Post-Office Savings Bank. He thought it a wise thing to do: it prevented any chance of their spending a large sum on some sudden overwhelming impulse.

Then for some time their lives moved in a smooth uneventful groove. The cats were despatched to the London dealer; the neatly painted board came from Lady Ryehampton and was fixed up in the place of the Terror's handiwork; they did their lessons in the morning; they rode out, along with Wiggins who now had his bicycle, in the afternoons.

Then came December; and early in the month they began to consider the important matter of their mother's Christmas present.

One morning they were down at the home, giving the kittens their breakfasts and discussing it gravely. The kittens were indulging in engaging gambols before falling into the sleep of repletion which always followed their meals; but the Twins