he protested. 'Oh no, Stephen! That's not fair! It mustn't be
opened before Christmas morning.'

'But I gave you my vases yesterday.'

'That's different,' she said. 'Christmas is Christmas.' 'Oh, very
well,' he yielded. 'That's all right, my dear.'

Then he began to sniff.

'There's a deuced odd smell from it,' he said.

'Perhaps it's the wood!' she faltered.

'I hope it isn't,' he said. 'I expect it's the straw. A deuced odd
smell. We'll have the thing put in the side hall, next to the clock. It
will be out of the way there. And I can come and gaze at it when I feel
depressed. Eh, Maria?' He was undoubtedly charmed at the prospect of
owning so large and precious a cigar-cabinet.

Considering that the parcel which she had given to Penkethman to put in
the music-stool comprised a half-a-pound of Bostock's very ripest
Gorgonzola cheese, bought at the cook's special request, the smell
which proceeded from the mysterious inwards of the packing-case did not
surprise Vera at all. But it disconcerted her none the less. And she
wondered how she could get the cheese out.

For thirty hours the smell from the unopened packing-case waxed in
vigour and strength. Stephen's cold grew worse and prevented him from
appreciating its full beauty, but he savoured enough of it to induce
him to compare it facetiously to the effluvium of a dead rat, and he
said several times that Bostock's really ought to use better straw. He
was frequently to be seen in the hall, gloating over his cigar-cabinet.
Once he urged Vera to have it opened and so get rid of the straw, but
she refused, and found the nerve to tell him that he was exaggerating
the odour.

She was at a loss what to do. She could not get up in the middle of the
night and unpack the package and hide its guilty secret. Indeed, to
unpack the package would bring about her ruin instantly; for, the
package unpacked, Stephen would naturally expect to see the
cigar-cabinet. And so the hours crept on to Christmas and Vera's
undoing. She gave herself a headache.

It was just thirty hours after the arrival of the package when Mr
Woodruff dropped in for tea. Stephen was asleep in the dining-room,
which apartment he particularly affected during his colds. Woodruff was
shown into the drawing-room, where Vera was having her headache. Vera
brightened. In fact, she suddenly grew very bright. And she gave
Woodruff tea, and took some herself, and Woodruff passed an enjoyable
twenty minutes.