… and inside the seventh, an eighth, and inside the eighth, a ninth …
"The gold! The gold!" said Stansfield Gaines. "Look for the gold wrapping paper!"
… and inside the ninth …
"I found it," cried Thane, leaping up somewhere among the jumble of boxes.
"Me too!" cried Julian.
"Not yet," warned Megan, "wait till everybody …"
"I found mine," said Barengaria.
And then they waited and waited until somewhere in the room Yardena -- with giddy disgust, and nausea clutching at the root of her throat -- finished unwrapping each package carefully and opening each box carefully (so as not to throw up) until she finally, finally, came to the last box, the gold-wrapped box, the box they all were waiting for.
She rose from among the wreckage of the thirty-six boxes pointlessly added to the mornin
