by New Yorker
All pigs were different—some were more engaging or mischievous than others—and my brothers and sisters and I didn’t love all of them equally. In our shared memory, though, there was Matador. He arrived a bag of rattling bones and turned into a charming monster who laughed at the world with the eyes of an old man. He loved chocolate, soup, loving scratches, and Creole songs. And he became huge. When he escaped into the city, he was like a rolling boulder. One kindly fellow who sought to corner him found himself driven into a pole. Others were dispatched into gutters. When Ma Ninotte, followed by her brat pack, caught up, one of Matador’s victims asked her, “Tell us, Ma’am, what seventh species of animal is this, if you please?” Another said, “He’s a sower of sores, a liver boiler, a rheumatism starter, a filth-maker, and, if you don’t mind my saying so, Mrs. So-and-So, an ill-bred bastard of a beast.” We finally rounded up Matador on the banks of the Pointe Simon, opposite the white man’s warehouses, where he had stopped to suck down unceremoniously the scrumptious emanations of a salted-meat barrel.
As December approached, a parade of snivelling delegations implored Ma Ninotte to excuse Matador. Ma Ninotte responded, with a feigned rage (for she loved Matador as much as we did), “Tianmay soti en zèbe, muven”—“Get away from my feet, you brats.”
A dog dressed as a man was the killer—a certain Marcel. He seemed to exist only as Christmas approached, when he became a pig slaughterer. We had become so attached to Matador that when the fellow appeared we greeted him with cries of hatred. He had brought no implements; he had come, as he did every year, to agree on a price, a day, and a time. He arrived by day, in his white visiting shirt. As usual, he called up from the first step, “Ma Ninotte, how’d the pig do this year?”
Then began a long wait, the most terrible of our childhood. December arrived, with its winds, cold drafts, swollen noses, upset stomachs, fitful coughs, and old flus. We remained vigilant. We counted the knives and the tubs, but Ma Ninotte seemed to be preparing a pigless Christmas. She tended to the peels of her orange liqueur. She prettied her salted ham, her conserves, the other delicacies she had accumulated in her cupboard while awaiting the days of joy. But we never heard her promise anyone even the smallest chop. The air was trimmed with scents from cake ovens and the steam of fricassees. We saw her buy neither the peppers nor the sack of onions nor the coarse salt nor the herbs that announced the evil Saturday of the fattened pig.
Marcel must have worked in the middle of the night, because he was long gone when we awoke and found no Matador but just a whitish, bloody mass, which Ma Ninotte then cut up with her broad-bladed knife and distributed in newspaper as gifts to the other families in our building, and to the doctor who cured us, to the pharmacist who gave her medicines, to the Syrian shopkeepers who helped her out of jams. The rest was for her, in the form of cured meats, roasts, chops, the pig’s head, and sausages, which we had neither the stomach nor the heart to eat.
I have no memory of the pigs who succeeded Matador. Suffering is a harsh vaccine: it must have prepared us not to get too attached to Christmas pigs.
(Translated, from the French, by Carol Volk)
1997
A VISIT FROM SAINT NICHOLAS
(IN THE ERNEST HEMINGWAY MANNER)
JAMES THURBER
It was the night before Christmas. The house was very quiet. No creatures were stirring in the house. There weren’t even any mice stirring. The stockings had been hung carefully by the chimney. The children hoped that Saint Nicholas would come and fill them.
The children were in their beds. Their beds were in the room next to ours. Mamma and I were in our beds. Mamma wore a kerchief. I had my cap on. I could hear the children moving. We didn’t move. We wanted the children to think we were asleep.
“Father,” the children said.
There was no answer. He’s there, all right, they thought.
“Father,” they said, and banged on their beds.
“What do you want?” I asked.
“We have visions of sugarplums,” the children said.
“Go to sleep,” said mamma.
“We can’t sleep,” said the children. They stopped talking, but I could hear them moving. They made sounds.
“Can you sleep?” asked the children.
“No,” I said.
“You ought to sleep.”
“I know. I ought to sleep.”
“Can we have some sugarplums?”
“You can’t have any sugarplums,” said mamma.
(photo credit 13.1)
“We just asked you.”
There was a long silence. I could hear the children moving again.
“Is Saint Nicholas asleep?” asked the children.
“No,” mamma said. “Be quiet.”
“What the hell would he be asleep tonight for?” I asked.
“He might be,” the children said.
“He isn’t,” I said.
“Let’s try to sleep,” said mamma.
The house became quiet once more. I could hear the rustling noises the children made when they moved in their beds.
Out on the lawn a clatter arose. I got out of bed and went to the window. I opened the shutters; then I threw up the sash. The moon shone on the snow. The moon gave the lustre of mid-day to objects in the snow. There was a miniature sleigh in the snow, and eight tiny reindeer. A little man was driving them. He was lively and quick. He whistled and shouted at the reindeer and called them by their names. Their names were Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donder, and Blitzen.
He told them to dash away to the top of the porch, and then he told them to dash away to the top of the wall. They did. The sleigh was full of toys.
“Who is it?” mamma asked.
“Some guy,” I said. “A little guy.”
I pulled my head in out of the window and listened. I heard the reindeer on the roof. I could hear their hoofs pawing and prancing on the roof. “Shut the window,” said mamma. I stood still and listened.
“What do you hear?”
“Reindeer,” I said. I shut the window and walked about. It was cold. Mamma sat up in the bed and looked at me.
“How would they get on the roof?” mamma asked.
“They fly.”
“Get into bed. You’ll catch cold.”
Mamma lay down in bed. I didn’t get into bed. I kept walking around.
“What do you mean, they fly?” asked mamma.
“Just fly is all.”
Mamma turned away toward the wall. She didn’t say anything.
I went out into the room where the chimney was. The little man came down the chimney and stepped into the room. He was dressed all in fur. His clothes were covered with ashes and soot from the chimney. On his back was a pack like a peddler’s pack. There were toys in it. His cheeks and nose were red and he had dimples. His eyes twinkled. His mouth was little, like a bow, and his beard was very white. Between his teeth was a stumpy pipe. The smoke from the pipe encircled his head in a wreath. He laughed and his belly shook. It shook like a bowl of red jelly. I laughed. He winked his eye, then he gave a twist to his head. He didn’t say anything.
He turned to the chimney and filled the stockings and turned away from the chimney. Laying his finger aside his nose, he gave a nod. Then he went up the chimney. I went to the chimney and looked up. I saw him get into his sleigh. He whistled at his team and the team flew away. The team flew as lightly as thistledown. The driver called out, “Merry Christmas and good night.” I went back to bed.
“What was it?” asked mamma. “Saint Nicholas?” She smiled.
“Yeah,” I said.
She sighed and turned in the bed.
“I saw him,” I said.
“Sure.”
“I did see him.”
“Sure you saw him.” She turned farther toward the wall.
“Father,” said the children.
“There you go,” mamma said. “You and your flying reindeer.”
“Go to sleep,
” I said.
“Can we see Saint Nicholas when he comes?” the children asked.
“You got to be asleep,” I said. “You got to be asleep when he comes. You can’t see him unless you’re unconscious.”
“Father knows,” mamma said.
I pulled the covers over my mouth. It was warm under the covers. As I went to sleep I wondered if mamma was right.
1927
THE GREAT SANTA SHOOT-OUT AT THE MALL
(photo credit 13.2)
WAITING FOR SANTY: A CHRISTMAS PLAYLET
(WITH A BOW TO MR. CLIFFORD ODETS)
S. J. PERELMAN
Scene: The sweatshop of S. Claus, a manufacturer of children’s toys, on North Pole Street. Time: The night before Christmas.
At rise, seven gnomes, Rankin, Panken, Rivkin, Riskin, Ruskin, Briskin, and Praskin, are discovered working furiously to fill orders piling up at stage right. The whir of lathes, the hum of motors, and the hiss of drying lacquer are so deafening that at times the dialogue cannot be heard, which is very vexing if you vex easily. (Note: The parts of Rankin, Panken, Rivkin, Riskin, Ruskin, Briskin, and Praskin are interchangeable, and may be secured directly from your dealer or the factory.)
RISKIN (filing a Meccano girder, bitterly)—A parasite, a leech, a bloodsucker—altogether a five-star no goodnick! Starvation wages we get so he can ride around in a red team with reindeers!
RUSKIN (jeering)—Hey, Karl Marx, whyn’tcha hire a hall?
RISKIN (sneering)—Scab! Stool pigeon! Company spy! (They tangle and rain blows on each other. While waiting for these to dry, each returns to his respective task.)
BRISKIN (sadly, to Panken)—All day long I’m painting “Snow Queen” on these Flexible Flyers and my little Irving lays in a cold tenement with the gout.
PANKEN—You said before it was the mumps.
BRISKIN (with a fatalistic shrug)—The mumps—the gout—go argue with City Hall.
PANKEN (kindly, passing him a bowl)—Here, take a piece fruit.
BRISKIN (chewing)—It ain’t bad, for wax fruit.
PANKEN (with pride)—I painted it myself.
BRISKIN (rejecting the fruit)—Ptoo! Slave psychology!
RIVKIN (suddenly, half to himself, half to the Party)—I got a belly full of stars, baby. You make me feel like I swallowed a Roman candle.
PRASKIN (curiously)—What’s wrong with the kid?
RISKIN—What’s wrong with all of us? The system! Two years he and Claus’s daughter’s been making goo-goo eyes behind the old man’s back.
PRASKIN—So what?
RISKIN (scornfully)—So what? Economic determinism! What do you think the kid’s name is—J. Pierpont Rivkin? He ain’t even got for a bottle Dr. Brown’s Celery Tonic. I tell you, it’s like gall in my mouth two young people shouldn’t have a room where they could make great music.
RANKIN (warningly)—Shhh! Here she comes now! (Stella Claus enters, carrying a portable gramophone. She and Rivkin embrace, place a record on the turntable, and begin a very slow waltz, unmindful that the gramophone is playing “Cohen on the Telephone.”)
STELLA (dreamily)—Love me, sugar?
RIVKIN—I can’t sleep, I can’t eat, that’s how I love you. You’re a double malted with two scoops of whipped cream; you’re the moon rising over Mosholu Parkway; you’re a two weeks’ vacation at Camp Nitgedaiget! I’d pull down the Chrysler Building to make a bobbie pin for your hair!
STELLA—I’ve got a stomach full of anguish. Oh, Rivvy, what’ll we do?
PANKEN (sympathetically)—Here, try a piece of fruit.
RIVKIN (fiercely)—Wax fruit—that’s been my whole life! Imitations! Substitutes! Well, I’m through! Stella, tonight I’m telling your old man. He can’t play mumblety-peg with two human beings! (The tinkle of sleigh bells is heard offstage, followed by a voice shouting, “Whoa, Dasher! Whoa, Dancer!” A moment later S. Claus enters in a gust of mock snow. He is a pompous bourgeois of sixty-five who affects a white beard and a false air of benevolence. But tonight the ruddy color is missing from his cheeks, his step falters, and he moves heavily. The gnomes hastily replace the marzipan they have been filching.)
STELLA (anxiously)—Papa! What did the specialist say?
CLAUS (brokenly)—The biggest professor in the country … the best cardiac man that money could buy.… I tell you I was like a wild man.
STELLA—Pull yourself together, Sam!
CLAUS—It’s no use. Adhesions, diabetes, sleeping sickness, decalcomania—oh, my God! I got to cut out climbing in chimneys, he says—me, Sanford Claus, the biggest toy concern in the world!
STELLA (soothingly)—After all, it’s only one man’s opinion.
CLAUS—No, no, he cooked my goose. I’m like a broken uke after a Yosian picnic. Rivkin!
RIVKIN—Yes, Sam.
CLAUS—My boy, I had my eye on you for a long time. You and Stella thought you were too foxy for an old man, didn’t you? Well, let bygones be bygones. Stella, do you love this gnome?
STELLA (simply)—He’s the whole stage show at the Music Hall, Papa; he’s Toscanini conducting Beethoven’s Fifth; he’s—
CLAUS (curtly)—Enough already. Take him. From now on he’s a partner in the firm. (As all exclaim, Claus holds up his hand for silence.) And tonight he can take my route and make the deliveries. It’s the least I could do for my own flesh and blood. (As the happy couple kiss, Claus wipes away a suspicious moisture and turns to the other gnomes.) Boys, do you know what day tomorrow is?
GNOMES (crowding around expectantly)—Christmas!
CLAUS—Correct. When you look in your envelopes tonight, you’ll find a little present from me—a forty-percent pay cut. And the first one who opens his trap—gets this. (As he holds up a tear-gas bomb and beams at them, the gnomes utter cries of joy, join hands, and dance around him shouting exultantly. All except Riskin and Briskin, that is, who exchange a quick glance and go underground.)
1936
“I’d like to see old Ho-Ho-Ho try to assemble one of these damn toys.”
(photo credit 14.1)
NO SANTA CLAUS
EMILY HAHN
Mrs. Flynn was surprised to find herself caught fast in a social bottleneck several days before Christmas. It was not typical of her and it was not her fault, but it happened, nevertheless. She had arranged everything admirably and conscientiously around her three-year-old daughter’s program for the holidays. Mrs. Flynn ordinarily didn’t go in for social engagements; she devoted herself to Barbara and the apartment, and waited for Mr. Flynn, now Captain Flynn, to come home from Japan. In fact, in that holiday week, she didn’t even go to Barbara’s nursery-school party at ten o’clock one morning, but that was scarcely to be counted as a sacrifice. Reluctant to brave, so early in the day, the rigors of dark, horribly seasonable snowy weather, she sent Mamie, the cook, as deputy. Mamie came back alone—the children were to spend a last full day at school as usual—with a disquieting report on Barbara’s behavior.
“You didn’t miss much of a celebration, and that’s a fact, Madam,” she said. “They sang a couple of carols around the tree, and then Santa Claus come in to give out the toys, and Barbara, she cried fit to bust.”
“Good gracious!” said Mrs. Flynn. “What on earth made her do that?”
“Just plain scared, I guess,” said Mamie cheerfully. “You ought to take her around the big stores more, maybe, and let her talk to Santa Claus.”
“I won’t take the child into those crowds.”
“Oh, well, she’d forgotten all about it in five seconds,” said Mamie. “And, Madam, can I take my afternoon today?”
In spite of experience, Mrs. Flynn put up a feeble struggle. “Mamie, you know perfectly well,” she said, “that I asked you distinctly, last Sunday, which day you would want, and you said tomorrow. I do think you might have made up your mind before now. It isn’t as if I usually went out, and now I’ve accepted two Christmas parties for today. What am I to do about Barbara if you’re not home?”
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br /> “Well, let’s forget about it,” said Mamie. But there was that in her tone which brought Mrs. Flynn to heel.
“Oh, well, go ahead,” she said. “I can take Barbara along with me to Mrs. Tracy’s, I suppose. They’ll just have to understand, that’s all. And I can easily beg off the evening party. It’s a buffet supper.”
“No need for that,” said Mamie. “Once Barbara’s in bed you can leave her with a sitter, can’t you? That Mrs. Soper you had before for the theatre—she’ll come, most likely. You go to your supper and stop worrying.”
Mrs. Flynn was thinking aloud. “I don’t suppose Leonora would really mind if I bring her for cocktails—”
“Of course not,” said Mamie heartily. “Dress the child up and she looks a perfect doll. They’ll love her.”
That afternoon Mrs. Flynn, pushing an empty baby carriage ahead of her, arrived at the nursery school breathless and late, her yellow hair still pinned in damp ringlets after a hasty shampoo. Barbara romped out the door like a puppy and shoved a small wooden auto at her mother, crying, “Look! Look! Santa Claus gave it to me.”
Tactlessly, thoughtlessly, Mrs. Flynn said, “So you cried when you saw Santa. Why, darling?”
(photo credit 15.1)
“I did cry,” said Barbara cheerfully. “But it was the janitor, Santa Claus was. He showed me under his face, it was the janitor. Why was it, Mummy?”
