by New Yorker
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.
“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
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 da
ughter’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.”
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?”
“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?”
“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?”
“He was helping out the real Santa Claus,” said Mrs. Flynn. She tucked the carriage robe carefully around her daughter’s plump legs and started to wheel the buggy homeward. The wind blowing down Madison Avenue was chilling. It searched out and pounced on the moisture in Mrs. Flynn’s hair and struck to the bones of her fingers, too lightly covered in cotton gloves.
“Does Santa Claus want to come to me?” asked Barbara. “Does he, Mummy?”
“Oh, yes,” said Mrs. Flynn, but in her heart she could not contemplate the icy, airy midnight voyage, the jingling, frosty reindeer, without a sympathetic chilly shudder. “He loves to come out,” she continued mechanically, pushing the carriage. “Think what fun it is to ride in a sleigh and to slip down the chimney while Barbara sleeps, to fill her stocking.”
“Will he fill my stocking?”
“You bet he will.” At the corner the wind attacked them fiercely.
“Why? Why, Mummy?” asked Barbara.
“Why what, sweetheart?”
“Why does Santa Claus want to fill my stocking? Why does he?”
The snow, stirred into filthy slush in the gutters, impeded the stiff woo
den wheels of the Victory carriage. It was easiest, Mrs. Flynn discovered, to tip the whole thing back on the rear wheels and just bump along. Her fingers sent sharp, shooting pains up her arms, and the cruel wind was freshening.
“Good Lord, I thought you’d gone to lunch!”
“Why, Mummy?”
“Oh, Barbara!” snapped Mrs. Flynn. “Stop saying ‘Why’!”
The child was startled and aggrieved, and her lower lip shoved out ominously. “Are you mad, Mummy? Don’t be mad.”
“Mummy’s not mad, sweets. Mummy’s fingers are cold and it hurts, and that makes Mummy cross.”
“Why does it make Mummy cross?”
“Oh, Barbara, please.”
Once Mrs. Flynn got home, with the lights on and her fingers chafed and comforted, she felt better. She saw herself flatteringly in the mirror, her childish nose, even more youthful than usual with its reddened tip, and her hair growing dry and fluffy between the pins. Some Christmas parcels had been delivered; they made a colorful little heap on the hall table. “For me? For me?” Barbara asked, dancing in her rubbers.
“No, darling, for Mummy. Your things will come with Santa Claus on Christmas, in his sack.” Turning the parcels over, Mrs. Flynn was reminded of a snippy salesgirl in Saks’ toy department. “You’re letting your little girl believe in all that Santa Claus stuff?” she had asked. Mrs. Flynn had retorted, ruffling like an embattled canary, “Why shouldn’t we tell them pleasant lies sometimes, instead of unpleasant ones?” Now she wondered if she were right. If only Ed had been here to talk things over with, such trivial decisions would be easy. She seemed to be getting the whole family into a mess of small, euphoric deceits. Lies about Ed himself, for instance. Had she been wise to begin those? Every week she read to Barbara a letter from Daddy, loving but quite imaginary. Ed would never think of writing letters to a baby. And the presents, the dolls and books and stuffed animals which she told Barbara that Daddy had sent from Japan—how could she expect Ed to live up to that reputation afterward? He wasn’t the type. He didn’t think about those things. Of course, as his mother always said, he was really soft-hearted, but… An icy hand squeezed Mrs. Flynn’s heart. Was Ed really softhearted? It was the first time she had ever wondered. She went hastily into Barbara’s room.
