Christmas at
Sagamore Hill
WITH THEODORE ROOSEVELT
by
Helen Topping Miller
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO.
NEW YORK · LONDON · TORONTO
1960
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO., INC.
119 WEST 40TH STREET, NEW YORK 18
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO., Ltd.
6 & 7 CLIFFORD STREET, LONDON W 1
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO.
20 CRANFIELD ROAD, TORONTO 16
CHRISTMAS AT SAGAMORE HILL
COPYRIGHT © 1960
BY
J. A. HILL AND DONALD G. TOPPING
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO REPRODUCE THIS BOOK, OR ANY
PORTION THEREOF, IN ANY FORM
PUBLISHED SIMULTANEOUSLY IN THE DOMINION OF CANADA BY
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO., TORONTO
FIRST EDITION
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NUMBER 60-53227
Printed in the United States of America
Christmas at Sagamore Hill
[Illustration: Decorative glyph]
The night was bitterly cold and a raw wind was blowing off the Bay,
sending dry leaves scudding and whipping the naked boughs of the trees,
when Theodore Roosevelt alighted from his carriage at Sagamore Hill. He
got out backward very cautiously, easing his muscular bulk down lightly
on his feet although he was holding both arms straight out before him.
The burden they bore was precarious.
In his arms he balanced a great globe in which a dozen goldfish were
swimming dizzily. Already a thin film of ice had formed on top of the
water and fragments of it followed the fish about in their hysterical
dashings back and forth.
He walked to the steps, setting his feet down firmly as not long since
he had tramped the rough vine- and fern-tangled hills in Cuba. Only now,
he thought gratefully, nobody was shooting at him.
The door of the big rambling house opened as he mounted the steps and
warm light greeted him. So did a chorus of assorted shrieks.
“Father’s home!”
Four children came rushing out into the night, staid Alice trying to
remember the dignity expected of a young lady of fourteen, Theodore,
frail and owlish, peering through his spectacles, Kermit, slender and
fair with legs that seemed too slim to support his wiry body, and after
them four-year-old Archie, stumbling and falling flat on the cold floor.
“Pick him up!” directed Roosevelt. “You see I have my hands full. And
hold the door and let me in before I drop this slippery thing.”
“What in the world is it, Father?” asked Alice, hurrying to prop the
door wide for him.
“Can’t you see?” demanded Kermit. “It’s fishes.” He scuttled behind his
father.
“Move all those things,” Roosevelt ordered, pointing to the hall table.
“Let me set this down.”
Alice hastily removed the card tray and candlesticks from the table,
setting them carefully on the floor. The fish continued their giddy
pirouette and small Archie pressed his button of a nose against the cold
glass.
“They dancing,” he exclaimed delightedly. “Father, fishes dancing!”
“Silly! Fishes can’t dance,” declared Kermit. “They’ve got no feet. Have
they got feet, Father?”
“No, they haven’t any feet. They’re just excited,” said his father,
hanging up his hat and overcoat.
There was a scurry of feet on the stairs and seven-year-old Ethel came
flying down followed at a quieter pace by her mother.
“We were putting the baby to bed. Oh, goldfish! But Theodore—”
“They’re ours,” Kermit said. “I counted and there are twelve of them.
Which is the mother fish, Father, the one who lays the eggs?”
“They aren’t ours,” answered his father. “I got them for the school for
you to give the other children as a goodby gift. This house is freezing,
Edie, can’t that man do something about the fires?”
“There’s one burning wherever there’s a fireplace, Theodore, and they’ve
been stoking both furnaces continually all day. This house is just hard
to heat on a windy day.”
“My room is like an icehouse,” said Alice. “My fingers got practically
stiff while I was dressing.”
“We’ll hope that the house in Albany is easier to heat,” said Mrs.
Roosevelt.
“I don’t want to move to Albany,” Ethel whimpered. “I don’t want to
leave my puppies and my pony.”
“Silly!” scorned young Ted, who had stood a little aloof from all the
excitement over the goldfish, as he usually did from things he
considered childish. “You should be proud to go to Albany, Father’s
going to be governor of New York.”
“Is that like being president?” asked Ethel.
“Slightly less than being president,” Ted conceded, “but not much less.”
“Theodore, we’re due at the schoolhouse right now,” his wife reminded
him. “Children, get your hats and coats and everyone must put on
overshoes. We don’t want any frosted fingers or toes for Christmas.
Theodore, I don’t really know if Ted should go or not. His chest is
still frail from that grippe.”
“Bundle up well, Ted,” ordered his father. “Cold weather never hurt
anybody.”
“It hurts me.” Alice shivered. “I get goose bumps and I hate them and
the end of my nose turns red.”
“Get ready at once, Alice, and you too, Ted, if you’re going,” directed
their father.
“Mother had me excused from making my speech,” said Ted. “I still think
I was well enough to have made it.”
“I can say mine,” Kermit shouted, halfway up the stairs, “‘Higgledy
piggledy went to school—’”
“You’ll be scared when the time comes,” Ted jeered. “I bet you forget
half of it.”
In the big carriages packed with robes and hot bricks they rode the
short distance to the Cove Creek school. The schoolhouse bell, creaking
and jangling merrily, was ringing loudly as they came near; they could
hear the wheels that turned it squeak and the ropes groan and slap
against the sides of the belfry.
“Someday,” announced young Ted as he climbed out of the carriage, “that
old thing’s going to come crashing down.”
“Then the children won’t have to go to school,” said Ethel.
Theodore Roosevelt, governor-elect of the State of New York, marched
into the little schoolhouse carrying the bowl of goldfish in his arms
and followed in a train by his family, to be greeted with loud clapping
by the assembled parents. With a bow he presented the fishbowl to the
teacher, sweeping off his gray campaign hat as he marched back to a rear
seat. Father shouldn’t sit in the back, thought Alice, who was beginning
to feel more like a princess every day and felt cheated because they
were not more prominently seated. Father ought to be dressed up, too,
wearing his silk hat and his beautiful white vest and striped trousers,
not that old gray suit and knickers as though he were merely anybody
instead of the governor.
One by one the children gestured or stammered through their “pieces,”
most of which had a very military quality. A young archfoe of Ted’s
finished with a tribute to the governor-elect, “We’ll send you to the
White House for the gallant deeds you’ve done,” which was tumultuously
applauded by all the children and parents.
Then the governor-elect, who had hoped to escape by silently sitting in
the rear, was called upon to speak. As he strode up to the stage, he was
aware of a low whisper from his daughter, “Father, don’t talk long!
Think of the poor children.”
Roosevelt did not speak of Christmas or the Holy Birth, which had been
said a dozen times already. In simple language, talking directly to the
young fry, he outlined his philosophy of life, counseled them to decide
that they were going to have a good time as long as they lived, and that
without being quarrelsome they should stand up for their rights, be
honorable and fair to all people. The applause when he had finished
shook the building but as he sat down he heard a loud mutter from his
oldest son, “Father, we thought you’d never stop talking.”
Now came the most exciting moment. From the gay tree, decorated with
wreaths of colored paper, with tinsel and strings of popcorn, the
presents were distributed. Roosevelt was asked to step forward and as
the gifts were handed to him by the teacher he called out each child’s
name.
There were dolls and skates and sleds and sleighs, picture books and toy
guns and swords, each one carefully selected by Edith over a period of
weeks and each the gift of Theodore Roosevelt. As he handed down the
presents into eager little hands he was no longer the governor-elect and
a military hero, he was merely Neighbor Roosevelt giving a happy holiday
to a group of small friends of his own children.
Edith had chosen all the gifts and Theodore had paid for them with the
last army paycheck he had received for serving in Cuba. And no child
hugging his present beamed more brightly than did Theodore Roosevelt as
he patted every small head and spoke a pleasant word to the recipient.
His own children were not forgotten and Edith had wisely seen that the
gifts were suitable even though there would be a bounteous Christmas for
the five young Roosevelts later. If she had a few moments of trepidation
as to how all this accumulation of holiday largess would be transported
to Albany before the month was ended, she kept her anxiety to herself.
Certainly Kermit could not be separated from the little mechanical ship
he clutched so tightly in his arms.
They drove back to Sagamore Hill in the bitter cold of the early winter
dark. The light snow that had fallen, just enough to allow Theodore
Roosevelt to experiment with an old pair of skis, was now frozen hard
and glittered in the chilly light from the western sky. Out toward the
horizon the Bay lay flat and gray and restless, reflecting now and then
a glint of dying winter light.
The children were quiet, huddling under the blankets, all but Ted who
said wistfully, “I should have liked those skates you gave to Pete
Murray, Father.”
“You already have skates,” said his father. “Don’t be greedy.”
“But those skates were better,” insisted Ted. “They have those sharpened
edges and two straps.”
“I still say you are being greedy, Ted. It’s an ugly trait. Get rid of
it. Pete Murray is not as fortunate as you. He never gets many
presents.”
“Anyway,” Kermit chimed in, “maybe in Albany there won’t be any ice.”
“I don’t want to go to Albany,” piped up little Archie. “I like here.”
“So do we,” said Ted, “but Father has to be governor of New York because
he beat the Spaniards in the war.”
“Not alone, Ted,” corrected his father. “There were quite a few stout
fellows helping me. Thousands of them, in fact, from generals and
admirals down to plain soldiers and sailors.”
“But the Rough Riders were the bravest,” his son persisted.
“We’ll hope history will affirm that rash assertion.” His father was
dry. “However, I thank you for your commendation. All right, here we
are. Pile out, you fellows. Mother and the girls are just behind us in
the other carriage. Everybody carry his own loot. Supper will be ready,
we’ll hope, though I doubt if Archie can stay awake long enough to eat
it.”
The fires would be warm and pleasant after the chill outside, but later
icy drafts would creep out of the corners making the family shiver. It
was fortunate the young Roosevelts were a hardy breed, all but Ted who
was still inclined to be frail and subject to sudden illnesses. Theodore
Roosevelt remembered his own sickly childhood and hoped for the best for
his sons. Certainly he himself was tough enough now. There had been
times in his youth when he had been forced to go to the high, dry
western country to recover his health and strength. He still went back
occasionally in summer to look after his cattle interests there into
which he had sunk so much of his inheritance from his father.
The ranch had been a losing venture for several years and there had been
times when he and Edith had worried about being able to provide for
their large, expensive family, but now the future seemed secure for at
least a few years and Theodore Roosevelt had never been one to let
anxiety harass him for long.
He paused to look up at Sagamore Hill on his way back from the carriage
house. The bulky building with its wings and high roof line stood out
clearly against the sky of early night. The house had somehow the wrong
colors, as Alice was apt to observe a trifle acidly, remarking that the
mustard yellow of the shingles on the gables certainly did not harmonize
with the rose-pink brick.
Edith, his wise, firm, gentle wife, was waiting at the door.
“Hurry off with your wraps,” she said. “Supper is ready and we have good
hot soup.”
“What, no wassail bowl?” bantered Theodore. “No boar’s head with a
wreath of holly and an apple in his mouth? This is Christmas Eve,
remember. Just plain old soup?”
“Don’t make the children dissatisfied with their food, Theodore,” Edith
chided. “Ted, let me feel your cheeks. They look very flushed to me.”
“Frosty outside,” her husband reminded her.
“I don’t want any more pills or brown stuff out of a bottle,” whined
Ted, “and I don’t specially care for soup.”
“Listen, son,” said his father. “You are always talking about being a
soldier and a soldier learns first of all to eat what is put before him.
I’m sure Mother has very excellent soup and it will be warming and
welcome on this chilly night. I put wrong ideas in their heads,” he
admitted, as they shepherded the children into the dining room. “A very
foolish thing to do.”
“Now you set an example of hungrily eating your soup,” said Edith. “At
least there is a pudding later.”
“Does it have burning brandy on it?” inquired Kermit who had been
devouring pictures of the old-fashioned English Christmas lately.
“No burning brandy, just hard sauce, but I suspect the cook put a drop
or two of wine in it.”
“Well,” approved Alice, “that will be a little exciting.”
“You need to go to school, young lady,” commented her father.
“A stuffy old place like that?” She sighed. “And Bamie’s house is just
as bad. Now I know how it will be: ‘Remember your father is governor. Do
him credit.’ Sometimes I wish you were a plain man, Father, like other
girls’ fathers.”
“You wish no such thing! You bask in all the publicity! Anyway I am a
plain man. You don’t see me wearing a top hat, do you? Or putting on
airs?”
“Sometimes,” she admitted, “I wish you would dress up a little more and
wear all your medals.”
“Let’s all be just nice plain people,” suggested her stepmother.
Albany, Edith decided, was not going to be an easy place to hold the
children to democratic standards. The governor’s children might be
expected not to turn somersaults on the lawn of the executive mansion,
or sail kites off the roof. Here at Sagamore Hill the younger ones had
had the freedom of the place, nothing was closed to them. Even in
Roosevelt’s workshop under the roof, the door was always open and she
had seen her husband often writing or dictating an important speech with
Archie or Kermit crawling about his feet or pushing a toy train and
shouting “choo choo choo!”
Important visitors were often left cooling their heels in the parlor
while Roosevelt was out having a rough and tumble in the hay with the
children or down at the dock teaching one of them how to dive. When he
was with his children he was as young as they were, and though this made
him more lovable it could be exasperating, too, and at times
embarrassing. Like the time a maid had misinterpreted the mission of two
delegations of visitors, leaving a group of important men to cool their
heels on the front porch while she waited on some startled and
bewildered clergy in the parlor.
But if there were times when Edith Roosevelt yearned for a little
privacy, she kept the thought to herself. To be ignored and eventually
forgotten would be a living death to a man like Theodore Roosevelt, with
a nature so ebullient and outgiving.
He had to express himself either vocally or by action just as he had had
to risk his life and health fighting with his Rough Riders in Cuba.
There had been a job to be done, a wrong to be righted, and his fierce
sense of justice and obligation would not let him ignore it. Of course
the excitement had appealed to him, too, just as the thrill of riding
and roping cattle on the Dakota ranch had done, the place where already
he had sunk too much of the money left him by his father. The only
recreation or relaxation that he knew was in doing something vigorous
and different. There was, Edith sighed to herself, nothing restful about
him.
“Now,” she put in a maternal admonition, “there will be no pillow fights
tonight. Everyone must go quietly to sleep, there will be enough
excitement in the morning.”
“At least,” said her husband, “may I be allowed to help them hang up
their stockings?”
“If you’ll promise to come down immediately and not mar the mantelpiece.
And Ted must have some ointment on his chest and a dose of cough
medicine. I’ll come up with you, Ted, and see that you are well rubbed.
You don’t want to spend Christmas in bed.”
“Mother, do I have to? I hate that slimy stuff.”
“You have to and you have to hold still and not squirm and yell,”
insisted his mother. “Come along now, all of you. I want you all in bed
and warmly covered before the fires go out.”
“You mean Father isn’t going to tell us even one story?” wailed Kermit,
stumbling up the stairs.
“No stories tonight, Kermit.” His father gave him a gentle slap on the
rear as he followed him. “Orders from the queen. We must all rest
tonight for tomorrow is a big day.”
The doorbell pealed then and over the upper railing they saw the maid
admitting some visitors.
“Three gentlemen to see Colonel Roosevelt,” she announced, hurrying
halfway up the flight. “They’re in the parlor.”
“Let them wait,” said Roosevelt impatiently. “Some delegation of office
seekers, no doubt, or somebody wanting a favor of the governor.”
“But you aren’t the governor yet,” Ethel argued. “You’re only Father.”
“My favorite appointment and nothing would please me more than to work
full time at it. Get along, boys, I can’t keep those people waiting too
long.”
“You do,” reminded Ted. “That time when we were all playing circus in
the barn you kept some men waiting a long time while you were trying to
teach Kermit’s pony to kneel.”
“Then Father was not governor of New York,” his mother told him. “Now he
has a responsibility to the people of this state.”
“Thank you, my dear,” said her husband. “Kiss me good night, all you
youngsters. I’d better see what those people want. After all, this is
Christmas Eve and a cold night. Likely they want to get home to their
families.”
The three men waiting below had a mission they considered important and
praiseworthy. They wanted Colonel Roosevelt when he took office as
governor to do something about getting better roads for the county.
“They’re a bog in winter and a fog of dust in summer. They’re a hardship
to the folks who live here and they discourage summer people. Every time
some people pay their taxes they harangue us about the bad roads.”
“But, gentlemen,” Roosevelt protested, “the county roads are the
county’s affair, except for a few miles of state and post roads. Your
county officials are the people for you to see about this matter.”
“The county officials, Colonel, are us three and there’s nobody for us
to appeal to. We’re the ones who are getting all the knocks and got no
answer unless we raise taxes, and Lord, what a howl there would be about
that! Trouble is, people want a lot of things till it comes time to pay
for them and then they want somebody else to take on the load.”
“That’s the trouble with the whole country,” said Roosevelt. “In Albany
there are probably people already waiting, wanting something but wanting
no part of the financial responsibility of paying for it. The President
and Congress are bombarded constantly with requests to give benefits to
certain areas and groups of people but all those things cost money and
the money has to come from the people, the ordinary people like you and
me, gentlemen.”
How many times, he wondered, as the delegation left reluctantly,
grumbling among themselves, would he hear the same arguments in the next
two years? All at once, standing in his own doorway looking out at the
dark night sky which was already beginning to lower and spit a few more
flakes of snow, he felt a dread of the new task that till this moment
had stimulated and exhilarated him.
The peace and quiet of Sagamore Hill suddenly was doubly dear. The
fields and hills over which he had roamed with his children, the fringe
of wood where he had chopped down trees, exulting in every blow of the
ax, at seeing white chips fly wide. Here, he was thinking, he could have
lived, writing his books, watching over the growth and education of his
children, getting fatter with the years perhaps, less able to swim and
dive and wield an ax, or flash down a snowy slope on new skis.
He knew, however, a life like that was not for him. Action was essential
to him, positive and vigorous, and he could no more keep out of public
affairs than he could resign himself to sitting by a fireside all the
rest of his days. He could never sit still there. He was always jumping
up to discipline the blazing logs with firm jabs of the poker, or hurl
on more wood with a heave and a grunt.
He went to the fire now and found Edith sitting there with her usual
piece of sewing in her lap.
“It seems to be getting colder,” she remarked. “Those upstairs rooms are
really chilly. I do hope the governor’s house has an adequate heating
system; I dread the colds we get in winter and Ted’s chest is not really
strong.”
“There we’ll have steam no doubt, and boilers to burn coal. I’ve never
been inside the place but once and that was quite long ago. It’s a
gloomy old pile but we have to live in it.”
“It can’t be any harder to heat than this house,” said Edith, trying not
to let any of the odd feeling creep into her voice, the slight
reservation she had never voiced even to herself but that had always
been present deep in her mind—her own feeling about Sagamore Hill.
After all, it had been built for another women, the girl whom her
husband had deeply loved, Alice Lee. And it had been originally named
Leeholm. That Alice Lee had died before the first stone of the
foundation had been laid could not but remind Theodore now and then of
what he had lost, especially when he looked at Alice Lee’s daughter,
brisk, vigorous little Alice born with an assertive nature, blunt and
forthright, like his own.
All her married life Edith Carow Roosevelt had kept a firm hand on her
emotions, not letting any useless jealousy creep in to raise a cloud
between her and her husband. He was hers and had been for many years and
their children were proof of the constancy of his love. He adored them
all, though now and then his was the firm hand that supplied the
occasionally needed discipline and punishment. The children’s worship of
their father was only too evident in the way they followed him about,
having scant enthusiasm for any game in which he did not join.
They sat quietly together for an hour, then Theodore asked, “Do you
think it’s safe to get the Christmas presents out now? It’s getting
late.”
“Let’s wait a little longer. Ted never goes to sleep promptly, and Ethel
and Kermit were both very excited when Mame put them to bed.”
“Good old Mame! I bought her a locket. Probably a frivolous gift for
Mame, but everyone needs something foolish and gay to liven up life now
and then.”
“She has been faithful for years. I couldn’t have raised the children
without Mame. She doesn’t get along too well with the other servants at
times, but they’re used to her blunt way now and ignore her difficult
days,” Edith said.
“We all have difficult days,” he remarked. “I know there have been
times, when I was harassed and frustrated by outside events, that I have
been difficult to live with.”
“You have learned to control your emotions very well lately,” she said,
“though sometimes I have thought you a bit too impulsive.”
“You mean going off at half cock, lacking in sober judgment. I know
that. No one knows it better than I. All my life I’ve battled against
going at things headlong, the way I fought in Cuba, and struggled to put
down graft and corruption when I was with the New York Police
Commission.”
“I still hate thinking of that winter when times were so hard and we
were so short of money. I still can’t bear to see a slice of bread
wasted. Theodore, listen!” She rose suddenly. “It’s a wagon coming up
the drive.”
They both hurried to the front door. A wagon drawn by two horses was
slowly coming up the hill, lanterns hung upon it and sleigh bells
jingling merrily from about the necks of the horses. It was filled with
young people who were singing at the tops of their voices.
_God rest ye merry, gentlemen! let nothing you dismay,
For Jesus Christ, our Saviour, was born on Christmas day._
“How sweet!” exclaimed Edith. “We ought to invite them in.”
The noise would rouse the children, she knew unhappily, as the
youngsters went on into another carol. Theodore walked out to the wagon
to deliver the invitation, while Edith racked her brain to think what
she had in the house to offer a crowd of young fry, who would certainly
have huge appetites. There might be cookies in the pantry or apples. The
cook always kept a supply of cookies on hand as Theodore often put a few
in his pockets when he went on his almost daily rambles over the
countryside.
It was a relief to her when he returned to the porch saying that the
carolers would not alight, as they had many other places to go and it
was getting late. After a dozen more songs, coming sweetly clear on the
frosty air, the singers launched into a popular song that had been sung
when crowds greeted the hero of San Juan Hill.
_We’ll send you to the White House for the gallant deeds you’ve done._
Edith knew a sudden trepidation as the wagon jolted away, the voices
still floating back on the still, cold air. She had heard whispers of
the White House before from the politicians and public men who were
constantly thronging the house, but never a word from Theodore. If he
had any ambitions beyond the governorship he was keeping them from her
and that was unlike her husband who was often too vocal and positive in
his plans and opinions. Certainly he had always confided in his wife,
even if at times she had secretly thought he was not too wise to be so
frank about important and confidential matters.
What he may have been thinking she had no way of knowing, though as a
rule his line of thought was seldom concealed from her. The presidency
would be an honor of course, and if Theodore had a dream of sometime
occupying that distinguished position she could say nothing to
discourage or frustrate such an ambition, but her quiet soul shrank a
little from being thrust into the responsibilities of such a life and
always she thought of her children. The publicity and adulation to which
they would be exposed in Albany would be bad enough.
Like their father they were all fiercely democratic—at least the boys
were—but every honor that had come to their father had excited them,
Alice especially. Alice loved importance and took every plaudit and
cheer as partially her own.
Edith argued determinedly with herself that she was worrying about
nothing, that no doubt after his term as governor was ended, Theodore
would be content to return to Sagamore Hill to write and live the life
of a country squire. But all the while she was tormented by her hidden
awareness that quiet and peace were never made for Theodore Roosevelt.
They went back into the house and discovered three small figures
crouched above, peering through the railings of the stairs.
“We couldn’t sleep, the singing kept us awake,” said Alice when Theodore
began to scold.
“Scurry back to bed, all of you,” he ordered. “You’ll catch your death
of cold.”
“Just some young people singing Christmas carols,” explained their
mother. “When you are older perhaps you can go out caroling too on
Christmas Eve. Kermit, come here, your night clothes aren’t properly
buttoned.”
“Mame did it,” declared Kermit.
“He kept wriggling and diving under the bed,” Ted reported. “Mame
couldn’t even hold him.”
“She tickles,” Kermit defended. “Will you tell us a story about the Wild
West, Father?”
“Certainly not!” Edith was firm, detecting a faint sign of weakening on
her husband’s face. “It’s far too late. Jump into bed quickly. Did Mame
give you your tonic, Ted?”
“Yes.” He made a wry face. “I hate that gooey stuff.”
“You hate being sick, too, and the idea of not growing up as strong as
the other boys,” their father reminded him.
“I hated that stuff I had to take to make my bones strong,” declared
Kermit.
“You hated having to wear braces on your legs, too.” His father followed
the boys into the nursery, gave each a friendly smack and tumbled them
into bed. “But the braces made your legs strong enough so you can swim
like the rest of us.”
“I still hate getting water in my ears,” stated Ted, pulling the covers
up to his chin. “Will there be warmer bedrooms in that palace up in
Albany, Father?”
“We’ll hope so—and it isn’t a palace. It’s officially called a mansion.”
“In storybooks governors always live in palaces. Does the president live
in a palace in Washington?”
“No, just a big white house. You’ve seen it. You should remember.”
“I’ve seen so many places,” sighed Ted, “but I like this house best.”
“We all do. We’ll come back to it every summer,” promised Roosevelt.
The house was quiet at last but Edith Roosevelt, when they had completed
the task of filling all the dangling stockings, lay awake a long time,
her thoughts trying to search the future, what lay ahead for all those
children. More of war and danger, more heart-racking anxiety for their
mother? Perhaps it was best not to know, otherwise life would be one
long torment of apprehension.
Morning showed a thin cover of snow on the ground, but before day came
to reveal it plainly, there was pandemonium in the parents’ quiet
bedroom as the children came rushing in lugging their stockings. Only
small toys bulged in the stockings, but Alice proudly displayed a little
gold bracelet and Archie, round-faced and beaming, bounced up and down
on his father’s stomach excitedly cranking a small tin toy that made
musical sounds as the handle turned.
“Get up, Father,” begged Ethel. “Get up and light the Christmas tree!”
“That room will be cold,” objected their mother. “Here, crawl under this
blanket, all of you. Theodore, do poke up the fire.”
There were some embers left in the fireplace and he strode over,
barefoot, in his night garb and jabbed and stirred at them, vigorously,
piling on the wood till a roaring blaze was kindled. He liked fires to
roar, horses to gallop, he had to put gusto into everything he did, his
wife lay thinking.
“We’ll have breakfast first,” she said firmly. “No one will be
downstairs this early, so all of you take your stockings and crawl back
into your beds till Mame comes in. Then after breakfast we’ll light the
Christmas trees in the gun room.”
“It’s cold in there too,” complained Ted, “cold as anything.”
“It’s cold everywhere. This is a winter’s day,” said Theodore. “Scamper
now! No one is to stir out of bed again till Mame comes in.”
“She’s an awful sleepyhead,” complained Ethel. “She won’t stir for hours
and hours.”
The gun room was not yet warm when at nine o’clock Theodore lighted the
candles on the two Christmas trees, Mame standing by worriedly with a
bucket of water and a dipper to head off any flickering blaze. She had
wrapped each child in a heavy coat, but even that did not keep small
fingers from cramping with cold as they fumbled with strings and
wrappings, squealing happily over their treasures.
Ted gloated over a new sled while his mother wondered how it would be
transported to Albany, for assuredly he would refuse to leave it behind.
Ethel hugged a new doll and put it to bed repeatedly in its cradle her
Aunt Bamie had sent, adjuring it to lie still now and Father would come
and tell a story, maybe about cowboys.
At ten o’clock Roosevelt impulsively decided to go to church, and Alice
and Ethel insisted on going with him. Wrapped in heavy coats they set
out in the carriage, the girls with their chins buried in fur, their
small noses pink with frost.
At the little Episcopal church Roosevelt got down and shook the door. It
was locked fast. Presently a woman stuck her head out of the house next
door.
“No services today,” she said. “The minister is sick with the grippe.”
She came closer. “It’s Mister Roosevelt, isn’t it? Governor now, ain’t
you? My man voted for you. He was at San Juan Hill.”
Instantly Theodore had his notebook out. “What was his name? I’ll
remember him. I remember all my Rough Riders, they were a gallant lot of
fellows.”
She told him the name. “He got wounded in a skirmish. But he got over
it. Now he travels around selling housewares for some folks in Jersey
City. He’s away down in Pennsylvania today. It was too far to come home
for Christmas but it makes it a dreary time when the man’s away, the
young ones miss him.”
As the carriage started up the hill Ethel announced, “I never got to put
my five cents in the collection, Father.”
“You mean you’ve lost it already?”
“It’s in my mitten. Where Mother put it. Do I have to give it back to
Mother?”
“No, you may keep it. When we get to Albany you can take a ride on the
streetcar with it, but unless you can promote a little more cash you’ll
have to walk back,” he teased.
“I’d have to take Mame with me,” she demurred, “and she always grumbles
that her feet hurt.”
The good smell of dinner met them at the door as they entered, and some
warmth from the glowing fires that had been piled high with logs. The
furnaces too gave up a grudging wave of heat and, warming his hands at
the wood fire, Theodore was glad they would not have to struggle with
inadequate heating much longer. This house had been built for summer and
was delightful at that season, catching the breezes from the Bay. The
trouble was that the wind was just as enthusiastic in winter, and the
curtains at the windows now waved gently as it frolicked around the high
gables.
Ted was sitting on the stairs, capped and mittened, his new sled at his
feet.
“I thought you’d never come, Father,” he fretted. “Mother says I can’t
go out alone.”
“I don’t think he should go out at all,” declared Edith, “but I agreed
to leave the decision to you.”
“There’s not enough snow, Ted,” his father told him. “It wouldn’t carry
your sled. You’ll have to wait for a heavier snowfall. From the look of
those clouds we should get it tonight.”
Ted stared ruefully out the window. “Why is God so stingy? In Albany
there won’t be any place to use a sled. Mame said so.”
“There are parks in Albany, Ted,” Edith assured him, “and likely grounds
around the capitol building and there is sure to be a hill there
somewhere.”
“But it won’t be here! I want to slide here where we live.”
“I saw two flakes of snow falling,” comforted Alice. “I saw them on my
muff.”
“Church must have been very short today,” Edith said. “You were only
gone an hour.”
Theodore told her about the rector’s being housed with the grippe.
“I’m always afraid of that in winter,” she said. “That siege Ted had
once weakened him so. That’s why I try to keep him from exposing
himself.”
“Dinner is served,” was announced at the door.
“Let’s all march in,” Theodore suggested.
“But first we must all wash our hands,” said the mother. “Run along
upstairs. Ted, leave your hat and coat up there. I’m not sure I want you
outside today.”
“The outside air can’t hurt him,” demurred Roosevelt, when the troop had
pelted off up the stairs.
“You aren’t sure of that. You can be too insistent about toughening up
Ted, as the doctor reminded you. After all, you were a frail child
yourself.”
“But my life in Dakota toughened me. Now I never have a pain and rarely
a cold,” he insisted.
“You were grown then. Give your sons a chance to grow, Theodore.”
“I suppose you are right. You usually are. Anyway, this is going to be a
dour day, although those clouds show a few signs of thinning and letting
the sun shine through.” He studied the sky from the window.
They went in to dinner then and there was the usual argument about who
should say grace. Ethel won and hurried through the little verse,
conscious of impatient looks from her brothers, moving their eyes though
their heads were bowed.
There was a bounteous spread on the table and for the first time in days
there were no guests. Obviously everyone was respecting a family’s
desire for privacy on this holiday and Edith was grateful.
The big turkey that old Davis, the gardener, had fattened in a little
pen, feeding it corn and all the scraps from the kitchen, stood brown
and beautiful at the head of the table and Theodore sharpened the
carving knife on the steel with a ringing noise.
“Only two drumsticks,” he remarked, slicing away, “so somebody has to be
content with the second joint.”
The expected shrill protests arose, Kermit insisting that he had never
had a drumstick since he could remember.
“You can’t remember long then,” declared Ted, “for you had one at
Thanksgiving.”
“We’ll settle this.” Roosevelt took an envelope from his pocket and tore
it into strips, two longer than the others. “The long pieces get the
drumsticks and no more said about it.” He folded them carefully in his
hands with the ends visible and passed them around the table.
Ethel and Archie won and squealed with delight, while Alice remarked
philosophically, “I’d rather have breast, anyway. Drumsticks are dry and
tough.”
Before the dessert was served, the maid approached the head of the
table.
“Three gentlemen to see Mr. Roosevelt,” she announced.
“Ask them in to the fire and invite them to sit down and wait,” said
Theodore. “Are they elderly gentlemen?”
“No, sir. They’re young and sort of brown and tough looking.”
He jumped, upsetting his glass of water. “My boys!” he exclaimed,
hurrying out while Kermit and Archie scurried after.
“Soldiers, Mother,” Kermit ran back to report, “and Father’s hugging
them.”
“How do you know they’re soldiers?” demanded Ted.
“They saluted!” Kermit was triumphant. “Just like Father taught us.”
Oh, me! wailed Edith Roosevelt silently to herself, not even Christmas
dinner alone! She rang the bell quickly.
“Set three more places,” she directed the girl who answered. “Mr.
Roosevelt will have guests. But you are all to sit still,” she ordered
the children.
“Don’t I stand up and bow like you told me?” asked Ted.
“No, you only bow a little when you are introduced.”
“You only stand up for ladies,” explained Alice.
Edith rose herself to greet the three young men who followed Theodore
into the dining room. They were plainly dressed and obviously slightly
embarrassed. Roosevelt introduced them by name or rather by nicknames.
“This is Lew, and Ike, and Cricket. They shared their shelter with me
one rainy night in Cuba.”
“We hate to bust in this way, ma’am,” said Cricket, who was older than
the other two. “We asked the Colonel to let us go and wait and come
back.”
“Nonsense! You’ve come a long way and it’s cold outside,” the Colonel
said. “Sit here, and here, and you, Ike, over there.” He introduced the
children who forgot to eat in their excitement.
“Mighty pretty daughters you’ve got, Colonel. Smart-looking boys, too,”
said Ike.
“Thank you,” Edith replied graciously, not looking at Alice, who had
murmured thanks and straightened her shoulders, posing a little as she
was inclined to do.
Roosevelt ordered the turkey brought back and began carving and filling
the three extra plates put before him.
“These boys came up here all the way from South Carolina,” he explained
to Edith, “and stopped to call on me.”
“We’re on our way to Pennsylvania. Got jobs in the mills there, ma’am,
but when we got near this place we just had to see the Colonel, so we
hired a rig and come out here. Never thought about its being Christmas.”
“You’re very welcome,” Edith assured them.
“Did you kill any Spaniards in Cuba?” asked Ted, while the visitors
helped themselves gratefully to the food being served by the maid.
“Well, we shot at a lot of them, so we must have hit a few,” replied
Cricket.
“Anyway, they were shooting at us from up in trees and under bushes, and
there were too many trees and bushes for a man to take any chances.”
“Anyway, we licked ’em,” said Lew. “When a Spaniard runs he runs. And
yells.”
“Have you got your guns?” Ethel asked.
“No, miss, we were discharged from service so we turned in our rifles.”
“Father has a lot of guns,” observed Kermit. “Ted can shoot, but I
can’t.”
“You will be old enough before long,” said his father. “Ted shoots very
well for an eleven-year-old.”
“I hit the bull’s eye twice,” Ted bragged, while Edith controlled the
little jerk of panic she always felt when she thought of her eldest son
with that gun. “Teach him early enough and he’ll know how to handle a
weapon wisely,” had been Theodore’s argument when the new light rifle
had been brought home.
Edith excused herself when the meal was over and went upstairs but the
children refused to follow as she suggested. They followed the men
instead, even Alice taking a chair in a corner, tucking her feet up
under her, a habit Mame much deplored. Ted sprawled on his stomach on
the floor at his father’s feet, chin on palms, while Archie crawled
under Roosevelt’s chair and curled up there, half asleep.
The talk was fascinating to the children, even to Ethel, who had never
showed any female dismay at violence; indeed she was a real little
warrior herself, holding her own with two older brothers. All the
Roosevelt children had been taught to stand for the right and fight for
it if necessary, and there had been times when their mother secretly
regretted this branch of her husband’s education, when Ted came home
with a split lip and spectacles bent, or all of them engaged in battles
in the nursery.
Alice had her own room now and was inclined to stay aloof when violence
threatened, but earlier she had been one of the stoutest fighters.
Kermit leaned on his father’s shoulder drinking in the stories of
Spanish ambushes and night attacks, of the renegade Cubans who begged
food from the Rough Riders and then carried information to the Spanish
headquarters.
“I shot one buzzard,” said Cricket. “He begged for some beans and I only
had a spoonful and then he drew out a rusty old pistol. I got him before
he could cock it.”
“Bang between the eyes?” questioned Kermit.
“Well, no. Elsewhere in the body,” replied Cricket delicately. “But the
worst thing in Cuba wasn’t the Spaniards or being shot at, it was the
goldurn mosquitoes—begging your pardon, Colonel.”
“They were so thick we had to cover up our heads with blankets to get
any sleep.” Lew took up the story while Roosevelt smiled ruefully. “We
couldn’t light a fire to smoke ’em out most of the times. That was what
their sharpshooters were waiting for. Man show himself in the light and
down he went!”
“The fever was bad too,” Roosevelt said. “It has already made very
doubtful any hope of building a canal across Panama.”
“We had more sick with fever than we had wounded, even when we charged
the Hill,” Ike recalled. “Well, we must be heading back, you fellows.
It’s been fine seeing you again, Colonel, and we’re sure proud New York
elected you governor.”
“We sure are,” agreed his lanky companions, rising to their feet.
“Our thanks for a good dinner, sir, and give our thanks to your good
wife. We better push on, our man we hired to drive us is waiting and our
train leaves at six o’clock and it’s a long way to the station.”
“I’m honored by your visit, boys,” Roosevelt followed them into the
hall, the children trotting after.
When the Rough Riders had gone, Roosevelt picked up the sleeping Archie
and carried him up the stairs, Ted climbing after, asking with every
breath, “Can I go out now, Father? Is there enough snow for my sled?”
“There’s almost no more snow, Ted, but we’ll hope for some to fall
overnight. Those fellows,” he said to Edith when he had put Archie on
his bed and covered him well, “came out of their way to see me and I was
very much honored by their visit. They hired that driver too and I don’t
doubt they needed the money. Men who work in mills and have families
have little money to spare. At least I know Cricket has a family. He
showed me pictures of two boys when we were waiting for transportation
in Tampa. He attached himself to me as a sort of unofficial aide. There
was not much emphasis on rank in my command.”
“And what there was I’m sure you ignored,” said Edith indulgently. “It
was undoubtedly a very democratic organization.”
“When you’re depending on a man to fire in time to save your life you
have no use for protocol. That boy Lew, who had so little to say, twice
saved my horse from being shot under me. Rank loses its importance when
a lot of savage men are attacking you, and you see your men fall and
know the next bullet may be for you. They were all gallant, all of them.
I owe them more than I can ever repay.”
“Shall we go down now to the fires?” Edith asked. “By the way, Davis
won’t be back today. I gave him Christmas afternoon off to be with his
family. Some of his children have come home bringing their children with
them. Can you attend to the furnaces?”
“I’d better put on some overalls. That’s a dirty job. Then I’m going to
take the youngsters out awhile. We can have a romp in the barn. They get
too restless in the house all day. I’ll keep Ted’s feet dry,” he
promised.
“And don’t let them get overheated,” she warned. “That thermometer
downstairs hasn’t risen above freezing all day. It seems awfully cold
for so early in the winter. I hear Quentin now. I’ll take him down by
the fire so Mame can get some rest.”
He shrugged into a rough army coat and cotton overalls and went below to
poke and rattle vociferously at the two furnaces, shoveling out ashes,
wondering whimsically what the important politicians of New York would
think if they saw their governor-elect carrying a hod? Certainly they
would respect him the more if they saw him in working garb at such a
menial task, at least the working classes would and there were a lot
more of them who had voted for him.
When the furnaces were filled and burning well he carried up several
armloads of wood, panting a little from the steepness of the stairs.
Edith sat beside the fire holding small Quentin, while Kermit crawled
about her feet, pushing a toy cannon about and yelling “Bang!”
Edith looked him over, aghast. “Theodore, those are your church
clothes!”
“I had overalls over them and a jacket, but I’m going up to change now
to take the children out.”
Kermit jumped up and rushed after him, shouting, “Father’s going out to
play. Father’s going out to play.”
Alice emerged from her room where she had been stowing away her
Christmas presents, and in the nursery Ethel hastily put her doll to bed
and flew out.
“May we climb trees, Father?” she asked.
“Not today. It’s too damp and cold. Today we’ll play in the barn.”
Archie woke up then and came trudging after his father. “Are you going
to shave, Father? May we watch you shave?”
“No, I’m not going to shave. Find your coat and cap. Mame’s asleep and
Mother’s busy with the baby. Ted! Where are you? This expedition is
about to start. Overshoes for everybody. Bring yours in here, Archie,
and I’ll buckle them for you.”
It was Theodore Roosevelt’s favorite march, over the yard and out
through the fences to the old barn that he had sentimentally left
standing when he built Sagamore Hill because, he told himself, it had
such a nice big haymow. When he had pushed forward with his men at San
Juan Hill, struggling through thorny brush where poisonous snakes
lurked, slipping and sliding over the matted vegetation, he had had the
same feeling of leading a troop of trusting souls as he had now,
propping the heavy barn door open till the last straggler panted
through.
“I speak to play cowboy,” shouted Ted.
“You need outdoors for cowboys,” Alice objected, “and horses!”
“Can’t we have the pony out, Father?” Ted begged. “Grant hasn’t had any
exercise today.”
“No, I promised Mother we’d play inside. It’s fairly warm in here.
Who’ll be first up the ladder?”
“Me!” shrilled adventurous Ethel. “But we can’t climb with these
overshoes on. They’re too slippery.”
“Stack them all here neatly. And nobody is to turn and jump back down
that ladder,” their father ordered.
“She did one day,” declared Kermit, “she landed right on my stomach.”
“You had your stomach in the way of my feet.” Ethel flashed quickly up
the ladder. The others came after, Theodore taking the rear to help
Archie, who had to be lifted up the last steps. The mow above was high
and lighted by a dusty window. The roof had chinks here and there
between the aged shingles, letting in pale beams of light that showed
the ragged mounds of hay with a pitchfork sticking up out of one stack.
Ted promptly seized this and began waving it, shouting, “I’m a Rough
Rider. I choose Father with me. The rest of you can be Spaniards.”