house to house. Ermelinda enjoyed the luck of selling nine bonds
on subscription and one fifty dollar one outright. It was all very
interesting indeed. Ermelinda grew more and more enthusiastic and her
patriotism flamed hot. She went over the territory assigned and then,
on her own hook, took up new territory. It was in rather a shabby
quarter of the town but one of the girls was with her. So they entered
a doorway and went into a tenement. She was surprised to see it so gray
and destitute.
They knocked at the first landing, but though they met with a fair
reception, they sold nothing. At the second landing it was the same.
Ermelinda caught glimpses of bare poverty in the rooms as the door
opened at her knock. She had always known that such things were, but
the vivid picture of them had never been presented. So she mounted to
the top floor and knocked. The door opened. It was a thin little ragged
boy who opened the door and there were more thin little ragged boys
inside--yes, and little girls and a baby and a mother and a father. All
of them were so poor and so unhappy! Ermelinda explained her errand
but, of course, it was hardly any use! Ermelinda wrote to her editor
about it that evening. The editor answered, “Well, wouldn’t it be
rather jolly to surprise that family with a basket of good things for
Thanksgiving Day?”
Oh, indeed it would! She could get the girls at High School to help!
She began to plan what to put into the basket. On the way to school the
next day she told everybody she met. Ermelinda had a most engaging way
of putting facts in story form. But though some contributed five or
ten or twenty-five cents, there were others who drifted off as soon as
money was mentioned. Then Stella Wilkins came by and Ermelinda grabbed
her.
“Say, Stella,” she began, “don’t you want to help, too? I’m getting up
a basket for Thanksgiving for a poor family I found in a tenement, they
are--” but right here she stopped short. Stella’s expression was almost
frightened. For the first time, Ermelinda noticed that Stella might
be classed as “poor.” Ermelinda had never thought much about poverty
before or noticed whether the boys and girls who came to classes
showed signs of need. She had always liked Stella. “There are some
children,” went on Ermelinda. “The little things look sick and hungry.
We’re planning to give them a perfectly splendid Thanksgiving--I
haven’t a cent to my name but I’m nabbing everybody I see--”
Stella smiled. “Guess you know, Erm, I really can’t, though I’d like
to,” she said. “But father lost his work this fall and we’ve all had
to do without things. I’m trying ever so hard to get my little sister
a winter coat. She hasn’t any and she can’t go to school till she has
one--It’s awfully hard, Erm. I’m glad you’re helping _them_!”
Ermelinda put an arm around Stella. “I’d like to work, too, to get that
coat,” she said. “I’ve been lucky all my life and had things done for
me but I’d be mighty proud if I could buy my little sister a coat if
she needed one!”
They walked toward the class together. Somehow, they had become real
friends.
She rushed home the next afternoon early in order to go buy the basket
with one of the girls. Oh, Ermelinda’s family was to have the dandiest
Thanksgiving that there ever had been!
She put a gay crêpe tissue paper table-set into the basket. It had a
tablecloth and napkins with bright colored fruits upon it. Then all the
other things were packed tight and the basket was very heavy and very
tempting when Ermelinda’s busy fingers had finished. It was put away in
the pantry closet to stand there safely till the time should come.
Next day Ermelinda found Kitty Fowler, who volunteered to help. “You
see, Kitty, I can’t carry that big basket all alone myself,” she
explained. “I do need somebody ever so much.”
“Then I’ll help and I’ll be at the corner waiting for you at four
o’clock.”
When she reached the corner with tired arms, Kitty was not there.
Ermelinda waited. It was frightfully windy and cold. It seemed as if
it might snow for there was penetrating dampness and chill in the air.
She thought of Stella trying to buy the coat for a little sister--she
wondered if, by now, the little sister had it. She hoped so. She
wondered how Stella had earned the money--Still Kitty did not come. It
was growing dusk.
Ermelinda decided that Kitty must have forgotten. She was that
kind--always ready to help but not responsible. It was too late to go
home and get mother--beside that, mother was tired. The boys were out
skating. There was no reason why she, Ermelinda, should not go alone.
So she tugged the big basket and the bundle onward. Her arms ached and
she had to stop more than once to turn ’round about, taking the basket
in the other hand and changing the bundle. Somehow she reached the
right street and the door that led to her family up there on the top
floor. Somehow she reached the landing. She put the basket down and
knocked. She had planned how nice it would be just to hand the basket
in and say, “Santa Claus came for _Thanksgiving_ and brought you this.”
Then she would run away and they would call, “Thank you! Thank you!”
Maybe they had not heard; Ermelinda knocked loudly again. No answer!
She knocked again. All was silent! Then a woman in a blue apron came
out upon the second floor landing and screamed up at her, “They’ve
moved away. What d’you want anyhow? That family went off last
week--Nobody’s there!”
At last, Ermelinda understood! But the woman did not know where they
had gone. She suggested that Ermelinda ask the janitor on the first
floor.
It crossed Ermelinda’s mind that she might give the basket to the
woman on the second landing, but as she came down the wide-open door
showed a table with food upon it. The janitor didn’t know where that
family had gone--he said the man had work and they had gone away. Yes,
they had been in hard straits for a while--didn’t pay rent at all,
he said. But now there was nothing for Ermelinda to do about it. The
bitter disappointment of the expedition made a lump in Ermelinda’s
throat--why, if the fairy godmother had come to help Cinderella and had
not found her, that is about how the fairy godmother would have felt!
Little Lady Bountiful almost cried but she took up the packages and
walked home. She told mother all the story and then she wept. There
were all those good things for somebody’s happy Thanksgiving and where
should they go?
At last, mother suggested that she herself would buy the things in the
basket and that Ermelinda might give the money to some public charity.
She wrote her editor and asked what to do. The editor wrote back and
said _she_ thought Ermelinda was right: that the boys and girls might
be told, perhaps, but that since they had given the money without
sacrifice, it ought to be used to help some need. Ermelinda received
the letter from the postman just as she started for school. She opened
it in the cloak-room and there she met Stella, who was just hanging her
tam upon a neighboring hook.
They went into class. Suddenly in the midst of her conjugating of a
Latin verb, a thought came to Ermelinda--Oh, how about the coat for
Stella’s little sister? She would find out! At noon, she found Stella,
eating lunch upon a bench. “Say, Stella,” she began, “we’re friends.
Tell me, did you get it--that coat for your little sister?”
Then Stella told her. No! There was no coat. She couldn’t get that
work. The little sister had colds and Stella was worried. As they
talked, Stella told Ermelinda just how bitterly blue everything was.
They parted as the bell rang for classes.
After school, Ermelinda labored over a letter that it was rather fun
to write. She worked hard because of the fact that she was trying
to disguise her handwriting. The letter was from Cinderella’s Fairy
Godmother to Stella and inside the envelope, sealed with a blue bird
seal, Ermelinda put the money! Then she sent the letter inside another
to her editor in the city and asked her to mail it there. She told her
Cinderella’s fairy had asked her to send this letter to somebody who
mustn’t know where the Fairy Godmother lived. And the editor mailed the
letter in the city. So the deed was done.
It was about three or four days afterwards that Stella came upon
Ermelinda studying hard, her head in a book. “I want to tell you, you
were so interested,” she beamed. “My little sister’s got the coat,
only I didn’t really give it to her _myself_. The money came in a
letter that was mailed in the city. It was ever such a dear letter and
signed by Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother. I think it must have been from
a real fairy, somehow, but I don’t know who could have known about the
coat--I don’t know anybody else who might have sent it, unless it was a
_real_ fairy!”
“I’m glad your little sister has the coat,” Ermelinda chuckled.
_The Directory Santa Claus_
_THE FIRST DECEMBER SURPRISE_
_When Dotty had made the Surprise Book upon that memorable day when
she had not been able to go to school, she had calculated wrongly, so
Marjorie’s Surprise Book had more than the usual number of leaves and
it lasted till the following Christmas. The first surprise of that
December which closed Marjorie’s Surprise Book seemed very thick and
fat indeed. It proved to be two stories in place of one and with them
was a Christmas card. “I’m sorry that the Surprise Book must end,”
sighed Marjorie. “Aren’t you, Dot?” And of course, Dotty held out hopes
that Santa Claus might bring another! I shouldn’t wonder if he did, for
Santa Claus likes to make surprises. Maybe it was he, himself, who had
told Mother how to make the first Surprise Book, long ago. They each
chose one of the Surprise Book’s Christmas surprise stories for Mother
to read aloud on Christmas afternoon when the stories were opened.
Dotty’s came first. It was “The Directory Santa Claus.”_
_XIV_
_The Directory Santa Claus_
Christmas holidays had begun and school was out. The scholars had
spoken Christmas pieces that told of gift-giving and Santa Claus.
Rose Schneider and Lili Fifer, with school-books under their arms,
pushed open the heavy oak door of the big city library and trotted with
one accord upstairs to join the line of children waiting to get in.
“I got a dandy book,” Lili volunteered as they wedged into the waiting
line. “It was all about a little girl that went to see Santa Claus.
I’m bringin’ it back now. Say, Rose, you get it on your card. It’s an
awfully nice story.”
But Rose shook her head. The thin snub of her nose turned up even
higher than ever. It added emphasis to her refusal. “There ain’t any
Santa Claus,” she said. “I never had any Christmas presents from him.”
“Well,” Lili insisted, “I ain’t either but _I_ think there _is_ a Santa
Claus all right. He don’t know us, maybe, but he’s awfully good to some
children. My cousin that goes to Sunday School gets a doll, and a box
of candy, and an orange from him every Christmas. He has a long white
beard an’ he’s ever so jolly!”
“Salvation Armies, they make Santa Clauses. They’re not real--only
anybody dressed up. Most likely your cousin’s Santa Claus was like
that,” Rose retorted. “The Salvation Army Santa Clauses they always
stand by the street corners to catch Christmas dinner pennies in their
pails.”
“No. ’Twasn’t that kind of a Santa Claus! _He’s real!_”
“Well, you won’t find him in no _directory_,” Rose argued. “You just
go an’ look. All real folks’ names is in it an’ you won’t find Santa
Claus. There _ain’t_ any!”
With this parting thrust, Rose squeezed through a sudden opening in the
line and escaped into the reading room beyond.
Lili waited for her book to be discharged, then she raised a
questioning little hand toward the lady at the library desk.
“Please,” she asked, “where is the directory book?”
“Downstairs,” the librarian answered. And downstairs Lili went.
The directory book was really very, very big indeed. It was almost a
pity that it couldn’t be a story book, for one could never have done
with a story book _that_ size. There’d always be something new to read
in it. When the fat volume was opened on its desk, Lili studied it
at random trying to make out what it all meant. She decided to begin
at the very beginning, so she commenced with _A_, turned on to _B_,
and ran her forefinger down page after page. It took a great deal of
time and patience. The text was very small and Lili was afraid she
might overlook it. Down page after page it travelled till it came to
_Claus_--Oh, there it was: Claus, Adolph, carpenter! No. That couldn’t
be Santa Claus--the whole name wasn’t right. And beside that, _he_
wasn’t a carpenter, Lili felt sure.
How many people there were by the name of _Claus_! Well, with patience,
one might find the right one! “Then I shall tell Rose that there is a
Santa Claus for sure,” thought Lili. On down the list she went.
There was an S. T. Claus. That was the nearest to it. Who knows what
that S. T. might mean in the way of abbreviation? The address was not
far from the library. Lili decided to go down the avenue and find out
if it were where the _real_ Santa Claus lived.
The long winter twilight was beginning when Lili came out of the
library. Already the lights from the grocery and the drugstore on the
corner beyond warmed the cold gray stone of the pavement with red
light. Further over, past the intersecting street, an arc lamp made a
misty star in the dimness. Toward the star of light Lili made her way.
Yes, yes, she was on the right side of the street--she was getting
nearer, nearer! Lili’s heart went pit-a-pat. Oh, there it was--There
it was! It was a little shop that bore the number. Over its window was
a sign, S. T. Claus. Somewhere Lili thought she had seen Santa Claus’
name written that way! It was the _very_ place, no doubt!
In the shop-window was a wee green tinsel-covered tree. Toys
were caught in the branches. They overflowed onto the broad base
of the display-window--cats, dogs, carts, steam-engines, dolls,
baby-carriages, jumping-jacks--Oh!
Lili stood staring, transfixed with wonder, for--for there in the
store, visible through the lighted window, was a small, jolly-looking,
white-bearded man--exactly like the picture of Santa Claus in the
story book! To be sure, his white beard was not _quite_ so long, and
he wore a gray knit coat instead of a bright red one with white fur on
it. But his occupation of stringing Christmas tree chains was so very
Santa-Claus-like, there could be no mistake in identity!
Just here, he came to the window and added a box of gay candles to the
display of toys. He looked out at Lili through the frosty panes and
smiled. “Hello,” he called by way of cheery greeting.
“Hello,” returned Lili, and, somehow, before she knew it, she was
standing in the shop beside the worn counter, looking up into the merry
face of Mr. Claus.
“It was through the directory that I found you,” she smiled. “Rose
Schneider, she says there ain’t no _real_ Santa Claus--but I says there
is for _sure_! A lot of children must have passed here an’ not known
where Santa Claus lived maybe! But _I_ found you!”
Santa Claus doubled in a hearty chuckle. “And here I am all the time,”
he laughed, “just every day.”
“Didn’t anybody know you was the real Santa Claus?” Lili gazed
confidently into the old man’s bright eyes. “They had ought to know by
the sign,” she suggested.
“How should they?” the little man replied. “Santa Claus--everybody
knows he likes to be an ordinary citizen. You won’t tell the kids, will
you?”
Lili hesitated. “No, not if you don’t want I should. But there is Rose
Schneider an’ she says there ain’t any real Santa Claus. It was through
her saying that I found you in the directory. She said there wasn’t no
such name there”--
There was a silence.
“I’ve got it,” he announced suddenly. “Just why don’t Rose believe in
Santa Claus--because he never brought her any presents or what?”
“I think it’s because you’ve forgot her mostly,” returned Lili. “I says
to her you forgot me, too--but you didn’t know about us maybe.”
He thought.
“Where do you two kids live?” he questioned.
She told him.
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” said he. “I don’t want the other children
to find it out that I _am_ the real Santa Claus, so you’d better not
tell them. You run home now an’ you keep it quiet. Wait till real Santa
Claus time at Christmas! THEN, Rose will believe!”
Ah, yes. And she _did_! It was a wonderful, wonderful Christmas for
Lili and Rose. It was better even than Rose’s cousin’s Christmas, for
they shared together a little tree that was left on Christmas Eve “From
Santa Claus,” and each little girl had a doll, and some candy, and a
game. “It’s from the _real_ Santa Claus an’ I know him but _you_ don’t,
Rosie Schneider!” Lili beamed.
And Rose retorted, “I do too believe in the real Santa Claus!”
“I want a story about the _real_ Santa Claus and the little girl,” she
demanded of the librarian at the children’s reading room next day.
“Lili Fifer, she says it’s an awfully good story and she likes I should
know more about him. It’s true for sure, ain’t it?”
And the librarian smiled.
_Mary Elizabeth’s Soldierly Christmas_
_THE SECOND DECEMBER SURPRISE_
_Marjorie’s Christmas story was called “Mary Elizabeth’s Soldierly
Christmas.” She said she liked it better than the story Dotty chose
from the Surprise Book’s Christmas pocket. You can tell what you think
about it for yourself, for here it is._
_XV_
_Mary Elizabeth’s Soldierly Christmas_
Mary Elizabeth looked up from the soldier scarf she was learning to
knit. Her mother, in the rocker beside Mary Elizabeth’s hassock,
caught a bit of anxious thought that rested between Mary Elizabeth’s
brown eyes. “What is it?” she asked, putting her hand down upon Mary
Elizabeth’s to stop the knitting needles.
“I was thinking,” Mary Elizabeth sighed, “just thinking, Mother. It’s
going to be a very soldierly Christmas this year, isn’t it? But the
children--they don’t realize it and they’re thinking and talking about
Santa Claus. Are we going to have the tree this year?”
Mary Elizabeth’s mother patted Mary Elizabeth’s hand softly. “We’ve
always had one, haven’t we, daughter?” she said. “Can you remember the
time when we did not have one?”
“No,” laughed Mary Elizabeth. “I suppose it was when I was too small
a baby ever to have a tree or so little that I didn’t know what the
lights were and thought I would like to play with their sparkles--but
I do remember the tree we had when I was a little bit older. It was
before any of the children came. I was about three years old, I think.
You told me that the tree was made in honor of the little Christ
Child’s birthday and I always thought you meant a little child like
myself and expected to see him--”
Mary Elizabeth paused. “Then I grew bigger, and by and by there were
all the children and the baby, and I was the oldest and we all thought
that a funny friend who was a jolly old man called Santa Claus brought
us the toys we found in our stockings. We thought all the play was
real--about his coming down the chimney and about his sleigh with the
eight reindeer. It used to seem strange that so big a man as Santa
Claus could squeeze down our chimney and by and by I suspected it was
all a play and you told me that it was just a funny, jolly way to make
the very little children enjoy the fun of Christmas surprises. You
told me then that I might help toward Christmas myself by trimming the
tree. That was to be my part: each year I was to do it all myself and
every year I tried to make it some new and lovely kind of a surprise. I
always have loved to fix the tree. I always have felt that it must be
the kind of a tree that the little Christ Child would love if he came
in the way that I used to think you meant when I was still little.”
“Your tree has always been a beautiful tree, Mary Elizabeth,” Mother
smiled. “It has always been a tree that shone with happiness. Each year
we have loved it so that the children could not bear to part with it at
New Years, you know.”
Mary Elizabeth smiled. But her question still remained unanswered.
“Will there be a tree this year?” she asked. “I’m afraid the children
would be sad without it, Mother.”
“I, too, have been thinking, Mary Elizabeth,” said Mother. “It is
indeed a soldierly Christmas. What do you think we had better do?”
“Well,” answered Mary Elizabeth, thoughtfully. “We have the ornaments,
though I usually buy some new ones. I would have to get candles. The
tree would not cost so very much, only it seems as if every penny ought
to go to the little French and Belgian children--and there are the
soldiers to send things to--and when everything is the way it is, why
it really hardly seems like Christmas!”
“I know,” returned Mother. “But we sent all the money in the children’s
bank and all your money and my money, Mary Elizabeth. We have the
soldiers’ things all done--almost. I think we ought to have the tree
for the children and you can fix it up somehow, can’t you?”
“Yes,” smiled Mary Elizabeth, but she was thinking that she must
somehow find a way to make that tree as pretty as usual--even without
any money to buy things!
That day and the next, Mary Elizabeth pondered the question. She
thought of this and of that but nothing seemed quite right. There was
no way to earn any money. And the tree had no star for the top. It had
been lost, somehow. It was not with the tree fixings in the box in the
attic! How to get a new star, that was one question. How to get the
candles was another. And Mary Elizabeth’s tree had always been a tree
that people came in to look at and admire. It was not like any other
tree. It was always a surprise, somehow. Money was needed to buy things
to make it wonderful. Money was needed to make it a bright surprise as
usual!
At school, Mary Elizabeth found herself puzzling over this problem as
vacation time drew near. It was harder for her than any arithmetic
problem, for it could not be solved at all. Twice she saved five cents
by walking home and that bought candles. But the problem remained as
usual. It was _how to get more money_.
Then there came the day when the magazine came. It was always something
of an event when the magazine came. It had new pictures in it and often
it had cut-out pages for the little children. Once there had been a
circus with clowns to cut out and ever since that time, Brother somehow
got hold of the paper as soon as Mother took it from its wrapper. He
was always hoping for more circus, you know. He knew its pages by
heart and spelled out the titles and headings of the pictures. When
Mary Elizabeth came home one day, he announced that the magazine had
come.
“What’s in it?” questioned Mary Elizabeth.
“Pictures,” Brother replied mysteriously, “but not any of a circus.
It’s a puzzle page. You have to guess what the pictures are and they’ll
give a prize of five dollars to the one who answers and tells what the
pictures are.” But Brother was still busy with the magazine and Mary
Elizabeth was called away to help Mother with the little sister. She
did not see the page, though she thought about it and wondered if she
could answer all the questions and get the money that way to trim the
Christmas tree. In the evening, after supper, after the little children
had gone off to bed and Brother, too, with them, she found the magazine
and looked it over. Yes, it was a contest. And the pictures were Mother
Goose. It seemed easy to guess them--Mary Elizabeth guessed Simple
Simon right away. It was the picture of a funny doll fishing in a
little pail with a hook and line. She tried the others. She was not so
sure of all but she guessed them with the help of the little children’s
Mother Goose to refresh her memory. She was so excited that she felt
the prize was already hers. She was sure she _must_ win!
Just think of it: the first prize was five whole dollars and the second
prize was two whole dollars and there were eight other prizes each of
one whole big dollar--ten chances that Mary Elizabeth might earn some
money for her Christmas tree! Her hands shook as she took up pen and
put it to paper. She used her very best paper and three times or more
she discarded what she had written and tried to do better. She wrote
with extreme pains and slowly. It took all the evening just to write
the short answer. She put it into its envelope to mail on the way to
school next day, but she said nothing about it as she kissed Mother
good-night.