We thought a good deal about young Derry Willard coming. We talked about
it among ourselves. We never talked about it to my father or my mother.
I don't know why. I went and got my best story-book and showed the Fairy
Prince to Carol. Carol stared and stared. There were palms and bananas
in the picture. There was a lace-paper castle. There was a moat. There
was a fiery charger. There were dragons. The Fairy Prince was all in
white armor, with a white plume in his hat. It grasped your heart, it
was so beautiful. I showed the picture to Rosalee. She was surprised.
She turned as white as the plume in the Fairy Prince's hat. She put the
book in her top bureau-drawer with her ribbons. We wondered and
wondered whether young Derry Willard would come. Carol thought he
wouldn't. I thought he would. Rosalee wouldn't say. Carol thought it
would be too cold. Carol insisted that he was a tropic. And that tropics
couldn't stand the cold. That if a single breath of cold air struck a
tropic he blew up and froze. Rosalee didn't want young Derry Willard to
blow up and freeze. Anybody could see that she didn't. I comforted her.
I said he would come in a huge fur coat. Carol insisted that tropics
didn't have huge fur coats. "All right, then," I said. "He will come in
a huge _feather_ coat! Blue-bird feathers it will be made of! With a
soft brown breast! When he fluffs himself he will look like the god of
all the birds and of next Spring! Hawks and all evil things will scuttle
away!"
There certainly _was_ something the matter with the Christmas tree that
year.
It grew. But it didn't grow very fast.
My father said that perhaps the fertilizer hadn't been rich enough.
My mother said that maybe all Christmas trees were blooming rather late
this year. Seasons changed so.
My father and mother didn't go away to town at all. Not for a single
day.
Late at night after we'd gone to bed we heard them hammering things and
running the sewing-machine.
Carol thought it smelt like kites.
Rosalee said it sounded to her like a blue silk waist.
It looked like a worry to me.
It got colder and colder. It snowed and snowed.
Christmas eve it snowed some more. It was beautiful. We were very much
excited. We clapped our hands. We stood at the window to see how white
the world was. I thought about the wise men's camels. I wondered if
they could carry snow in their stomachs as well as rain. Mother said
camels were tropics and didn't know anything about snow. It seemed
queer.
A sleigh drove up to the door. There were three men in it. Two of them
got out. The first one was young Derry Willard. It was a fur coat that
he had on. He was full of bundles. My father gave one gasp.
"The--the impudent young--" gasped my father.
We ran to the door. The second man looked just exactly like young Derry
Willard except that he had on a gray beard and a gray slouch hat. He
looked like the picture of "a planter" in "Uncle Tom's Cabin." My father
and he took just one look at each other. And then suddenly they began to
pound each other on the back and to hug each other. "Hello, old top!"
they shouted. "Hello--hello--_hello_!" Derry Willard's father cried a
little. Everybody cried a little or shouted or pounded somebody on the
back except young Derry Willard and Rosalee. Young Derry Willard and
Rosalee just stood and looked at each other.
"Well--well--well!" said Derry Willard's father over and over and over.
"Twenty years! _Twenty_ years!" The front hall was full of bundles! We
fell on them when we stepped. And we fell on new ones when we tried to
get up. Whenever Derry Willard's father wasn't crying he was laughing!
"So this is the wife?" he said. "And these are the children? Which is
Rosalee? Ah! A very pretty girl! But not as pretty as your wife!" he
laughed. "Twenty years! _Twenty_ years!" he began all over again. "A bit
informal, eh? Descending on you like this? But I couldn't resist the
temptation after I'd seen Derry. We Southerners, you know! Our impulses
are romantic! Tuck us away anywhere! Or turn us out--if you must!"
My father was like a wild man for joy! He forgot all about everything
except "twenty years ago."
We had to put the two Mr. Derry Willards to bed in the parlor. There was
no other room. They insisted on sleeping with the Christmas tree. They
had camped under every kind of branch and twig in the world, they said.
But _never_ had they camped under a Christmas tree.
Father talked and talked and talked! Derry Willard's father talked and
talked and talked! It was about college! It was about girls! It was
about boys! It was about all sorts of pranks! Not any of it was about
studies! Mother sat and laughed at them!
Rosalee and young Derry Willard sat and looked at each other. Carol and
I played checkers. Everybody forgot us. I don't know who put me to bed.
When we came down-stairs the next morning and went into the parlor to
see the Christmas tree we _screamed_!
Every single weeney-teeny branch of it had sprouted tinsel tassels!
There were tinsel stars all over it! Red candles were blazing! Glass
icicles glistened! There were candy canes! There were tin trumpets!
Little white-paper presents stuck out everywhere through the branches!
Big white presents piled like a snowdrift all around the base of the
tree!
Young Derry Willard's father seemed to be still laughing. He rubbed his
hands together.
"Excuse me, good people," he laughed, "for taking such liberties with
your tree! But it's twenty years since I've had a chance to take a real
whack at a Christmas tree! Palms, of course, are all right, and banana
groves aren't half bad! But when it comes to real landscape effect--give
me a Christmas tree in a New England parlor!"
"Palms?" we gasped. "Banana-trees?"
Young Derry Willard distributed the presents.
For my father there were boxes and boxes of cigars! And an order on some
Dutch importing house for five hundred _green_ tulips! Father almost
sw--ooned.
For mother there was a little gold chain with a single pearl in it! And
a box of oranges as big as a chicken-coop!
I got four dolls! And a paint-box! One of the dolls was jet-black. She
was funny. When you squeaked her stomach she grinned her mouth and said,
"Oh, lor', child!"
Rosalee had a white crepe shawl all fringes and gay-colored birds of
paradise! Rosalee had a fan made out of ivory and gold. Rosalee had a
gold basket full of candied violets. Rosalee had a silver hand-mirror
carved all round the edge with grasses and lilies like the edges of a
little pool.
Carol had a big, big box that looked like a magic lantern. And on every
branch where he had hung his seven wishes for a camel there was a white
card instead with the one word "Palestine" written on it.
Everybody looked very much perplexed.
Young Derry Willard's father laughed.
"If the youngster wants camels," he said, "he must have camels! I'm
going to Palestine one of these days before so very long. I'll take him
with me. There must be heaps of camels still in Palestine."
"Going to Palestine before--long," gasped my mother. "How wonderful!"
Everybody turned and looked at Carol.
"Want to go, son, eh?" laughed Derry Willard's father.
Carol's mouth quivered. He looked at my mother.
My mother's mouth quivered. A little red came into her checks.
"He wants me to thank you very much, Mr. Willard," she said. "But he
thinks perhaps you wouldn't want to take him to Palestine--if you knew
that he can't--talk."
"Can't talk?" cried Mr. Derry Willard. "_Can't talk?_" He looked at
mother! He looked at Carol! He swallowed very hard! Then suddenly he
began to laugh again!
"Good enough!" he cried. "He's the very boy I'm looking for! We'll rear
him for a diplomat!"
Carol got a hammer and opened his big box. It _was_ a magic lantern! He
was wild with joy! He beat his fists on the top of the box! He stamped
his feet! He came and burrowed his head in mother's shoulder. When Carol
burrows his head in my mother's shoulder it means, "Call me anything you
want to!"
Mother called him anything she wanted to. Right out loud before
everybody. "Shining Face!" said my mother.
There were lots of other presents besides.
My father had made a giant kite for Carol. It looked nine feet tall. My
father had made the dearest little wooden work-box for my mother. There
_was_ a blue silk waist for Rosalee. My mother had knitted me a doll!
Its body was knitted! Its cheeks were knitted! Its nose was knitted! It
was wonderful!
We ate the peppermint-candy canes. All the pink stripes. All the white
stripes. We sang carols. We sang,
O, the foxes have holes! And the birds build their nests
In the crotch of the sycamore-tree!
But the Little Son of God had no place for His head
When He cameth to earth for me!
Rosalee's voice was like a lark in the sky. Carol's face looked like two
larks in the sky.
The tame crow stayed in the kitchen. He was afraid of so many strangers.
The tame coon wasn't afraid of anything. He crawled in and out of all
the wrapping-papers, sniffing and sniffing. It made a lovely crackling
sound.
Everything smelt like fir balsam. It was more beautiful every minute.
Even after every last present was picked from the tree, the tree was
still so fat and fluffy with tinsel and glass balls that it didn't look
robbed at all.
We just sat back and stared at it.
Young Derry Willard stared only at the topmost branch.
Father looked suddenly at mother. Mother looked suddenly at Rosalee.
Rosalee looked suddenly at Carol. Carol looked suddenly at me. I looked
suddenly at the tame coon. The tame coon kept right on crackling through
the wrapping-papers.
Young Derry Willard made a funny little face. There seemed to be dust in
his throat. His voice was very dry. He laughed.
"My wish," said young Derry Willard, "seems to have been the only one
that--didn't bloom."
I almost died with shame. Carol almost died with shame. In all that
splendiferousness, in all that generosity, poor Derry Willard's
gold-budded wish was the only one that hadn't at least bloomed into
_something_!
Rosalee jumped up very suddenly and ran into the dining-room. She looked
as tho she was going to cry.
Young Derry Willard followed her. He didn't run. He walked very slowly.
He looked a little troubled.
Carol and I began at once to fold the wrapping-papers very usefully.
Young Derry Willard's father looked at my father. All of a sudden he
wasn't laughing at all. Or rubbing his hands.
"I'm sorry, Dick," he said. "I've always rather calculated somehow on
having my boy's wishes come true."
My father spoke a little sharply.
"You must have a lot of confidence," he said, "in your boy's wishes!"
"I have!" said young Derry Willard's father, quite simply. "He's a good
boy! Not only clever, I mean, but good! Never yet have I known him to
wish for anything that wasn't the _best_!"
"They're too young," said my father.
"Youth," said Derry Willard's father, "is the one defect I know of that
is incontestably remedial."
"How can they possibly know their own minds?" demanded my father.
"No person," said Derry Willard's father, "knows his own mind until he's
ready to die. But the sooner he knows his own heart the sooner he's
ready to begin to live."
My father stirred in his chair. He lit a cigar. It went out. He lit it
again. It went out again. He jerked his shoulders. He looked nervous. He
talked about things that nobody was talking about at all.
"The young rascal dropped a hundred-dollar bill--when he was here
before!" he said. He said it as tho it was something very wicked.
Young Derry Willard's father seemed perfectly cheerful.
"Did he really?" he said.
"It's a wonder the crow didn't eat it!" snapped my father.
"But even the crow wouldn't eat it, eh?" said Derry Willard's father.
Quite suddenly he began to laugh again. He looked at my mother. He
stopped laughing. His voice was very gentle. "Don't be--proud," he said.
"Don't ever be proud." He threw out his hand as tho he was asking
something. "What difference does anything make--in the whole world," he
said, "except just young love--and old friendship?"
"Oh, pshaw," said father. "Oh, pshaw!"
Rosalee came and stood in the door. She looked only at mother. She had
on a red coat. And a red hat. And red mittens.
"Derry Willard wants to see the Christmas-tree garden," she said. "May I
go?"
Derry Willard stood just behind her. He had on his fur coat. He looked
very hard at father. When he spoke he spoke only to father.
"Is it all right?" he said. "May _I_ go?"
My father looked up. And then he looked down. He looked at Derry
Willard's father. He threw out his hands as tho there was no place left
to look. A little smile crept into one corner of his mouth. He tried to
bite it. He couldn't.
"Oh--_pshaw_!" he said.
Carol and I went out to play. We thought we'd like to see the
Christmas-tree garden too. The snow was almost as deep as our heads. All
the evergreen trees were weighed down with snow. Their branches dragged
on the ground. It was like walking through white plumes.
We found mother's Christmas-tree garden. We found Rosalee and young
Derry Willard standing right in the middle of it. It was all caves and
castles! It was like a whole magic little city all made out of white
plumes! The sun came out and shone on it! Blue sky opened overhead!
Everything crackled! It was more beautiful even than the Christmas tree
in the parlor.
They didn't hear us.
Rosalee gave a funny little cry. It was like a sob. Only happy.
"I love _Christmas_!" she said.
"I love _you_!" said Derry Willard.
He snatched her in his arms and kissed her.
A great pine-tree shivered all its snow down on them like a veil.
We heard them laugh.
We ran back to the house. We ran just as fast as we could. It almost
burst our lungs. We ran into the parlor. I didn't tell. Carol couldn't
tell.
My father and young Derry Willard's father were talking and talking
behind great clouds of smoke. The Yule log was blazing and sputtering
all sorts of fireworks and colors. Only mother was watching it. She was
paring apples as she watched. A little smile was in her eyes.
"What a wonderful--wonderful day to have it happen!" she said.
I couldn't stand it any longer. I ran upstairs and got my best
story-book. I brought it down and opened it at the picture of the Fairy
Prince. I laid it open like that in Mr. Willard's lap. I pointed at the
picture.
"_There!_" I said.
Derry Willard's father put on his glasses and looked at the picture.
"Well, upon my soul," he said, "where did you get that?"
"It's my book," I said. "It's always been my book."
My father looked at the picture.
"Why, of all things," he said.
"Why, it looks exactly like Derry!" said my mother.
"It _is_ Derry!" said Derry's father. "But don't ever let Derry know
that you know that it is! It seems to tease him a little. It seems to
tease him a very great deal in fact. Being all rigged out like that. The
illustrator is a friend of mine. He spent the Winter in Cuba three or
four years ago. And he painted the picture there."
I looked at Carol. Carol looked at me. It was an absolutely perfect
Christmas! If _this_ were true, then everything beautiful that there was
in the world was true, too! Carol nudged me to speak.
"Then Derry really _is_ a Fairy Prince?" I said.
Father started to speak.
Mother stopped him.
"Yes! Rosalee's Fairy Prince!" she said.