The Christmas Chronicles (2 page)

“Look out!” shouted Professor Wyatt. “You’re missing the entrance! We’ll be stranded!”

“I know … what I’m … doing!” panted the reindeer.

And he did. He gritted his teeth, got a hoof between the holly bushes, pivoted smartly on it, and swung into the road. The sleigh careened wide behind the reindeer, a runner came off the ground, sliced off a sprig of the left-hand bush without knocking over its pot, and then both runners slammed down onto the road as the reindeer bounded up its steep, shining slope. That jolt sent a Something bouncing out of the sleigh and onto the road. It was solid and heavy and very close to the dimensions of the
Oxford English Dictionary, Compact Edition.
It slid down eleven feet of road, and stopped almost right at my feet.

“Well done!” shouted the Professor as they disappeared up the road into the clouds and out of sight. Neither man nor beast noticed that the Something had fallen from their sleigh.

The moment they were gone, the road began to lose its solidity. For an instant it flickered like a fluorescent light struggling to come on, and then it winked out and was gone. And so were the holly bushes, except for the one sprig. Now everything changed back in an instant. The extraordinary light dimmed as the sun slipped below the western horizon. The snow stopped falling. The air grew chill, and I zipped my coat up to my throat. I suddenly felt weary, drained by what I had just witnessed. Automatically, I hauled out my cellphone to see if I had a signal. I didn’t.

And then, before I even had time to think of what to do next, it was on top of me.

Even now, from a comforting distance in time, as I contemplate what happened next it makes me shudder. What I can only describe as a grayness came rushing up to me, flying over the same path the sleigh had just run. It had edges, this grayness, and its shape was a roiling, churning storm cloud with a vortex at its center.

In a moment it was upon me, and I found myself engulfed in clammy coldness. I could still see the world from
inside the gray cloud, but everything I looked at was drained of all color and life. It was hard to breathe, an exertion just to keep my heart beating. And just as the grayness sapped the world of color, so it bled it dry of hope. When I tried to think of good things, they all seemed mockeries. And I found I couldn’t believe in anything. I doubted now I had just seen a sleigh and a road. Did my wife love me? Was Christmas coming, and after it a new year to look forward to? No. The future was a bleak and featureless misery, as far as my mind could look ahead. And in a moment, I lost the ability even to do that. There was no future, no past, just the endless depressing torment of the gray present. And then, most horrible of all, I found myself unable even to believe that anything existed outside the shape that engulfed me. It wasn’t a shape at all, really; it was the whole world, the universe, all there was.

I now believe there is something worse than dying. It is hopelessness. Because complete and utter hopelessness makes you want to die, and that must be worse than dying. I sank to my knees and then fell on my face, sightless, filled to the brim with despair and ready to give in.

But then, not quite sightless. By luck, if you believe in such ideas, I had fallen in view of the Something that had dropped from the sleigh. The overpowering grayness had
come so quickly after it had slid to my feet that I had forgotten it. Now there it lay, along with the sprig of holly still giving off its faint whiff of peppermint.

It was the peppermint that saved me. It cleared my head a little and lessened the grip of the cloud. I clutched the holly and brought it close to my face, breathing in its fragrance. That gave me the strength to reach out for the Something. It was a large, leather-bound green book in a matching slipcase. And as my fingers touched its pebbly texture, the grayness left me. Despair left me, too, melting away as a nightmare does in morning sunlight. Hope seeped back in. Of course: Christmas was coming. And New Year’s after that. And as for my wife, she loved me even after I made caramel apples on the couch last Halloween while I was watching a football game.

As for the gray cloud, it rushed on. I was not its object, after all. Though it had felt like an eternity, all that it had made me feel had happened in a few moments as it passed over me. Its real purpose was to get onto the road before it entirely disappeared.

But it was too late. The road was gone. The way was shut. It threw itself against the clouds, but they were to it a stone wall, and it banged against them with a horrible shriek of rage and despair. Then it shot away over the horizon as
fast as it had come. A roll of thunder came from where it disappeared.

I hugged the heavy green book to my chest as I climbed down the bank back to where my car was. I found I was shaking and had to move slowly and carefully to keep from slipping in the snow. My plan now was to stow the book in the car, take a few deep, steadying breaths, and then walk back down the road to get into cellphone range.

But I found I didn’t have to. There was the car, out of the ditch and even turned the right way to drive back down the mountain. I took the steadying breaths anyway. A spicy scent made me open the lid of the trunk. There were pine boughs in there, tied neatly together at the stems with silver ribbon. A small card printed in green ink placed on top of them read, “Merry Christmas.”

T
here was no one home when I got there, and that was fine with me. Much had happened that I didn’t understand, and I wasn’t ready to talk about it to anyone. Perhaps the book would provide some kind of explanation. I took it into my study and examined it.

It was large and beautiful, bound in forest green leather covers, with sewn signatures, thick, creamy paper, and
three attached silk bookmarks. The only unfortunate thing about it was that it was unreadable. At least by me. The text was filled with umlauts and accent marks and long words with a sprinkling of strange letters. I took it this was German or Welsh or some Scandinavian language, but I wasn’t really sure. Whatever it was, I couldn’t read it.

I flipped through the pages. Many were filled with graphs and tables that seemed to indicate production over time of various items. One page, which folded out, seemed to be a contract of some sort, complete with a red wax seal. Several more were devoted to detailed maps of various parts of the world, showing what I took to be wind currents marked out. The first part of the book, however, was of a different character. It appeared to be a story or history. There were engravings in this section: a boy making a wooden chair, a merry girl sewing a coat, a bearded man with his arm around the neck of a reindeer, a grave council sitting around a large table.

I flipped back to what was clearly the title page and saw what I had missed before: an engraving of a thumbprint in the lower right-hand corner.

Now it occurred to me that given the events of the day, if I pressed my thumb onto that print, something
extraordinary was likely to happen. I would be plunged deeper into an adventure that was already threatening to overturn my cherished notions of reality. So perhaps I can be forgiven if I hesitated. I shut the book and left the study. I wandered into the kitchen. I ate chips and salsa. I watched the news on TV. That last activity was all it took to make up my mind.

I returned to the study, opened the book to the title page, and placed my thumb firmly on the print. A mild vibration and a warm sensation entered my hand, stayed there for a few moments, and then left. And then the words on the title page formed themselves into something I could read. As simple as that. It was as though the book learned who I was from my thumbprint and adjusted its language accordingly.

The title page read as follows:

I sat back to assess. Apparently I had in my possession what purported to be a biography of someone who doesn’t exist. I had believed in Santa Claus when I was a child, given him up reluctantly when the laughter of other children had proved too strong, and then disregarded him altogether. Santa Claus was made up. Santa Claus was just a way for malls to get parents to buy more than they could afford. Santa Claus was, as my boys would say, extremely over.

But the reindeer, the sleigh, the road, the early Christmas present of pine boughs and a dislodged car? And the author, “Dunstan Wyatt, ES”—whatever that meant: Surely he was the Professor Wyatt who had been on the sleigh? As I thought about these things, something deep
within me, something long pent up and dammed, broke loose. I think it was Desire.

So I started to read
The Green Book
. I read it all night in my study. I fell asleep around dawn after I finished it. When I woke up, I intended to go straight into the bedroom, tell my wife all about what had happened, and show her the book. But the book was gone. In its place was a handwritten note:

“We needed this back,” it said. “But don’t worry; you’ll remember every word. Tell the world, before it’s too late, when and if you feel brave enough. Yours sincerely, Dunstan.”

I think I feel brave enough. Do you? Because I did remember every word of Professor Wyatt’s book, and what follows is his account, revealed to the world now for the first time. Are you ready? You are about to read the true history of Santa Claus.

(from The Green Book)

Author’s Note:
Welcome, Esteemed Reader. While a biography of this brief length cannot make a claim to completeness, it does to accuracy. It is hoped that this account will correct some misconceptions about its remarkable subject, and, even more important, cheer hearts and open minds. To that end, it is recommended that it be read each and every year at Christmas, silently or aloud, with a mug of hot chocolate ready to hand.

D.W.

T
he man whom legend calls Santa Claus was born simply Klaus. He was the first and only child of a skilled carpenter and his good wife, both of whom, I am sorry to say, died when the Black Death came to their village at the foot of Mount Feldberg in the Black Forest in 1343. Little Klaus, barely out of babyhood then, had no other family, and so he was adopted by the Worshipful Guild of Foresters, Carpenters, and Woodworkers. It was very unusual for the Guild to adopt a child, but Klaus’s father had been a
much-loved member, and so they did it. Of course, the Masters of the Guild were extremely preoccupied with their work of making plows and houses and clock gears—many, many things were made of wood in those days—and they really did not have the time to rear Klaus. So, mostly, they didn’t. They gave him plenty of food, which he liked very much. They gave him old carpenter’s tools instead of toys. And they gave him genial, distracted pats on the head whenever he came within range—benign neglect. It was a very satisfactory arrangement.

It is not surprising that Klaus became a very fine worker of wood. He had the best carvers and joiners and carpenters to watch and learn from, even though they did not actually notice they were teaching him. What was surprising—even alarming to some in the Guild—was that by the age of seventeen he had quietly surpassed them all. The piece he made to prove that he deserved to be awarded the title Master—his master-piece—was an exceptionally lovely chair by any standard. It was expertly joined, intricately and richly carved, and inlaid with all fourteen hardwoods that grew on Mount Feldberg. It was immediately adopted by the Guild as the new Governor’s chair. Klaus was given his Master Woodworker’s badge—a
gold pine tree—toasted with ale, and slapped on the back for congratulations.

“We must have raised you well, Klaus,” the Masters said, “though we confess we didn’t notice.”

“Yes, you must have!” said Klaus and laughed. And all the Guild members present at his pinning ceremony joined in the laughter. And that was not surprising, because of the three extraordinary features of Klaus’s extraordinary laugh. First, it was exceptionally loud and deep, even when he was a boy, coming from the very roots of his soul. Second, it was completely untainted by any sort of meanness—Klaus never laughed
at
anyone, always
with
them. And third, it tended to make whoever heard it start laughing, too. So, of course, everyone laughed now.

Almost everyone. There was one member who did not laugh. His name was Rolf Eckhof, and he was as thin and hard as an iron spike, with white-blond hair and a pursed mouth that looked as if it could never laugh. And though he was a competent woodsman with commissions enough for common items, he had been trying and failing to become a Master for six years. Now this laughing, carefree boy had done it on his first try—the youngest Master in the history of the Guild.