Free short stories and novelettes: October 2020

Chapter One

Edwin Bloom cheerfully awoke on this frosty December morning and he sat up in his bed. His awareness of the form bundled beside him evoked feelings of deep tenderness. He smiled at his wife Agnes’s vain attempt to gain one last little snooze, burrowing deeper as she did into the blankets. Edwin dangled his icy feet, then slipped down into some old worn slippers.

He lit a match, bending over a low space heater. After a moment a blue flame began sending out the heat waves that would have the room toasty when she arose.

He next toddled into the kitchen to prepare the coffee pot, coffee being an American habit he had acquired from Agnes. He was, you see, an English transplant.

And then it became time to rouse from their slumber the light and essence of his life, his daughters, Evie and Missy. Edwin’s slippers padded softly over the frayed carpet to their door. He peeped in. There they lay, wonder of precious wonders, beneath marvelous warm blankets on soft little beds, with stuffed animal friends all about and Mr. Snuggly wrapped tight in Evie’s arms.

Missy tossed herself over and looked back with impish eyes, beaming a doting smile on her rumpled teddy-bear-dad, unheeding of tussled hair covering half of her face.

“Time to get up already? Am I to make breakfast this morning?”

Missy, older than Evie by three whole minutes, aspired to be the more grown-up. They were, as the gentle reader would surmise, twins.

“Good morning, dumpling. Yes, you may cook. I should like to see the food on the table as early as possible. Then there is time for cleaning the kitchen afterward. Do you think we can manage all of that?”

“Certainly, if somebody else is going to do the dishes.”

“Oh, it is my turn. I intend on doing my part.”

Edwin’s attention turned to Evie, whose eyes had yet to flutter.

“Little peach blossom, it’s time to wake up.”

Evie slowly stirred. She saw first thing Mr. Snuggly, whom she loved and trusted every bit as faithfully as her parents and sister. He was a woefully ragged bunny, with one ear missing and the other hanging loosely. Which is the reason she insisted everyone speak loudly to him or else he might not respond properly and be able to bear his share of the burden as a member of the family.

“I am coming, Dad,” she said resignedly. And then, reproachfully, “Dad?”

“Yes peach blossom.”

“Say ’Good morning’ to Mr. Snuggly.”

“Good morning, Mr. Snuggly. I dare say you are marvelous chipper so early and not a drop of cocoa in you. I admire that in a bunny. Oh, you do as well? Come along. Bring Evie with you.”

Edwin was back in the kitchen, in which the aroma of the coffee drove him to pour up two steaming cups as rapidly as possible. He spooned the slightest bit of sugar into each and added a few drops of milk. He then stirred it all up and carried the brew, cups rattling on saucers, to the bedroom, wrangling the door with his body. Agnes feigned a mild surprise when she saw him come in juggling the life-saving mixture. The pretense lasted but an instant until she reached with gratefulness, grasping the cup with sensitive fingers and a display of sculpted crimson nails.

“I will never know why you insist on spoiling me,” she said, with a touch of puzzlement in her voice.

She sipped appreciatively.

“It is a joy to me if I see you content and happy. I would spoil you more were it within my capabilities.”

“I believe you would, except I have everything and could not possibly want for more.”

How bravely she spoke. He marveled that she could speak so and no trace of reproach in her presentation. He felt induced to come forth on his own behalf.

“Hmm. My prospect will be brighter, I dare say after I have interviewed. There are enterprises eager to snatch up the talents of one like me.”

“I am sure of it. Haven’t more than a couple already promised to call?”

“Yes, as soon as their position becomes open. But, I am of a mind to get cracking much sooner than they can afford. In short, I am leaving no stone unturned in my quest to again be an employed breadwinner.”

“I am certain a job will turn up, you are so positive and knowledgeable, and at a wage much higher than before.”

“My dear, I am going to make you proud.”

“As if I couldn’t be already proud. There was never a finer man, a better father or more ardent husband than you, Edwin Bloom.”

“Oh, that is such a lot to live up to.”

“I mean every word and you deserve to hear it every night and day.”

Checking his watch, he made to exit the room.

“I must go and oversee breakfast. We shall have to suspend the conversation until the girls are off with their aunt Stephanie and I have you to myself a few minutes more.”

“And is Missy the proud engineer of the food this morning?”

“She is. The child handles toaster waffles like a seasoned chef.”

Chapter Two

After Edwin positioned the plates on the table he paused to ponder the disposition of the silverware. That was Evie’s job. He looked to the hallway, acutely aware of a hole in his heart that only her waif-like smile could fill. She had lately been getting around much too slowly. He made a mental note to bring it to the doctor’s attention by giving her a call during the day.

Acting discreetly, lest the alarm bells be sounded, he moved cautiously in the hall to just outside the girls’ bedroom. He had been in the act of reaching out to push open the door when Evie’s tiny pale hand grasped the knob and pulled it away.

With surprising strength she shoved her father off, saying, “You go back in there. I am okay.”

Her wan fragile face betrayed those brave words but he felt relieved nevertheless at her getting about and being active.

He retreated to the kitchen where he found sassy Missy serving up the greatest stack of waffles, along with a fine store brand of syrup and a bar of real butter. Ghostly Evie followed him in and went unsteadily to the silverware drawer and counted out the forks and knives. She placed them just so on the table, then rested in the special chair Edwin had purchased and stationed there for only her.

He employed his jolliest persona to express the sentiment, “Just two days before Christmas. I wonder what I shall be getting.”

“I will take anything,” Evie said with a laugh.

“We the kids ought to be the ones to wonder about that,” interjected Missy.

“But,” he remonstrated, “grownups exchange gifts. Your mother always comes up with something thoughtful for me as do I for her. Last year she gave me a record to play on the stereo: White Christmas by Bing Crosby.”

Missy challenged the giving of such a gift.

“Old record. They don’t make records now.”

“I value them the more because of it. Let us not lose sight, my dears, of the true giving and getting, which are of the heart and in whose honor we are exchanging the gifts.”

“She’s teasing you, Dad.”

“We do hope you and Mom will get some grownups toys this year,” Missy added.

Edwin thought he detected a halo hovering above the precious girls. He found himself choking up and so turned his attention to the waffles and the task of buttering them up and drenching each stack with syrup.

After that he went to Agnes, who had been preparing for the new workday, she being the sole support of the family since his unemployment checks ceased coming. He had lost his position with P. Scoggins, Inc., as a consequence of his attempting the good deed of rescuing a supposed friend, Stony Molebanner, from corporate justice. It had been administered the time Stony got caught sabotaging the account of one who, to Stony’s mind, had been dealing in a deceitfully treacherous manner.

“I am ready, dear,” said Agnes.

He returned to preside over the waffles. He was obliged to suspend the process when Agnes appeared at the doorway, posing.

“You certainly are pretty,” said Missy.

“So gorgeous,” Evie chimed.

“God’s masterwork,” added a humbled Edwin Bloom.

Agnes was obliged to so enhance her charms daily, for she worked a beauty salon, where a worker’s appearance added to one’s personal advantage besides speaking well of the establishment as a whole.

She joined the assembly at the table and Edwin led in prayer and thanksgiving.

“Lord, Missy has prepared this food, taken from the bounty you have provided. As we partake of it then go about the tasks of the day we pray that you protect us and guide us and see that we get home safely when the journey has ended. Amen.”

After a chorus of amens, Edwin and Missy wolfed their food and then sat quietly in the aftermath to await the slowpokes. Agnes nibbled at her plate, dabbing daintily after each bite. Evie drank her medicine but only pretended to be eating.

And then Edwin detected a notable absence.

“Evie,” he inquired, “why has Mr. Snuggly deprived us of his company? Is he not well?”

“He was tired. Much too weak to come in here.”

He had been in the habit of diverting his children’s attention as he drank the cocoa poured up for the stuffed toy, thus perpetuating the belief that it might be in fact a living, breathing bunny.

“Please take his cocoa in to him,” Evie said.

He transported a mug of the tepid liquid into the bedroom and quaffed it, saying heartily, “There, Mr. Snuggly, don’t be so piggish. That will not be your final meal after all. Oh, I say. Good day, Mr. Snuggly. Have a nice outing with Aunt Stephanie.”

He deposited the mug in the kitchen and began preparing hot soapy water for the washing of the dishes. But, with the girls clamoring to see the new total, glad for the distraction, he cut off the tap and dried his hands.

“Total time, is it?” he remarked.

He waved a deposit slip before him as he led his family into the living room and halted before the spot on the wall over which hung a chalkboard - on it a column of frequently added to numbers. Beneath the old total, he stroked in a three numeral figure and quickly added the transfigured total.

“And there you are. The latest sum in Evie’s fund is twenty-eight thousand and twenty-three.”

Which generated wild cheers from Agnes and Evie.

Missy calculated a moment. The amount was paltry as compared to the needed four hundred thousand dollars. The fund was growing slowly indeed. Her heart ached for the lack of time.

“Well, Evie shall be getting her operation right on schedule if I read the city and its generosity correctly,” Edwin stated enthusiastically.

He scooped up his daughters, one to an arm, and waltzed them about the room, vocalizing The Christmas Waltz in a near baritone.

Agnes covered her ears.

“Please, dear, the neighbors.”

“Will love to hear me sing,” he sang.

“But it’s so loud, so -”

“- Off key,” he trolled.

Agnes, laughing, begged, “Please don’t sing anymore.”

“You sing badly, Dad.”

“I like it,” bristled loyal Evie.

Chapter Three

Once that aunt Stephanie had come and taken charge of the children and Edwin had escorted Agnes on-board a cross-town bus, departing her at Bailey’s Elegance, the beauty salon, he walked a breezy avenue amid smattering sidewalk traffic. He came to the church at Thirty-fifth Street and went in. There within the hallowed walls, he always found succor and became strengthened to face his problems and meet the world head-on.

On this brightest of December mornings, he took his favorite pew. And as he sat in it his composure deserted him. He entreated tearfully, requesting the burden be lifted from his shoulders. On many normal days, he had used this time to count up his blessings. On this abnormal day he made supplication on behalf of Evie, pleading his case for divine intervention; for he had witnessed a vision in the darkest hour of night, in which he had looked to her chair; and on not finding her there questioned Mr. Snuggly, who shrugged his shoulders. She was gone, irrevocably.

Edwin begged that the vision be lifted. The dialog became intensified and close. Finally, he felt an easing of pain. He rejoiced for Evie in that her spirit was strong; yet may she survive to become well and even healthy.

He had sat for quite a few minutes more than usual, for it was his vow never to leave the sanctuary before a crisis had abated.

* * *

Inside a high rise penthouse, an hour and a half moved back in time, Stony Molebanner was yawning and rubbing his red-rimmed peepers with small mole-like hands. He had lain awake the night through, only to doze a bit at the end. He snapped awake to resume a struggle he had been having with the pangs of inferiority he suffered before the overbearing finery of his new digs. He cowered before plush walls lined with exquisite paintings, quivered before mountainous ranges of lavish furniture. It all seemed to shout at him, “Unworthy bum! You don’t belong in here.”

He screwed up his courage enough to confront the haughty, gaudy chandelier, staring with fixed intensity until its imperial sheen diminished. Stony had relegated it to what it truly was. An oversized light fixture.

“I own this place. I own you. Get used to it.”

Stony was a diminutive guy. Short and thin. He often held himself with an old man’s stoop. His wispy hair and fine little chin stubbles helped give the appearance of a much younger man. Of a kid, in fact. The impression would be false, however. He happened to be nearest forty than twenty.

He was a belligerent, cantankerous fellow, in whom the river of kindness ran dry. His weak blue eyes carried a message of cruel anger. He constantly vented the anger like an exploded volcano, indiscriminately vicious. In fact, he willed that a fiery punishment be rained over the planet, for he despised it and himself that much.

Worse, he denied Moral Authority and so failed to recognize the celebrated birthday of the Christ.

Yep, he was miserable all right. Left to himself, he might wither at a young age and so pass from history unrecognized. But for one colossal stupefying fact!

One morning, bright and early, Stony Molebanner presented a winning ticket in the Power Buster Lotto. He collected the first installment on one hundred and twenty million dollars, with the remaining balance to be paid off in yearly installments over the next twenty-five years.

On this, the third day thereafter, his bloodshot eyes bespoke the fact he had stayed bent all night over a writing desk. He was making lists of those he imagined had wronged him and even the ones who let just a brief thought of doing it flicker like a match in the wind. Because he was a stickler for order the names were alphabetized, then numbered according to their importance. But in the final analysis, there was one name he was really concerned with. The name was Bloom. More and more he trained his focus on the family bearing that name.

Why he beamed so pristine a hatred on those gentle people is a complex issue. The author might lack the skill to adequately explain it. That he blamed Edwin for the dismissal from P. Scoggins, Inc., is a given. But it comes nowhere close to explaining the truth in the matter. It began much earlier than that. From the moment Edwin bestowed friendship upon him it seems.

It is said that familiarity breeds contempt. With Stony that was so. Whom he could not fear he buried with scorn. Agnes and the children he found initially appealing. Obsessive bouts of doubt and green envy turned him against these also.

In this gloomy equation, revenge might redeem him somewhat. Punishment of others somehow would bequeath redemption on Stony. The harsher the punishment the better. Which would make the planned exercise sweet indeed.

Dressed, he put on a little hat, perched at a rakish angle, and left the penthouse, bearing up his sleeve the evilest plan ever devised. It was fortuitously timed to coincide with the day on the calendar he most despised.

He came down his elevator to a common hallway. He was obliged to ride the public car the remaining eleven stories to the ground. By the luck of the draw, Jimmy and Silva Spiker happened to step into the conveyance just as the door began sliding to. Spooked by Stony’s evil eye, they looked uncomfortably to the floor. To their nostrils there wafted a stench off Stony’s malodor of the soul as they sought mightily to invisible themselves. To Stony’s glee.

He bounced out of the car and to the sidewalk, cringing before the unaccustomed sunlight. He forged on in a purposeful walk that brought him to the intersection of Leems Avenue and Fortieth Street. There he paused, then took up a station to observe the operation of a blind, crippled man sitting atop a burlap seat. He intently studied the man, almost as if seeing him for the first time. But of course, it was familiar old Beggar Bill, a common fixture of this corner. For seven years the man had sat behind a sign that read PLEASE HELP ME I’M BLIND.

For the greater part of the seven years, Stony had passed him by, throbbing with contempt. He begrudged Beggar Bill the living he made, condemned the eyesore he presented, resentfully suspected that the world thought more of that old reprobate than they did of him.

But, today, Stony viewed Beggar Bill in a whole new light. Today Beggar Bill posed an integral part to his Plan. Careful to hang beyond the range of the beggar’s radar-like senses, he bided, knowing that soon Edwin Bloom would happen along. He felt a little grin stretch the corners of his mouth. He knew he would not fail.

Chapter Four

To any sympathetic passerby who dropped money in his cup Beggar Bill held out a pencil. It was a battered no. 2, never sharpened. He had been offering the same gift all of these years, with nobody being mean-spirited enough to take it. Each time it was refused he carefully returned it to a spot beside the cup. His morose expression rarely changed from one encounter to the next. He never failed to say, “God bless you,” as his gnarled fingers dug in the recepticle to determine the extent of the passerby’s generosity.

The stealthy cold seeped inside Stony’s jacket. He took to pacing to keep warm.

Where could that sack of misery have gotten off to? he wondered. He should be here by now.

Where, indeed?

And, the answer was - well, it was Friday. There being no prospect of finding work this late in the week, Edwin had dawdled, wandering a meandering path from the church to Styx’s Tobacco Store, where he bought a great black cigar to enjoy later on in the park. His odyssey led him to a stretch on Leems Avenue where the Christmas decorations were excessive and glorious.

He lost himself in the glitter of too many Santas, hosts of heralding angels, precious babies Jesus in mangers of plastic and wood, singing along to piped-in carols. He regretted that the girls were not with him. He would have loved to carry Evie high on his shoulders, hearing her squeals of pleasure and to see the magic of the season reflected in Missy’s eyes.

At the end, he slogged on. He knew that by the next intersection he would encounter the man on the burlap seat. It had long been his practice to give to that unfortunate soul a coin or two at every passing. Coin! He paused to search himself for an offering. Alas, his pockets were empty.

He went through them repeatedly, feeling there must be a coin in there, simply because Beggar Bill would be so in need of one. At the same instant, the trajectory of Edwin’s gaze snagged and tangled on the beady-eyed gleam of one awfully familiar to him. The contact was broken by the other, who then sauntered toward the beggar.

“It’s Stony Molebanner, down on his luck yet helping the needy. Such a man after all. I’ve got to invite him to dinner.”

He advanced, beaming like a thousand-watt search-lamp and in so doing became an unwitting principle in Stony’s play. He observed approvingly as Stony pushed the hat yet further back on his head and feigned casualness. The schemer stood before the shivering

beggar waving a fifty dollar bill like a little patriot’s flag. He leaned forward that he might properly be looking down on the presumed lesser man. He addressed him in his most engaging manner.

“Good day, sir. I trust the world finds you well on so fine a morning?”

“Bless you, sir. Good day, sir.”

“I am myself in a dilemma, being short by three dimes toward a long distance call to my sick mother.”

“Oh?” the beggar sniffed. “Well -”

A troubled deliberation ensued.

“If it is of sufficient importance you may retrieve that sum from my cup.”

“Bless you,” Stony said in a delighted sort of way. “But, as this is not of a life-threatening nature, I cannot accept the coins for free. Do you recognize the texture of the currency as compared with the feel of other sorts of paper?”

“I do, sir. Indeed I do.”

“Then let this pass through your fingers.”

Stony allowed the fifty to barely tickle the tips of Beggar Bill’s digits.

It must be noted that the poor man had spent his entire life in the dark and essentially alone. Small wonder he became focused on money, it being the supreme ingredient to survival, the sole insurer of independence. And further small wonder that his concentrated energy caused him to “see” every form and denomination of it through his fingers and nose. In that wise the passing bill communicated itself via touches and sniffs, allowing him to instantly form a diagnosis.

“It is a fifty.”

Stony was truly astonished.

“Exactly so.”

Stony pushed the bill into his pocket. He took from his jacket a scrap of bond paper, making the switch right before the beggar’s sightless eyes and Edwin’s good blue ones.

“I have been lucky of late,” Stony went on. “You shall never know how lucky. Me being the possessor of a phenomenal amount of new-found wealth, I feel it my Christian duty - my duty, sir - to spread the good fortune to those, eh, not so fortunate. Therefore, I am about to remove the paltry pittance from your cup and drop in the fifty. That is if I have your approval?”

“You do, sir. Take the money and pencil as well,” slavered Beggar Bill.

“In the spirit of Christmas, sir. God bless you.”

“God bless you, sir.”

Displaying all the pomp of the seasoned thespian, Stony made a show of first removing all the coins and then allowing the slip of white to float into the cup. He even snatched up the pencil. Turning, as if to walk away, he instead barreled into Edwin, head-butting that one’s considerable paunch. He winged his elbows, seeking to make the collision as painful as possible for him. With a countenance the mirror of glee, he locked eyes with the larger man.

“Well, it’s the one got me fired from my job.”

“I saw what you did, Stony. You robbed Billy Scott.”

“Who? So that’s his name. Only you would have known.”

“I could get you arrested. But, if you will put it all back, I shall let the matter drop.”

“I intend putting it back and with interest. First, let me explain that I did this to illustrate a point.”

“Oh, I say -”

Stoney pugnaciously hung right in Edwin’s face.

“Tut tut tut. There is a greed and an evil side in each one of us, even a pius worm such as you. Given the circumstance and the need, even Edwin Bloom would rob the blind and lame.”

“Upon my honor and concern for my mortal soul I would never bend so low.”

“I am about to prove it.”

“Back off, Molebanner. I will not lend myself to this discussion. Give back the money. Allow me to be purged of your presence.”

“No, Edwin. I am her savior.”

To Edwin’s nostrils there wafted a distinct trace of sulfur. Sniffing it, he began to feel a bit frightened.

“Whose?” he enquired tremulously.

“She who hears the angel of death.”

“Jackal.”

“I know that her operation will not be performed, the state of her fund being what it is.”

“I warn you, sir, violence is not my nature; but, if you seek to extend this line of discourse -”

Edwin’s fists pumped the air. His hat fell off and went in the gutter.

“She will surely die. Unless …”

The truth is, Edwin could no more strike Stony than he could swat down an audacious fly doing the hula atop his favorite sandwich. He dropped his hands. He lost interest in the conversation. He pursued his errant hat, necessitating the turning of his backside to Stony.

Seeing that end of his victim turned upon him enraged Stony, for he seemed suddenly in danger of losing the argument.

“I’ve got the money,” he shouted. “Four hundred thousand dollars.”

Chapter Five

Edwin turned, wearing a quizzical expression. There was no striking from the equation Stony’s evil intent and the degrading nature of the encounter. But, he was capable of grasping at straws in his attempts to keep his daughter alive. He appeared to be mesmerized by the timbre of the words “four hundred thousand dollars.” He watched as Stony dragged great rolls of cash from his oversized pockets.

Stony burst forward, waving the filthy lucre in Edwin’s face. He followed that cretin’s dance, eyes glazed, grabbing ineffectively each time Stony closed in.

“Oh yes, sweet money,” the tormentor hissed through his teeth, grinning cruelly.

Beggar Bill cocked his head, catching more than a glimmer of what transpired.

“Here you are,” Stony said, “a pillar of morality and goodness, so you think. Here are the four hundred thousand dollars. And here - here, we have a blind man who is also a crippled beggar. I am about to toss this money at him. If you can wrest it from his grasp, then it is yours.”

“Stony, be merciful,” Edwin croaked. “I ruined myself trying to save you your job. I could still be your friend and ally.”

“You mean money’s friend. Get ready. Begins the final act.”

Stony heaved the money in a volley of bundles right at Beggar Bill’s hands. Edwin was horror-stricken to see Evie’s hope of recovery bounce off the beggar and he doing a very credible job of raking it in.

Enraged, he flew toward the spot, his overblown body a juggernaut that drove the man’s outstretched body into the sidewalk. Beggar Bill raised up his head and bawled for help while Edwin grabbed at the prize, prying it away from he who was blind and lame. True to the words of Stony Molebanner, he sopped up every spot of cash, leaving the beggar flat on his back, braying, and moaning.

He hugged the treasure against his chest, taking flight as Stony jumped to the side to avoid getting squashed. Edwin ran like the wind, straight into the waiting arms of an alert police officer.

The officer was Llewellen Lewis, ten year veteran of the force, a strapping example of good diet and exercise. He in his cruiser had been paused for the traffic light from the inception of the attack. Outraged, he handled the suspect a bit roughly, dragging him back to where Beggar Bill continued to plead for help.

Collared, subdued, Edwin cast about for the true author of the crime. He looked up the street just in time to glimpse Stony Molebanner stepping into a taxi and getting whisked off. He looked at the yowling Bill Scott and for the first time confronted his own guilt in the matter.

“Poor Bill,” he said to the officer, contrite, repented. “I must help him.”

“Put your hands behind your back,” Llewellen said, pulling a set of handcuffs from his belt.

“My money,” Beggar Bill bawled. “My money.”

He guided Edwin to the patrol car and helped him inside. The poor man hung his head and waited to get hauled away.

* * *

At first Stony’s chuckling interfered with his ability to communicate to the taxi driver. He finally managed to verbalize his desire to be transported to the nine hundred block of Blessing Avenue.

“There is a beauty salon called Bailey’s Elegance at mid-block.”

The driver’s engaging gray eyes twinkled at him through the rearview mirror.

“She will be unable to refuse your offer.”

“You think I am gone courting? I assure you I am not, sir.”

“Of course not.”

“Not that it’s any of your business.”

He found himself perplexed by the man’s probing stare. That face, he thought, frowning, is so familiar.

Examination of the posted photo revealed that his name was Santa Claus. Practical joker, Stony thought glumly, as he saw the sign of the establishment employing Agnes Bloom.

“That’s it.”

Santa steered to the curb, pumping the brakes and stopping a bit short.

“That will be eighty-five cents.”

Turning his considerable girth to face Stony seemed a formidable task, yet he executed the maneuver with ease. Stony seized on the moment to look Santa over, noting the ageless eyes, skin old but not wrinkled, cheeks fat and rosy, beard white and flowing. Santa emitted an almost indiscernible “Ho ho ho” beneath his breath.

I get it, Stony concluded, this man is a composite of every Santa Claus society has perpetrated on children and criminally clueless parents. He obviously trades on the resemblance.

He held out a dollar.

“I have no money for a tip.”

The taxi-driving Santa’s manner remained gentle.

“Of course not,” He said without reproach. Go conduct your business.”

Then he winked.

“She will not refuse your offer.”

“What I am about is not your affair. Go elsewhere to prey on the gullible.”

Stony popped out on the sidewalk.

“Begone,” he shouted.

The smiling Santa pulled away, tooting the horn twice.

Chapter Six

Gladys Pudgefrump had bustled the livelong morn, the whole while being mortified about her hair. It was, you see, tousled, not to be tamed. She nevertheless bravely attended her affairs, beginning with the disposition of her beloved poodles, Meanie and Little Gumdrop. After dropping them at Blind Pete’s Poodle Emporium she met with her interior decorator to discuss the total makeover of her parlor and guestrooms. It was determined at the conference that a decision would be reached mid-to-late spring.

Each time an unfortunate person found himself or herself confronted with that unconscionable head of hair she explained and apologized profusely. She declared that she must get herself away from the person’s sight as rapidly and humanely as possible.

It was an agonizing mercy when time for an appointment with Bailey’s Elegance finally came to pass. The distraught poor woman went in and placed the fate of her hair with Agnes Bloom.

Once the frantic woman had been shampooed, clipped, and managed and at last allowed to behold her restored self in a mirror, she expressed full delight to Agnes.

“Words alone cannot convey how exalted I am that my hair is now on par with my self-image. I can go about publicly, without being self-conscious and humiliated. My dear, I love it.”

She went on to further praise Agnes and in the end rewarded her with something more substantial than mere words of gratitude.

Leaving, she found herself sharing the door with a scowling little man who crowded his way in and who once inside paused to look into every corner of the establishment.

He carried himself with a habitual stoop. He was fair-haired, pale, wearing clothing that missed fashion’s mark by a considerable degree. His gloom spread an instant pall over each soul in there.

Every eye became set upon him.

Consternation gripped the women’s hearts. All except that of Agnes Bloom. She knew him well indeed and felt obliged to reach out to him.

“Stony Molebanner must be in horrible pain to be so miserable,” she had once communicated to Edwin. “I wish there could be some way to help him ease his mind and life become somewhat bearable.”

“The man is caught in an internal quagmire,” he replied. “Only a divine force can free him.”

Agnes moved to greet Stony at the same instant he acknowledged her. They met in mid-floor and conversed in lowered voices. Notwithstanding, the ladies distinctly understood him to invite Agnes to move the talk to the sidewalk.

She did not hesitate in her acceptance, to the astonishment of Evilene Bailey, the proprietress, as well as the other women who were in the various states of beautification. She went with him out the door.

Evilene Bailey bit her tongue. She had always felt a motherly concern for Agnes.

Mrs. Aboutsix gasped, a sharp intake audible throughout the salon.

They were bound to silence, but their mascara-ed eyes engaged in lively conversation.

What business could involve Agnes with that creepy man and her husband nowhere about?

Exactly. If they are not up to no good, then why the secrecy?

What are they doing out there?

But, the final crushing stroke resounded after Agnes slipped back in, a brown envelope in hand. She went to her station and stuffed it in her purse. Cutting the ladies’ stares like the prow of a ship, she retraced her steps.

“I’m so sorry,” she said over a retreating shoulder. “But, good-bye.”

She zipped out of Bailey’s Elegance and in a waltz of perfect timing went right into a waiting bus. She exited at the stop nearest home, to be confronted on every block with sparkling tinsel, strings of lights, bell-ringing Santa’s helpers, recorded carols from department stores, strangers wishing holiday greetings at the drop of a hat; in short, all the merriment celebrating the world’s greatest triumph. It made an eerie backdrop for Agnes, who moved like a fairytale beauty in a made-up scene. For she had perhaps lost everything.

She moved, oblivious of cathedral bells chiming “Joy to the World,” unheeding of offers of help, engendered by torrents of tears streaming from her eyes.

And when she came into the home she had shared with Edwin for so long she flung herself across the conjugal bed and hugged his pillow, addressing it by proxy.

“Oh, my dear, if we could have found a way to help our darling I would never do this to you.”

In the end, she took just her purse and one suitcase. She penned a note of explanation and placed it, along with the brown envelope, on the table near the door as she took her leave.

* * *

The attending officer’s disgust shrouded the air, like a London fog.

“You will be allowed your one phone call, after a while.”

“Thank you,” Edwin replied.

“A good Christmas you were planning,” the officer added.

To which he had no heart to respond. He skulked into the cell and stood at the center like a rootless tree with no place to fall. The clang of the closing door struck him to the core.

“Might as well have a seat and make the best of it,” came an airy voice from the deepest recess of the room.

The one who spoke sat on a steel rack. He seemed a weasel of a man, something of a runt, with short dark hair, with eyes that moved inside little turrets, seeking advantage from every situation. He sprang to his feet and advanced with his hand extended.

“Jack Spruce, friend.”

Jack’s smile exuded the confidence of one who thinks of himself as charming and quite good-looking.

“So, you are the one likes to rob the blind and give them a good beating besides. Quite a rap for a sappy-looking guy who doesn’t look as though he could beat an egg.”

Edwin’s stomach turned. He desperately pressed himself against the bars and tried to see down the corridor; but only the opposing wall composed a view, of dingy dirty concrete. He pinned his hope on dear Agnes. How would she respond on learning the depth to which he had sunk? What would be his daughters’ opinion of him on being informed of the sort of father they had? He felt no self-pity, but wallowed in a pit of self-loathing.

Stung at being rebuffed, Jack stood still a moment. The turrets moved as his eyes roved the rumpled older man, pegging the greenhorn for an easy mark. They were all easy, actually. He returned to the bunk and lay upon it, cushioning his head in his hands, looking at the ceiling as he rummaged a mental file for scams and cons to use on him.

The officer returned to allow Edwin to make his call.

Edwin approached the phone on the wall with great trepidation. He feared the coming conversation more than anything he had ever experienced. He smoothed his thinning hair and brushed at his trousers and jacket before lifting the receiver and asking an operator to dial the numbers.

He waited as the phone rang countless times. He gestured helplessly at the cop.

“She ought to be at home. She always comes home early on Friday.”

He was instructed to give it up; he would be allowed a second chance in an hour or so. Bewildered, he could not argue. There is really nothing to be done if the phone rings and nobody answers.

Chapter Seven

Jack Spruce raised his head and watched the newcomer dejectedly take a seat on the other steel rack. His eyes were all over the man. He correctly guessed his subject had failed to find one to go his bail. Now the jerk stared without blinking at the floor. Jack’s eyes crinkled with amusement as a tear slid down a plump cheek and plashed on the cold gray floor.

With that he decided to take the odd old bird under his wing, as jailbirds often will. This time his voice and manner were genuine.

“Hey, don’t go on so.”

Edwin sniffled. He wiped his nose on his sleeve.

“Come on; it looks to be worse than it is in here. Nothing actually happens in jail, except you sit around or work an assigned job as you ride out your time. Life goes on. What good is the moping, huh?”

Jack’s sincerity could not be lost on Edwin. Looking into the weasel-like face, he reminded himself, After all, this is a person.

“Mr. Spruce - Jack - okay. Of course, it’s time to bear-up. If I have been rude, it is the situation. I have gone from being a respected family man, blessed beyond all reason, to being an abject cageling, despised and contemptible. I may never get my life back. I have lost the adoration of the finest woman and the most wonderful daughters one could have. Evie, for whose sake I took this evil turn, shall be the most injured. She is ill. When her fund refused to grow, my ex-colleague, Stony Molebanner, drew me in on a ruse. He taunted and tempted me until I made a grab for some money. I cannot blame her illness. I cannot blame even Stony. Stony made me see what kind of a man I really am. I ought to forgive and thank him.”

Jack, who understood the raving of a fool when he heard it, interrupted.

“Hold it there, friend. You have got life all wrong; politely excusing this, making allowances for that, forgiving right and left, apologizing. No, no, no. Let me clue you in. I’ve been around a block or two. I’ve formulated my Rules of Life, as I call it. I am going to share them with you.

“First of all, never apologize. It makes you weak for them to take advantage of. The rest that follows is what makes number one necessary. So they are just as important. You don’t know the mob outside. They are not your friends. When they move to put you down, spit in their eyes. When they are most off guard, take what they own and more. If they offend you, exact a revenge. After a time you will be able to look on them without caring what they think or how they feel. Play them for suckers, friend, as do they you. As do they you.”

“Spruce, I may be guilty of some grave wrongs. I have undoubtedly compromised the disposition of my immortality. But I will not subscribe to the antisocial philosophies that cheapen people and glamorize brutality. Not ever. I don’t wish to appear as impolite; be so good as to keep that portion of your thinking to yourself.”

Jack’s retaliation was brutal.

“You are going down. Soon, you will beg for my help. You will become antisocial and more before this is ended.”

“I am low, Spruce, but not that low.”

Frowning darkly, Jack took to his bed.

* * *

On leaving the establishment at Blessing Avenue, Stony sought a cab. The one he hailed swished into place a bit too quickly. Preoccupied, he sat without looking toward the driver.

“Take me -”

“To the Children’s Protective Service?”

Santa’s eyes twinkled from the mirror. The motor engaged.

“It’s you again! Stop here. I’ll wait for another driver.”

“I’m afraid that is impossible. We have entered upon the Boulevard of the Northern Lights, where no pedestrian is allowed.”

“Then, at the first opportunity.”

“Certainly, sir.” The rate of under-the-breath ho ho hos had increased dramatically. “You are Stony Molebanner, are you not?”

“What if I am? What’s it to you?”

“Not important. What is important is what you are about to do to two precious children.”

“Who are you? How do you know about me? And those maddening ho ho hos; do they never quit?”

“I am, as the sign reads, Santa Claus. I know much, yet too little about you. My ho ho hos? Mirth does annoy the miserable.”

“No, really; who are you?”

“Who I am is really not the problem. Who Stony Molebanner is, how he is affecting others; that is the problem. I am a friend, Stony. Perhaps the only one you have got. In the spirit of Christmas, Stony, in the spirit of Christmas.”

“ I do not celebrate Christmas. I wish I may be on another planet at Christmastime.”

“Do you sincerely wish it?”

“I do. The devil take a bunch of revelers who express false sentiments of Peace on Earth and who give presents until it decimates their bank accounts.”

“I can’t deliver you on another planet. However we are traveling on the bridge and that is the next best thing.”

“There is no bridge in this part of town, you charlatan.”

“It is a celestial bridge, Stony, the like of which you shall never see. It will appear at any given point at any prescribed time. I have but to will it so.”

“Celestial -?”

Certainly. You don’t think my reindeer really can fly, do you?”

“I don’t see any bri-i-i-i-idge.”

The taxi rode a strand that appeared to end someplace among the stars, borne like a rocket into the firmament. Stony lay down and hid between the seats, babbling.

“Take me down. Take me down.”

“Don’t be afraid. I assure you, I am a capable driver.”

Santa spun a few barrel-rolls, did a quick loop, then settled to the drudgery of driving. Once, he looked around to check on Stony. From then on he drove in silence.

Spent, Stony slowly ceased his shrieking and clawing at the floor. He lay still.

They went so high that the North Star became exposed at the nadir of dawn. It was in that direction they headed. As Stony’s body slowly unknotted, they zeroed in on a frozen region, over which snowdrops danced without ever touching the earth below. He crawled into his seat and watched the steep hills slipping by, until a village appeared, nestled in the bowl of a valley.

The bridge swooped down beside reindeer barns, ending at a hangar near the first cottage of the town. The cab jolted over sleigh-ruts, coming to rest beside a majestic sleigh, with gleaming sides and shimmering bells. It stopped with a jerk.

A sea of elves engulfed the taxi. They danced and shouted excitedly.

“Welcome, Santa.”

“Welcome home.”

“Santa.”

He moved in their midst, as agitated as they, booming the jolliest ho ho hos imaginable.

But, the boss, Pumpkinpulp, had other ideas.

“Foolish imps,” he admonished. “Christmas is nigh. Get back to your jobs.”

The little ones scattered, fanning out to their individual workstations. As if by magic, the entire operation went instantly on track.

Then, the truth dawned on Stony.

I’ve slipped a cog. In reality, I’m probably wandering some sidewalk, raging out of my head. Probably wake up in a hospital bed.

He made no fuss when Santa and Pumpinpulp led him to the cottage. With flurries of the white stuff in his face, he moved obliviously past beds of screwed-up pansy flowers, unheedful that the walls were of white stucco, with green and red roof tiles and shutters. Porch columns like candy sticks and a doorknob of chocolate color and texture went unseen.

The room they entered was of a modest size, with chairs for sitting and lamps for reading and nothing else.

Santa and Pumpkinpulp paused as if waiting for something to happen. The friendly twinkle never wavered in the bearded one’s eye, nor did the effervescing ho ho hos desert him.

The grizzled elf, on the other hand, stared malevolently and mouthed a muttering every bit as persistent as the annoying ho ho hos.

Santa remembered his manners.

“Have a seat? I promise you, Stony, I won’t keep you here longer than necessary. And I wish to apologize for the manner in which you were brought here. It was not my plan to do it this way. Others higher than I conceived the stratagem. I am but an instrument of their doing.”

“Oh, give him two spoons of sugar and chuck his chin,” the elf said. “He isn’t one of you-know-whose minions, you know.

For a brief second or two, the ho ho hos wavered.

Chapter Eight

And that for which they waited?

Why, for none other than the specter of one who lived then died, back in the 19th Century. One who in life held Christmas dearer than anyone. The distilled essence of that bright particular holiday, Ebenezer Scrooge. At the very moment, this ghost was descending on the expectant building.

Attended by a host of angels, borne on a screeching wind, it reached the door, blown and blasted, the mode of travel being what it was, i.e., it being the equivalent of a hurricane

. The angels took their leave. It patted itself down, arranged the thinly spaced hair and thick bushy sideburns, all the while practicing “the smile.”

On cue, the chain-dragging spirits, among which numbered that of Jacob Marley, twisted and moaned outside the windows. Clanking, making shadows, scraping the walls, screaming horribly, they performed.

Now, Scrooge’s ghost was ready to make its entrance.

It passed its head through the door and cordially beamed about the room, obviously enjoying this feature of the job.

Stony had started fidgetting once the caterwauling began. It’s part of the illness!. That thought calmed him down.

His impression of the face in the door was of a kindly gentleman bearing a striking resemblance to Alistair Sim, the 20th Century actor. The spook came on through and took a chair. It regarded Stony in a solicitous manner, smiling slightly.

“I don’t need to sit,” it said, “as I never grow tired. I only do so to make mortals feel more comfortable.”

Stony sighed. He was beginning to suffer the strain of the ordeal.

“Who - or what - are you?” he said tiredly.

“A ghost. Of Christmas.”

“Hah! I saw that movie as a kid growing up. I must have sat through it and been bored by it a dozen times. But, no more. When the season comes I try to be at home, to allow no Christmas in. If the radio plays carols I change the station. I monitor the television to avoid programs that mention the season. I will not call it a humbug, but only because that would make of me a player invoking the work of fiction I most despise.”

“I promise you that you shan't be treated to a replay of Dickens’ account of my conversion, for I know too much about you. You are a new phenomenon, you and others of your generation. Agents of the millennium that’s starting. You could not possibly be confused with Ebenezer Scrooge and you could not be converted using the same arguments. For all my failings, I had a deep-seated belief in G/d. I had but to be reminded. You who think you know everything have no beliefs. All that is noble must be ridiculed and shot down. And you walk, aping the latest action hero, into oblivion, leaving not a snail’s trace of your existence, historically and in the afterlife, a life as pointless as any video game. My heart weeps for you.”

“You will have to do better than this to impress me. Dickens invented you with the inspiration of a murderer in a courtroom. I do not believe in the supernatural. I do not believe in you.”

“Hard hard man. You are not afraid to die, miserable and alone?”

“With my money, I will buy comfort. That is in the end all that’s worth hoping for. If I die alone, so what? We reside in the grave alone. What harm an early start?”

At that, the ghost howled, a horrific sound of anguish and pain, lasting ten times longer than mortal breath could sustain. Hurting throughout his skull, becoming deathly afraid, Stony broke for the door.

The underside of the cottage trembled, sending a footstool roving into his path. He tripped over it as a hole erupted in the oaken planks. He plunged into the void, falling through darkness, the spirit floating beside him.

“It feels like the real thing,” he said aloud.

He slipped along by a curtain of stars, the Earth rapidly approaching, the specter in his face.

“You surely will die, unless you take my hand and allow me to bring you down in a gentler fashion.”

Stony grabbed for the hand. It eluded him. Strive as he might, the hand could not be caught.

“I am trying,” said Stony, passing through a thin layer of clouds. “Why can I not take your hand?”

“It’s because you don’t believe in me. You don’t believe in anything, do you, Stony?”

“I believe in reality, not fairy tales. If one’s flesh gets burned, one avoids contact with fire in future; become ill from eating too much, approach the offending culinary spread with moderation, henceforth; need knowledge of calculus to secure a job, learn calculus; crave sociability, become married; become old or ill, die. All of this without benefit of clergy, ghost, or Lassie, except when one opts for it. I cannot believe in you as more than a dream or a delirium and that, you old fool, is that.”

Stony folded his arms, shut his eyes. Having done all there was to do and saying all that could be said, he was ready to die.

They plummeted by an airplane, then a sparrow. The sidewalk rose as the flyswatter to the fly. Pedestrians, once dots, became as ants, next doll-like, then nearly people-size.

Scrooge’s ghost became energized. It gripped Stony so tightly both grimaced. Dangling him a mere inch above the concrete, the specter set him gently down.

The bluff had failed.

“You see?” Stony gloated. “I knew it was a delusional dream. I am dreaming still, else I should not see you.”

“I won’t go away. Count on seeing me every minute of each day until you believe in something.”

“Santa too?”

“Especially he.”

Stony’s lips curled derisively.

“I may see you, but I will proceed to ignore you. My mind has produced you. Meaning, I have to tolerate you until my mind has played its game. I shall not moderate my behavior to suit you. You shall be the unnecessary appendage I learn how to ignore.”

And with that Stony marched up to the Children’s Protective Service and marched in.

Chapter Nine

Agnes saw Stony fall from the sky. She had looked from the window from the time the plane lifted off the runway and steadily climbed above the wispy clouds, as it settled into a bright and steady air-lane. The buildings below had grown small and the cars less distinguishable as they went sailing over the downtown. He was a glitch on her vision, of the sort one passes off and rarely remembers. She pressed her face to the glass; when nothing memorable presented itself she leaned back to rest.

The valiant craft toiled onward. In a few hours, it would land her on a strange unfamiliar coast. There would be lodging; she would be safe. Stony’s money would see to that.

Stony’s money. She wondered if Edwin would still love her on learning she had taken it. The check inside the brown envelope would pay for Evie’s operation. The note left on top of it stopped short of revealing that Agnes would come home at the end of three weeks, part of the stipulations. She prayed that time would pass quickly. She shut her eyes as tears squeezed out like pearls.

Forgive, Edwin! Oh, Evie! Missy!

* * *

Brimblestone Heights, the place the Blooms called home, had not always been this run-down. Standing among clusters of houses and apartments now languishing in poverty, the old girl still wore its gown of bricks and bonnet of slate in a proudly tattered fashion. Evie and Missy had forgotten the well-to-do neighborhood where they had been born; they loved “the Heights” with all their hearts. As they came up the cobbled entry with Aunt Stephanie, the twins rejoiced to be within the secure confines of home.

They went upon the walk with Missy bustling, happy as a lark, and Evie with Mr. Snuggly following alongside her old tired aunt. Missy tinkled the wind chimes at Mrs. Cramden’s patio, cuddled the stray cat that lately hung around, and finally rushed to unlock the door as the slowpokes dawdled.

She skipped into the room, intent on finishing off a soda when her attention was caught by the note on top of the table.

Evie plopped Mr. Snuggly on the couch as Stephanie paused near the entry, removing some mittens.

Missy shrieked then. It was a scream of agony and fear, startling Stephanie into tossing away her mittens. Evie lost some balance and sat back next to Mr. Snuggly.

It could not but be argued that Stephanie was simple. She was a middle-aged girl, with few resources. She gaped until Missy came over and pressed the scrap of paper in her hand. She stared at it stupidly, without deciphering a word. Her eyeglasses perched precariously, accentuating the look of a simpleton.

Evie stoically waited, knowing Missy would explain.

“What does it say,” Stephanie wanted to know.

“Mom is not coming home.”

“Has she got an emergency, then?”

“Not coming home perhaps ever.”

“Nonsense. Nonsense. Nonsense,” Stephanie droned.

Evie, torn between panic and outrage, shouted, “You ought not say that!“

Missy dissolved into tears, with Evie following suit.

Stephanie refused to accept the note at its word.

“It’s nonsense. The note didn’t mean to say that. You will see. When Edwin gets here he will explain it. Everything will be all right.”

“Then she’ll come home? And everything will be just the same?” Evie said hopefully.

“We will just sit quietly until he does.”

And so they waited, Evie lying against Mr. Snuggly, eyes half-closed; Stephanie in Agnes’s soft chair, humming and shifting her crossed legs; Missy about to open her favorite book.

A booming knock resounded like a first volley of a war.

It was up to Stephanie to laboriously haul herself out of the chair and coax her protesting bones to answer it. About midway there, a second knock rattled the door in its hinges. Too thickwitted to be fearful, she attained her goal and pulled the battered portal open.

It was a ham-fisted sergeant with a crew of jackbooted officers in brown jackets and riot helmets. Her spirit immediately lifted, for lawmen correct injustice when they come, do they not?

Her joy was squelched by the officers falling back and the opening getting filled with the overbearing presence of Ms. Screwnie Jones. Screwnie wearing riot gear herself. The voice of the rat-faced agent of Child Protection was nasal, shrill and grating,

“Stephanie Bloom, step aside, please. The girls are to be seized, the father being in jail and the mother being a deserter. Surrender them or be in contempt of the law. Resist and feel the weight of the law.”

“Seized? Take them? No; I will care for them.”

“No, Stephanie Bloom, you will not. You have no means to provide for them. From what I understand about yourself from my research, which is always thorough, you ought long ago have been confined in an institution.”

Stephanie moved to bar the jackboots, but was brushed past. She held on to the arm of one and was dragged until she fell off.

Evie clung to Mr. Snuggly, who (or which, at the reader’s whim) was becoming wrenched free as she writhed and scratched at the officer. At last, the poor bunny fell. In the fray that followed a heavy boot trod upon the hapless Snuggly, causing one eye to get ripped from the fabric, left to dangle from a single long thread.

Missy did the most damage, kicking one ankle repeatedly and biting three hands.

Captured, the girls were popped out the door, held as in a vise, squealing and bleating. Tossed inside Screwnie’s minivan and shut in, they were.

The rodent-faced agent remained a moment to reassure Stephanie, who sat in the spot where she had fallen, wheezing for breath.

“Don’t fear for them, my dear. I will personally get Esther and Minnie processed right away so that they can share Christmas love with their foster family.”

“Foster family? Esther and Minnie? But - but - but -”

But, Ms. Jones turned on her heel and marched away to drive off with the children.

Still reeling, Stephanie pulled herself into Agnes’s chair and rocked herself.

Edwin will know what to do. Edwin will sort it out.

Across the floor Mr. Snuggly sat with his remaining eye fixed upon the brown envelope on the table.

Looking at him, Stephanie was certain the bunny just wanted to cry but could not get the tears out.

“Don’t you worry. Edwin will sort it out.”

* * *

But jail is no place to be when things are in need of sorting out. Edwin Bloom, having no bond money, having already borrowed to the hilt from his friends and acquaintances, besides being shy in this instance to ask, the nature of his transgression being what it was, was held over for trial. He longed for the time he would get a court-appointed attorney. At least then he would have someone fighting for him from within the system.

Chapter Ten

To Screwnie Jones, red tape was a dirty word. She set her goals and went right at them, making the paperwork keep up as best it could. Through devotion beyond the mere call of duty, she got Evie and Missy assigned to a foster home that same evening, keeping them together.

In the dusk of gathering night, Screwnie ushered the withering girls into the mansion of Nope Parliadge, a self-described kindly man, who gave “his” kids more than nourishing food and comfortable digs. He gave them moral and temporal guidance. He gave them a lifelong philosophy. No matter their age. For, even if too young to understand, the child will by rote absorb sufficient of the teaching by the time they are old enough to think independently. The child following the path has no time to investigate in the alleys and dens of corrupt thinkers and social do-gooders. The child becomes an important societal cog as a preteen, eager to remain free from every source of aid and welfare. So Parliadge taught; so he lived.

The house rested high up, like the lone survivor of King of the Hill. It gloated threateningly over the lesser houses down the slope, wearing a coat of paint like an undertaker’s jacket. Most foreboding, the grounds, though neatly groomed at the street level, were a disheartening tangle the rest of the way, of thorny vines, untrimmed shrubs, and trees. The unwary would be lost just seconds upon entering. Small wonder the estate inspired tales of ghosts and dead bodies. None of it had been substantiated; just the wood owls and the guilty would know for certain.

Prior to being seated to dinner, the dozen or so of his wards were assembled in the great playroom, there to be lectured to and challenged before a morsel be seen. Stood at ease like small soldiers, they were not to turn in the direction of the grand Christmas pine off to the side. No time could be allotted for the dreamy child to ponder which gift beneath the glittery boughs be marked for whom. They were in the playroom for but one purpose: to listen; to learn.

It was quite the ragtag line they made, with long gangly Walt bending next to scrawny Mikey; Mikey bumping an elbow with energetic Angie; Angie annoying Chris; Chris older and taller than the rest, stepping on Rosie’s toes; Rosie falling against Tina; Tina trying with all her might to keep silent; Arnold with his green eyes fixed on the visage of Nope Parliadge; Becky holding the hand of toddler Sergio; then, red-haired, freckled, bashful Robert; lastly, Cory, the one orphan in the group.

He faced away from them, a pointing stick clutched behind his back. The wife, Jane, timidly policed the line by tapping this shoulder, setting that body straight, cupping a hand over the working set of lips. After fully ten minutes of this, he faced them and began speaking.

“Good evening, children. We have a wonderful meal for you, all set up in the dining room. Before we go in there, I have something to say.

“You all are here by circumstances not of your choosing. And, yet, the truth is, you are wards of the state and you are takers. Soaking in our good taxpayers’ money and no dime of it for your own labor, not one cent contributed by blood relations. It is a truism that welfare begets helplessness and dependency.” His eyes roved the captive, uncomprehending audience. “But, you will learn self-reliance, I warrant it, and not take a bit more once you have matured enough to become productive. Any person that takes taxpayer money is not a free person, but a sneak, one who would perpetuate the situation were it not for concerned citizens such as myself. That is a truism and I warrant it.”

As he studied the faces one at a time his attention became fixed on the soft babyish features of Mikey. Mikey was three years old. He had come into foster care straight from a hospital bed and Mikey’s parents went up on charges. Pummeled by they like a punching bag, the authorities said; starved by they like a fever; half the normal size of a three-year-old; he grinning sheepishly, wishing only to please; he a criminal in circumstance, albeit an unwitting one and yet a criminal nonetheless. Parliadge became incensed by the grin. He waved the stick.

“You by your demeanor are admitting to being a compromised child of want, a taker with nothing to give in return.”

The smile encompassing the whole of the child’s face faltered. Although Parliadge shifted his attention and moved on, giant teardrops rolled off Mikey’s cheeks and splashed on the parquet flooring. He looked with futility for a sympathetic face.

At the same moment, everyone’s attention became diverted by the infusion into the room of Ms. Screwnie Jones, shepherding the twins. Mikey broke ranks and ran straight into Missy’s arms, hugging her, openly bawling. The startled girl immediately began comforting him.

Jane, an inconsequential person in the eyes of all, attempted to disengage them.

Screwnie, smiling through ratty teeth, hailed Parliadge with great familiarity.

“I hesitated to bring these to you, you having twelve, but I also remembered your saying, ’How many is too many?’ So, here’s Esther and Minnie.

“Girls, you are lucky to be given a home so warm, so nice, as this one is. And lucky you are to be given a parent figure so caring, so understanding of the unloved unwanted children, as you are and as Mr. Parliadge is, respectively speaking. It is a truism, is it not, Mr. Parliadge, that grateful is a term for what they should be expressing?”

“It is, Ma’am.”

“And what do we say to this fine gentleman, and dear Mrs. Parliadge, for giving so much kindness?”

The diminutive sisters hid their faces, striving to sink into the Earth and be removed from the goodness of these benefactors. But no way it was going to happen. Missy choked on her sobs. Evie seemed carved of chalk, slightly blue at the edges.

“Be polite and greet your foster parents. Say, ’Pleased to meet you.’ You must -”

And she slipped a hand beneath the chin of the blue-edged waif and tilted her face until her eyes must meet those of Nope Parliadge, behind whose smiling features lurked an insidiousness born of that hard fundamentalism that never yields, even at the tender moment.

“Easy, Ms. Jones,” Parliadge cautioned, discovering the look of sickness about the creature. “You have not brought disease upon us have you?”

“Why, no. I would be devastated if you really thought I could be guilty of an action so thoughtless. I would be humiliated and embarrassed.”

“But, look at her.”

Evie made a strangling sound. Without further warning, she swooned.

“She hasn’t took her medicine!” Missy shouted.

“Medicine?”

In her haste to take possession of the twins, Screwnie had neglected to check on medical histories. She kneeled over the senseless body until she detected a pulse. She looked to Parliadge for help.

“Do you know CPR?”

“No. I - Do you?”

“I - I - I -”

“I know how,” Missy said, shoving past Screwnie.

Working slowly, methodically, she brought life back into the nearly dead body of her sister.

Parliadge ordered Jane to call an ambulance immediately.

“Hurry, else they might not save her.”

By ordering Jane as one instructs the incompetent, he was rewarded, as is always the case, with incompetence. In a dither, she moved close to the phone, then looked helplessly at him, the puppet awaiting the hand of the string-master.

Parliadge brushed Jane to the side. He snatched the phone and made the call himself.

“Wait by the door to let them in,” he commanded.

Jane meekly stood by the door until the paramedics arrived.

“Parden our mess …” she began.

They stepped around Jane, discovering the child lying across Missy’s lap, she stroking her hair. They took over and shortly placed her in the rescue truck for delivery to the children’s hospital.

Missy, restrained from going along, stood alone in the aftermath. She had faith in the medical establishment; surely Evie was going to survive.

She did not protest when Jane led her by the arm into an austere little room. She sat upon one of two beds, hardly aware that the outside lock clicked behind her. She pondered and worried, finding strength in knowing that somehow soon Mom and Dad would be together and they would come and would be like rescuing angels of the kind in Sunday School lessons. She and they and Evie would walk away together in sunshine-filled happiness.

How lucky she could not witness the events taking place inside the retreating truck. The paramedics were not able to gain any ground in the battle to save her sister’s life.

“It’s time to pray for her,” said one to the other.

Chapter Eleven

No other eating establishment the whole of Capricorn Lane had a reputation to equal Billy Dupin’s. His was a low sprawling architecture affording positioning of tables in just the right mix of coziness and sociability to make it the place of choice. Succulent chops, juicy porterhouses, crispy salads, enticed the discerning diner to return. It was a vibrant atmosphere of savory food smells and exuberant conversations, to muted strains of recorded music.

The great feeding area was located between the kitchen and a series of alcoves, each capable of serving forty appetites. On this day every chair had been taken. No one noticed the skulking figure waiting to be seated.

Stony’s malevolent stares and muttered complaints availed nothing. He asked to speak with the manager.

Billy Dupin graciously heard the complaints, his mustachioed grin unwavering before the withering volley of nasty comments and insults. His professionalism broke down when Stony pressed four one hundred dollar bills in his palm.

“Sir, I will have you sitting in two minutes.”

“Make it one and there’s another hundred in it for you.”

Billy Dupin ran to the kitchen, shouting, “Orlando! Orlando! I need you quick!”

Orlando Sanchez, a waiter, joined him to drag a table to the center of the floor. The fawning restaurateur pulled Stony over, his hand discreetly open to receive the other bill. Stony looked up from his menu.

“That’ll be all.”

“Sir, our little agreement …”

“Oh, that. Well, I see by my watch it’s been over two minutes. I can’t reward you for incompetence. Sorry.”

“But -”

A professional, his mustachioed grin returned.

“Thank you, sir. Orlando, give this man anything he wants. Anything.”

Orlando bowed.

“Something to drink, sir?”

“Wassail.”

“Pardon, sir? Wassail? We don’t have it.”

“Hot tea, then. And apples. Bring me some baked apples.”

“We don‘t serve baked apples. If you just will look at the menu.”

“Two baked apples.”

“Sir -”

“Baked apples.”

“Oh, I suppose we could get the chef to prepare some golden ones. Would you like to try that?”

“Just get me some. Where’s my tea?”

“Right away, sir.”

Orlando bustled off, leaving Stony staring and frowning at patrons seated around him.

“Waiter! Waiter!” he cried petulantly.

Orlando wheeled, midway to the kitchen.

“Waiter, that woman’s staring at me.”

The harried waiter glanced at the woman indicated.

“Well, she appears to be minding her own business now, sir.”

“Is this any way to dress for work? You are serving the public. Put on a hairnet, gloves, mask. Don’t serve another thing until you do.”

“Sir, I don’t intend wearing those things.”

“Perhaps you had best call in the manager then.”

“You leave me no choice.”

* * *

Ebenezer’s ghost held its head in its hands, emitting frequent little groans. Seated across the table, the great doe eyes of Santa Claus took in the antics across the room. He felt empathy for the man and was in fact prepared to devote the rest of Stony’s life, if that was what it took, to the task of liberating his good side, the part locked so in misery and self-hate it would bring the world to heal before giving in to love. The ghost lifted its head to speak.

“Look at him make a spectacle, bristling with contempt, proudly sporting the crown proclaiming him ‘Most Unloved of Humans.’”

Santa nodded.

“But, you know what? I feel that Stony is in more dire need of a hug than any man that ever lived. After all, he has been deprived from childhood until now.”

They debated the pros and cons relative to a tortured childhood as it affects adulthood. Santa pleaded for charity. The ghost took a conservative tack.

“A hard childhood must be overcome in the maturing stage of life,” it said. “Stony is nearly forty. By now the brutality he experienced when very young should be a harsh memory of the past, not a mire in which to wallow the rest of his life. Nothing of the present seems to touch him. He strikes out from childhood at the future.”

“Ah, but my point is, not just a hug; not from just anyone. Love’s hug.”

“So, what you are saying is, ’Stony rejects the world because the world seemingly rejects him. But, if the right woman offers true love, his resistance might simply melt away.’ Tell me, is there such a woman …?”

Their eyes met. They smiled.

Meanwhile, an angry Billy Dupin remonstrated with the subject in question.

“Why don’t you please go? I give you everything free, plus your four hundred dollars. You don’t have to make my waiter cry.”

“Easy, buddy. Relax; live. I’m prepared to pay Orlando five hundred dollars to slide on his belly across my table. Get him out here.”

“Now you make me cry. I call somebody who make you cry. The police. I give you ten seconds to get out of here.”

The cellphone in the restaurant owner’s hands convinced Stony he should take his act out on the road. Santa fell in, walking him to the taxi outside.

“Where’s the old ghost?” Stony quipped. “Too tired to keep up?”

Santa’s eyes were a-twinkle.

“Where to?”

“I think I’ll go home. Too much merriment for a December 24th.”

Through the bustle of holiday traffic, they crawled. Santa furtively scanned the milling pedestrians. As they crossed K Avenue, he distinguished the 19th Century dress of Ebenezer Scrooge. The spirit signaled him to take his turn at the next block.

Down a virtually deserted side street, a woman sprawled over a steel grate. Her head was turned just so that a smattering of freckles about a pug nose showed beneath her blazing red hair.

The taxi halted with a jolt.

“Oh, my,” Santa exclaimed, beginning to haul his considerable girth from behind the wheel.

He lifted the woman off the wind raked sidewalk, cradling her. She lost her grip on a busted purse string, sighed, and breathed no more. Santa looked over his shoulder.

“Please help us, Stony.”

“Why? It’s just another trick.”

“You know CPR. Please. Each second decreases her chance of survival.”

“Do it yourself, know-it-all.”

“I am not mortal, with breath to breath into her. She will not survive without you.”

Stony slammed the door.

“Get this over with,” he muttered.

He marched up to her and went to his knees. His mouth approached hers, then hesitated. That she was handsome was not lost on him.

Such lips, parted, ripe, succulent …

“Now, Stony, before she slips away.”

He placed his mouth on hers. Shortly, she stirred. Stony jumped, as if viper-bitten, wiping away the taste on his sleeve.

As Santa helped her to stand, Stony returned to the cab.

“My medicine fell through the grate when my purse broke open. I tried to reach it. I was dying …”

She looked for Stony.

“I want to thank him.”

“Do you still want the medicine? I could fetch it for you.” Santa said helpfully.

“Well, no. Strange as it seems, I don’t need it. I feel okay. In fact, I feel wonderful.”

“Let me drive you home, Miss -?”

“Derry O‘Flynn.”

Her perfume flavored the air as she slipped in next to Stony. He scowled out the opposite window, acutely aware of her activity, organizing the purse and finding a mirror and comb.

“This must be terribly inconvenient for you,” she said, stroking at the red tangles. “I am so sorry.”

Stony inhaled a lung-full of perfume that choked off his reply.

“You saved my life. Thank you so much.”

He sat back, experiencing a giddiness threatening to rise in his craw and disgorge four decades of bitter gall. He was astonished, awe-stricken even, that the taste of her lips still lingered on his. His hooded eyes met hers. He saw green, oceans of green, worlds of green, his head in a territory he had never visited nor allowed himself to dream of. The hatred and resentment he had always felt for women began melting away. His soul

lightened but an iota, yet it was enough to induce euphoria. Riddled with shock and self-doubt, he felt himself falling totally, foolishly, in love.

With his intelligence so short-circuited, he could not speak, though she smiled encouragingly. Hers was a smile that said “Hi” in a way that conveyed more than simple words convey. She was no wallflower and she recognized the signs Stony displayed. There was no denying her returned attraction. There crystallized, all in an instant, undying love, reciprocated.

Chapter Twelve

Christmas in a jail cell. Jack Spruce lounged atop his rack, ticking off lists of potential victims and enemies, smiling at each torturous thought. And yet the holiday lingered at the back of his mind. By degrees he abandoned the scheming, taken to musing about past seasons, often spent alone, rarely in the company of friends or family. Could it be; he moped, sitting on the edge of the bed. He of the sprightly disposition took it on himself to be seared by the gaping loss inside. As to why, he had no clue.

He had been about to give it up, sleep the day away when Edwin crossed the cell and in a true Christmas spirit wished with all his heart that Jack would experience this day as a time of peace, love, and worship.

Stunned, he felt the tears working.

He studied Edwin with new-found respect.

Here, he pondered, is a soul with all the travails next to Job, on a mission to cheer me instead of getting angry. What a man this is.

That selfless act disarmed young Spruce. He felt like sharing with someone.

“My Christmas growing up,” he volunteered, “was a miserable affair. Dad said, ’I was never allowed Christmas; I don’t see why the boy ought to be raised differently.’ He didn’t make a lot of money and he spent it selfishly, while Mom and I did without. That’s how come I took to stealing. My first bust, I got caught pinching pop bottles from old man Green’s store and selling ‘em back to him.”

“Didn’t you know it was wrong?”

“Maybe I did. I don’t know. Good. Bad. What’s it to a poor kid prowling the streets while other kids go to school?”

“Does your conscience bother you that acts of criminality hurt the innocent?”

“I never thought much about it. I enjoy running games on people. So they get hurt. They can learn to live with it, same as me. Look; I could be your friend today and rob you blind tonight. Becoming attached is a sucker’s game. I wish I had a cigarette.”

Edwin clucked a moment.

“I wish you could have been with me, growing up in England. We were from the country, a fair distance out of London. We had the best Christmases. It was not about gifts, but being family. My father, G/d rest his soul, made each day of the season an event. Do you mind my telling about it?”

“Suit yourself. We aren’t going anywhere.”

Jack became enthralled as Edwin regaled with stories of Christmases in England and later the United States, his portraits of Agnes, Evie, Missy, Stephanie and even Mr. Snuggly, during those magical times. When the last sleigh bell had jingled and the final gift unwrapped, he longed for more. He felt as though he were experiencing Christmas for the first time.

That night he took to his bed, face to the wall, with visions of sugarplums dancing in his head, so to speak.

He awoke to the rattling of keys and the clank of the door opening.

“Spruce,” the officer barked.

It was his call to go.

He sprung to his feet, eager to take up the life so abruptly interrupted by the law. Grabbing his shoes, he paused beside Edwin huddled on his cold bed.

“This is it, friend.”

“Jack, have a good life.”

“Where do you live? I could help you.”

“Seventeen Cobble Way, Brimblestone Apartments. My wife is Agnes and my sister is Stephanie.”

They shook hands.

“Good-bye.”

“Jack; listen to me. The universe has its dark side, life from inert matter. Injustice strives to overcome us. We commit little crimes, whether we are good or bad. Some children get lost in the shuffle at Christmas. But, the striving to overcome, that’s what makes us human beings.”

“Thank you, Edwin. Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas.”

And he spurted from the system, to regain his car. Once in the traffic, a sudden big grin came upon his face.

Why not? I’d be a fool if I didn’t burglarize him. He makes it too easy.

He tooled his way across town in his sleek convertible, searching for the apartments on Cobble Way.

He presently knocked on Edwin’s door and he whistled a cheery tune as he waited. There ensued a long pause before it cracked open. An elongated rectangle of light illumined the anguished face of Stephanie Bloom.

“Edwin? Is that you?”

He thrust himself forward.

“Merry Christmas, Miss Stephanie. Jack Spruce is the name. I have just left Ed’s side. He is in jail, you know. He wants to find out why no one answers the phone or looks after his whereabouts. Is his wife in? Where is Agnes?”

Distrustful of Jack’s weasel-like demeanor, she nevertheless felt obliged to invite him in.

His eyes moved in their little turrets, scanning everything in the room. They barely acknowledged the untidy signs of struggle: furniture knocked about, papers scattered, phone wire ripped out of the wall, lamp kicked under a table, for he was cataloging booty for later in the night. He felt slightly uncomfortable discovering the eye of Mr. Snuggly beaded upon him. He repeated the last-asked question.

“Where is Agnes?”

“She’s gone and not returning.”

“The children?”

“Gone too. Kidnapped by that woman. Wait; I have Agnes’s note around here.”

Stephanie searched hopelessly, the drive of her motions becoming aimlessly futile.

Pretending to help her look, he chanced to pick up the brown envelope from the table by the door. He lifted the unsealed flap and withdrew a check. He gasped. Four hundred thousand dollars signed but blank on the “pay to” line! He furtively slipped it in his pocket.

When Stephanie actually did produce the note he snatched it away.

“I will show it to Ed in his cell,” he said.

“Will Edwin be coming back soon? Mr. Snuggly and I are quite alone. We don’t know what to do.”

“Who is Mr. Snuggly?”

“I’m so sorry. I forgot to introduce you. Mr. Snuggly, Mr. Jack Spratt.”

“Spruce.”

He looked about, wondering if the friend might be invisible. Then he caught her drift, recognizing the stuffed bunny with the baleful one eye.

“Snuggly, huh? Look, it’s been nice; I have business to attend. Good day, Miss Bloom.”

The door closing seemed to signal the last ray of hope getting strangled. She somehow knew Jack had no intent to help out.

“Oh, dear,” she said to the bunny.

She waited for its tears to start falling.

Chapter Thirteen

On the stand near the bed were a stack of tattered books. Missy had selected Little Women, a long time favorite of hers. A dozen leafs into the reading, Screwnie Jones, Nope Parliadge and Jane Parliadge filed into her room. She afforded them a perfunctory glance then turned away, finding it painful to engage such aliens as she perceived these to be. She attempted to slide deeper into the novel and be hidden in its pages.

Screwnie plucked the volume from her fingers and pitched it atop the pile.

Missy coldly looked these people over. What do they want?

Her ears were shut to the creatures.

Screwnie’s mouth worked; she therefore spoke, but she could not fathom what the verminous-faced woman said. She stayed passive even as her shoulders were seized and shaken.

Her gaze traveled from one visitor to the other. Her plane of consciousness and theirs simply did not connect. She only waited to resume the story of Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy and thus felt rather than witnessed their departure. The instant they vanished, she reached for her story and rescanned the last lines. But the battered tome now seemed empty. Instead of re-immersing herself in the girl’s adventures she imagined how Evie must be faring at the hands of the doctors. She had to believe her sister would soon be returned to her, restored if not wholly well.

But Evie fared not well, I shudder to report. Her tale is much too pitiable. It would offend the reader’s sensibilities beyond measure were it fully reported. Suffice to say, she did rather worse than poorly.

Something of her condition must have communicated itself to her mother in exile. It or something else made Agnes buy another ticket and return to the airport. She understood by now that pacts with the devil benefit only he. Had she taken the time to thoroughly examine Stony’s proposition in the first place, it is certain she would not have participated. She now felt Providence would provide for the family, it was so blessed. Poor brave Edwin for putting up with one such as me.

* * *

Edwin, as prior noted, was philosophical. Being thus enabled him to face up to the tribulations much more stoically than ones given to crass emotionalism or self-pity. He adjusted to life in a cell, knowing he would eventually be freed. He had every faith that Spruce would come through with some form of help.

Even so, it was with a mild jolt he heard the door get unlocked and the officer call his name.

He toddled into the sunlight, blinking gratefully in its beneficence, sucking in gusts of fresh air. Looking more rumpled than ever, but spirit intact, he felt prepared to triumph in the struggle ahead.

He seized Jack’s hand in an emotional gesture.

“You remembered me.”

Jack could not meet his eyes.

“Well, yeah - I - Ed, I -”

He disengaged his hand, reaching into his shirt. He handed the check to Edwin, who gingerly pinched it between a thumb and forefinger, as if it were radioactive.

“Where did you get this?”

“I stole it from you.”

“You did?”

“I went to your apartment, Stephanie wasn’t looking, and I took it.”

“That swine, Molebanner, placed it in my home.”

“Yeah. I don’t know how anything ties together; Agnes, the children, they are gone.”

“Gone? Where?”

“There’s this note.”

Edwin crumpled the note after reading it. Jack found his friend’s steely look unnerving.

“Thank you for being a man in the situation, Jack. I am indebted to you.”

“Where do you need to go, old buddy? I have a car at your disposal.”

“We shall start at my apartment. I must speak with Stephanie as well as get cleaned up.”

Coming down the marble steps, following the gray sidewalk up the block, Jack told the story of his visit to Edwin’s home. His language was terse, unsparing of himself, full of livid detail.

“I am sorry,” he concluded. “Temporarily, I forgot the things knowing you has taught me.”

As they climbed into the topless car, Jack was a fount of observation and commentary, until Edwin interrupted him.

“I have much to ingest, only a little time to plan. On the one hand I must prepare to do battle against the bureaucracy. On the other I’ve got to have Agnes here helping me. In either endeavor I cannot fail due to lack of insight. Indulge me a silence, will you?”

“Do you mean for me to button my trap?”

“I do.”

“Why didn’t you just say so?”

The wisp of a car moved in zephyr-fashion across the city. When it came into Edwin’s neighborhood, it became shadowed by a yellow taxicab, triggering Jack’s street-smarts to take evasive routes several blocks out of the way. He lost the cab, then came on Cobble Way. As he turned into the parking lot they discovered the same vehicle unloading right before Edwin’s door.

He pulled into a recess partially obscured by some shrubs. From that vantage point they observed an attractive woman paying off the driver. Edwin emerged from his reverie, his mouth agape, trying to extricate himself from the sports car, which just now appeared to be wrapped around him. He tore free, his toddling steps a cartoon of running as he approached the unaware flower of creation now on the stoop, fumbling for her key.

“Agnes! My love! Agnes!”

Becoming aware of the commotion, she looked around. Her lips parted. Her already moist eyes flowed.

* * *

Screwnie would not be denied. She held Missy’s shoulders, speaking as loudly as she could, short of screaming.

“She’s passed. Your sister has expired.”

These and similar missives were delivered until Missy suddenly snapped to awareness. She jerked away.

“No! You killed her!”

Like a mad streak she left the room, ducking under the outstretched arms of Nope Parliadge in the hallway. She flipped the deadbolt and gained the outer yard. The street’s the place to get caught! There! The heavy underbrush! She burrowed like an animal through the thick branches, quickly swallowed in the jungle surrounding three quarters of the mansion grounds.

Her crawling brought her to a spot of soft earth covered with moss, near the heart of the growth. She lay face down, head in her arms, sobbing hysterically. Hearing the searchers’ attempts to crash into the sanctuary, she became still. The voice of Nope Parliadge counseled the group.

“No need to thrash about, as we’d never find her. Just wait. Time and hunger will drive her into the house. Come. We have to plan our presentation to the authorities. There’s the challenge facing us, my dears.”

Chapter Fourteen

Derry O’Flynn slipped into her efficiency apartment, gently shutting Stony out. She inhaled delicate rose fragrance, the flower his Christmas gift to her. Filling a soda bottle with water, she put in the stem and set it on the dining table.

She thought him utterly divine. Diminutive, stooped, mild-eyed, wispy haired, so sincere in his pleading/demanding way; all this but a frame for the noble being within. She read in him an extremely reserved, even shy, sort of person, not guessing that he evaded nearly all personal facts about himself because fearing the truth would end what promised to be a good love story.

Parting was bittersweet, with she partaking the sweet, he partaking the bitter.

I’ve got to undo all my handiwork concerning the Bloom family and do it now.

He stormed up the street, looking for all the world like the Stony of old, having all the fury of a boiling cauldron. He came on the wind-whipped corner of Fortieth at Leems, looking hopelessly about.

“Beggar Bill,” he bellowed. “Beggar Bill.”

Not a remnant of the indigent remained, for Beggar Bill, anticipating one or the other of his tormentors’ return, had relocated. The bundles of money lay in an evidence locker at the police station. He only wanted life to go on as before.

For long minutes Stony stood amongst the desolation, looking up and down the streets. Swirls of wind played maliciously, lifting leaves and trash in the air, whipping grit in his eyes.

Time was of essence; if it did not cooperate, he surely would fail. He looked for his moral guardians. The one time he wished for them they were absent.

It was off by foot, then, to bail out Edwin.

The bitter winds had not dissuaded the swelling crowds of after-Christmas shoppers. If anything it goaded them to greater milling, a propensity to close every gap before the stormy little guy threaded a path through them. He took to shouldering his way ahead.

“The stupid sidewalks are for traveling, not impeding the ones with places to go,” he said crossly.

In reply to startled expressions he redoubled the force of his efforts to break through.

When at last he’d gotten free, he nearly stepped over one small girl who had the audacity to squeak, ever so sweetly, “Merry Christmas, mister.”

“You simpering wretch. Be gone with you.”

Within minutes he scaled the marble steps, already waving a fistful of cash.

“Bail money for Edwin Bloom,” he said , bursting through the door.

In agonizing slow motion the desk officer looked up from his crossword puzzle, removed his glasses, wiping them with a hankerchief. His forehead wore wrinkles all the way up his bald pate. The gentle look he fixed on Stony was not unfriendly.

“He-yup.” He cleared his throat. “That one’s, a, gone.”

Stony’s groan accompanied him into the street, where he hailed a cab.

“Brimblestone Apartments.”

* * *

On the way to the door at Cobble Way, Stony prepared himself to be contrite. He felt he ought to apologize, beg forgiveness and volunteer to help them “make it right.” But, standing below the stoop, reflecting, he backtracked, second-guessing the resolve until he at last concluded that he actually bore little guilt in the matter. After all, beyond the scheming, did not the greatest good emerge? My check undoubtedly will save Evie’s life. In essence, a benefactor is what I am. Hah!

He rapped a staccato beat on the door then, fully prepared to take his bow. He whistled a jaunty air, waiting there.

It was a haggard, red-eyed Edwin Bloom that answered, a hollow shell of the man, really. He clutched Mr. Snuggly tightly in his arms. At the sight of murderer Molebanner at his entrance, sorrow morphed into a blackened rage.

“Have you come to have your final laugh? Is it not enough to know you have finished her? Evil, low …”

He saw the tearstained face of Agnes, there to lead Edwin away.

“Come,” she soothed, as if to a baby. “Come with me. There, dear.”

Before being shut out, he saw Edwin disolve into tears, his bulk quaking, his voice an orchestra of piteous groans. He waited uncertainly. As he had not presented his case the first time, he debated whether to rap again.

He was startled to have Jack Spruce suddenly in his face, clutching at his collar.

“Molebanner; they will go in the morning to identify their dead child to the authorities. I advise you to keep as far from these premises as you possibly can. He is calm now, but who knows how he may turn after viewing little Evie?”

“I came to make amends. I thought my money -”

“’Thought your money.’ Can it give back an innocent life? And his second daughter who‘s missing?”

“But, I - The children -”

“Don’t say another word.” Jack relinquished the hold on Stony’s shirt. “Just, don’t.”

He heard like an explosion the thunk of the deadbolt getting violently slammed into the locking position. Stony slunk off, arguing, justifying himself. There is one thing for certain. I do not intend carrying a burden of guilt to a crime I did not commit. The child was hopelessly ill in the beginning. If I bear any blame at all, it would be the playing of a harmless prank. Go blame the doctors. I can’t be held responsible for their mistakes.

Derry; dear Derry. She’s lost to me now.

He cursed Christmas with all his heart.

Going around a corner, he ran smack into Santa Claus. The ghost at the fat one’s side stepped forward to speak.

“Ho, Molebanner. What do you have to say for yourself?”

Never had the spirit’s distaste for Stony been so evident.

“I never intended it. I just wanted to even the score with her father.”

“No, you set out to destroy a family. Congratulations. You have succeeded. My friend here feels great empathy. I, on the other hand, control this project. It is for myself to make a decision to pull the plug on it.”

Stony sniffed.

“Pull it then.”

“Derry also is dead. Ah. I see that one struck at least a glancing blow. Actually, she was dead moments before you bent over to resuscitate her. We intervened. She revived, just temporarily. Now our project ends with failure, she resumes her death. Good-bye, Stony. I wish I may tell you I have enjoyed knowing you, but I make a pitiable liar. Come, Santa, my reluctant friend. It is over.”

“Wait,” Santa objected. “Why must this man be denied his second chance, the sort of chance Scrooge obtained, where he woke up, as from a dream and started over?”

The ghost frowned impatiently.

“Out of the question. There is no budge in the man, no remorse. He pities not the victims, but cries for himself..”

“I thought - It seemed implied -”

“Hardly, Santa. This one’s incorrigible.”

“Then, what is the point of this exercise if he cannot be afforded a fresh opportunity? Who is to say he would not do the right thing the second time around?”

The old specter sighed.

“He would not be acting from enlightenment. No, he was never peomised that. He was cautioned to change his heart, which is the same bargain we each get daily. Anyway, my supervisor will not allow it.”

“But, Evie; Derry! Their lives are forfeit.”

“True. The tragedy Stony wrought lives beyond his personal welfare, one of life’s unresolved injustices. On the higher plane, young as she was, the child has earned her redemption. The same is true of Derry. If each had lived one hundred years, the disposition would be the same.”

The curtain of finality crossed the stage, so to speak. The spirit and gift-giver were lifted from the scene. Ebenezer Scrooge’s ghost raged on a wind, sent off to another region. Santa simply vanished.

Stony shouted at the empty space before him.

“What kind of beasts are you, keeping these innocent lives? What makes your crime less than mine?”

He defiantly promised that, given the opportunity, he would make the spirit pay dearly for this.

Chapter Fifteen

But of course ghosts rarely if ever have to pay. The one which had been Scrooge blithely slid into a next project, too busy to mope over Stony’s lost soul. Curiously, one no less busy than that phantasm brooded over a door perhaps shut too quickly - he who labored tirelessly to make Christmas seem to spontaneously occur.

How neat if the season could thrive all the year, in every heart, he pondered. Then I could retire.

Lately it seemed there were more folks in need of the spirit than ever before. He found many of the new edition humans difficult to connect with. To him, Stony represented a trend quite troublesome. Often he managed to bury his doubt beneath mountains of work. Still -

“Pumpkinpulp, where is my report on Stony Molebanner?” he demanded all too frequently.

“Molebanner Molebanner Molebanner Molebanner. What is so all-fired urgent? He stays the same, hour after hour, like a beetle trapped in a jar.”

He trotted in one of thirty elfin spies, who essentially reiterated the boss’s opinion.

“He now spends his time before a personal computer, randomly surfing the internet. That’s a cut better than the phase where he watched bloodthirsty movies all day long. He orders sumptuous meals, taken in solitude. He’s become a hermit in every sense of the word. If he thinks about Evie, Derry and Missy, there is no sign.”

“Hasn’t visited the gravesite ever,” Santa sighed. “Or mounted a search attempt for Missy.”

Pumpkinpulp snorted.

“If you want any more updates, sugar.”

The old elf worried this obsession could harm Christmas. He furtively kept an eye on Santa, convinced he was allowing compassion to overload common sense.

* * *

One day, with the new season arriving, Santa engaged to count and sort thousands of gumballs. He was mildly surprised, not particularly amused, to behold the visage of Scrooge’s ghost on the wall, like a mounted moose head.

“Big news,” it said. “Concerning Molebanner.”

“Six hundred fifty-six thousand one. Do we need my taxi? Six hundred fifty-six thousand two.”

“Not necessary. Wrap up the loose ends here and we can zip right over.”

“ I know you would not spare further time on Stony unless there were some new equation in the works, some cause for optimism. There are simply too many other Christmas criminals out there. Six hun - Drat; I’ve lost the count.”

* * *

Stony the mole lived in his hole … in his inner sanctum, insulated in a timeless world, he and his PC. He gave up realms of precious sleep lost in the worlds of the internet. He loved the PC. Theirs was a relationship more tangled than the computer-ignorant might imagine. The machine had become a being, giving its all without complaint, the friend he never had.

And so, true to his word, having bought comfort and companionship, he was now getting an early start on being alone in the grave. After nearly twenty hours of typing commands, sliding the mouse, blinking his weakening peepers, it was with an unbearable, almost physical pain the little hermit saw a face in the computer screen coming eyes first, then squeezing out, a whole face, head, neck, shoulders - On and on it came.

“No, you blasted - You are not wanted here.”

“Nevertheless, friend.”

The spirit derived some morsel of satisfaction regarding Stony’s discomfiture. It stood back, allowing Santa’s considerable girth to invade next through the screen. It thought it detected some small flow of eagerness in Stony recognizing the stout figure bouncing before him, effervescing, “My friend, how are you?”

Stony quickly trained his gaze to the floor.

“We have got some news,” the portly one reported.

“Tricks and lies.”

“I am not all that sure what it means,” Santa admitted.

He was overridden by the ghost.

“Evie and Derry are not in Heaven. There is no word on Missy. Workmen cut the entire wood around that mansion. She was not there. It is conjectured a wild animal may have gotten her and dragged her away.”

“Your pockets are full of pinballs. If anybody made it there they did.”

“It’s the truth, Stony,” Santa insisted.”The records bear no listing of any of them. They might be detained in Limbo, or, highly unlikely, Hell. There is precious else it might be.”

“I’m not buying this. The both of you get out of here.”

The spirit repositioned itself, putting Stony between it and Santa.

“You know what?” it casually remarked. “It’s time to use some muscle on this jerk.”

They lifted Stony in his chair, treating him as they would a basket of apples to be dumped. Stony pitched forward, tumbling not in the lush carpet, but a patch of wounded Earth. He felt instantly damp and cold. There were graves around him, unkempt, many with no permanent markers.

“I recognize the pauper’s cemetery. Why have you brought me here?” he protested.

The specter had abandoned its traditional face, projecting insubstantial features and icy orbs. Santa distanced himself, allowing his partner space to work.

On getting no reply, Stony took to examining some newer additions, being drawn curiously to one in particular.

“And who rests here?”

“She.”

He sighed, being tired of the games these delusionary images played on him.

“Whom you pretend to have loved.”

“Why is there nothing inscribed to her remembrance?”

“Of the few that knew her, none apparently cared that much. Her legacy: come and gone. She might never have existed, in human terms.”

“She was a lovely, feeling, caring person. How could anyone not love Derry?”

“As is the way with many like her, only hollow relationships occurred. There was nothing to build upon. Need I remind you of her final experience with love?”

“That was a cheap shot.”

“Stony, I am trying to provoke in you a human response, some tenderness shot into the vitals of anyone but yourself.”

“I want to go home. You have no right to keep me here.”

“We are going to leave you alone in the cemetery. When we return, your fate will be sealed. I pity you the judgement.”

Santa interjected, his the voice of one betrayed.

“What do you mean?”

“Have you ever witnessed a living man dragged off to Hell?”

“I won’t stand for this.”

“You will. It is the boss’s orders.”

“Then, under protest.”

The ghost made a slight bow to Stony.

“We will be right back.”

As they faded, Stony made his way to the high wrought iron gate, speaking with bravado as he went.

“Chumps. Think they can drag me off to Hell. I don’t believe in it. I don’t accept anything they stand for.”

He expected to pass through to Federal Street, but the entrance was closed and the fence could not be scaled.

They won’t keep me here forever. I just need to wait them out.

He walked the rows, observing the occasional plastic flower, a few odd tokens. Mostly, these lives seemed cast aside, like so much offal. He was drawn to a small oasis of brightness near the paying customers’ end. There was an immaculately cared for grave, decorated with home-made remembrances, such as pictures on construction paper, a sprig of pine with ornaments and a modest marker. The inscription made Stony’s eyes smart. IN HEAVEN REST, OUR LITTLE EVIE. He turned away, cursing.

“But I love you, Uncle Stony,” a voice, hers, seemed to speak just as it did in the early days, before Edwin - before he -

Stony moved quickly along, shunting the girl from his thoughts.

I won’t listen. I don’t have to hear.

A far-off cathedral bell rang slowly as he gloomily returned to Derry’s grave and sat down beside it. Solace. Solace he sought from being near. Here was love. They conspired to take her away from me. The more he thought of her the more he tried to conjure her face, but could recall none of the features. Perhaps because of her essence so trapped, perhaps because he had been too self-involved to truly have seen her, access was denied. Stony regretted to be unable to feel anything at all, as though his heart were made of leather. Yet, he seemed incapable of change.

Let them come. I defy them -

A sound interrupted the reverie, the noise of animals vying for a single prize.

He crept near. The unkempt village of the dead had outgrowths of brush. The snarling and snapping came from the near one. He peeked and saw two silver wolves, what appeared to be the body of a young girl.

A-a-a-a-a!” he shouted, charging the beasts, prepared to do battle if necessary.

White fangs, slavering jowls, eyes white with hatred confronted him. He drove a fist into the nose of one, rather through the fading snout. Whirled around. They were vanishing; likewise the prey.

He stumbled away, aware suddenly of the few hundred gravesites trembling.

“What do you want? I will do anything,” he bellowed. “You want remorse? I killed them. I am sorry. I wish they came back. I know you can’t need me. I don’t even have faith in you. I don’t believe in anything. Leave me to my fate.”

From the center of the field jutted a gnarled oak tree. He ran as one possessed, ripping from his waist a leather belt as he approached it.

* * *

“We don’t drag persons off to Hell,” the not-so-jolly fat man remonstrated.

“But we can make exceptions,” the ghost said adamantly.

“That’s like changing the rules in mid-game.”

“In two minutes flat, the Earth will erupt. A thousand minions from that place will flow like a river to surround our friend, engulfing him until he floats like a log into the raw crevasse. After, the Earth instantly heals its wound; a patch of flowers shall bloom out of season, lasting only until tonight’s impending snow storm arrives.”

So heated the discussion, it was quite by chance the specter glanced over the bone yard, catching its eye on the package from an oak limb dangling. It instantly became a knife edge, slicing Stony down.

Together, Santa and the spirit lay him on his back, coughing and breathing heavy, raspy breaths.

Bewildered by the turn of events, Scrooge’s ghost shouted in panic..

“It’s a matter of seconds. Has he changed enough to turn back the devil?”

In answer the ground rumbled like an earthquake of staggering proportions. Great chunks of it flew off to the sides to form a newly gaping chasm. Molten lava spewed into the sky. The promised demons danced out of the hole, wearing flames like clothing, Stony the focus of their attention.

“Save me. Save me,” Stony babbled, kicking his legs as they approached.

Santa Claus moved to shield him, was thrust aside by the sheer force of weight as Stony swept along in the current of the fiery river of the damned. The flow carried one and all into the pit. Seconds later, the slabs of rock and soil fell into place, sealing it over without a scar.

Spirit and fat man watched the last little seam healing over, pushing down the final bit of brimstone. It burped a cloud of gas, became serene.

Santa and the ghost looked at one another in horror. It had been a scene beyond their wildest imagining.

“Why? Why?” Santa pleaded, anguished.

The specter hung its head, as though ashamed.

The patch of flowers now blooming in an array of all the colors of nature did not console. They expressed only total failure.

“Well -” the ghost faltered.

“Don’t call me; I’ll call you,” Santa said as he turned to go.

There came a hissing out of the Earth, a giant spewing of air. Stony was spat in an arc into a bush upside down. Wisps of smoke emitted from his clothes and hair, his face blackened by soot.

“Take me. I deserve it,” he mumbled.

They hauled him out of the branches, still protesting the expulsion.

“Stony, you have done it. In a few short moments you will wake up in your old bed and it will be the day before you cashed the lottery ticket.”

“Will I remember anything?”

“You will have total recall for a month. After that, you are on your own.”

Chapter Sixteen

Edwin Bloom awoke and sat up in bed. He sympathized with Agnes on the other side of the mattress, trying to ignore time and and add a few winks. He arose and got the heater going for her. Next, he went into the kitchen to make the coffee, toddling afterward to the children’s room to stick his head in. Missy instantly arose.

“Is it time to get up, Dad? I want to make the breakfast this morning.”

“Good morning, dumplings,” he said cheerily. And to Missy, “Yes, you may cook. I should like to see the breakfast on the table at, mmm, seven oh six. Then there is time to clean up the kitchen afterward. Do you think we can manage that?”

“Certainly, if somebody else is going to wash the dishes this morning.”

“Oh, it is my turn. I intend doing my part.

Evie had yet to stir. She lay facing Mr. Snuggly.

“Little peach blossom,” he urged. “Time to be waking.”

“I am coming, Dad,” she sighed. “Dad?”

“Yes, peach blossom?”

“Say ‘Good morning’ to Mr. Snuggly.”

“Good morning, Mr. Snuggly. I daresay you are marvelous chipper so early, and not a drop of cocoa in you. I admire that in a bunny. Oh, you do, too? Well, come along. Bring Evie with you.”

As Edwin padded in his worn slippers toward the kitchen, a frenetic banging interrupted his morning rituals. He hurriedly answered the door, seeking to keep Agnes from getting disturbed by all the noise. He flung it wide, after the fashion of the innocently inclined, finding himself almost overwhelmed by an exuberant Stony Molebanner.

“Merry Christmas, Edwin! G/d bless us everyone.”

He pumped Edwin’s hand until he had to wrench it free.

“Merry Christmas, Stony. But, why -”

“Would a curmudgeon like me be so happy and full of the spirit? Ho ho ha ha ha ha. I love the season so, I had to get an early start to have time to praise it properly. Oh, my friend, I cannot begin to tell you how I appreciate the opportunity to come to you this way.”

“But -”

“But, I have something to return to you, something you lost and I found. Remember the lottery tickets the boss gave out the day before we got into trouble? I saw you drop yours and picked it up.”

“The lottery was held a few days ago, Stony. That ticket is worthless.”

Stony strutted about the room, waving the ticket high in the air. He became possessed of a dancing demon that had him flying about and jumping until his head almost bounced on the ceiling. His was an energy that had Edwin dizzy watching, until, at last, Stony presented him with the ticket.

“It is worth one hundred and twenty million dollars,” he said, wheezing.

He collapsed, laughing, on the floor, holding his aching sides, tears flooding from his eyes.

“I stole it,” he managed between belly-laughs. “Know what I am? A humbug. Just a

humbug. Oh! I’ve got to stand on my head the way he did.”

“The way who did?”

“Scrooge. Christmas Carol.”

Stony tumbled about like a gigantic beetle, oblivious that Agnes had come running to witness the madman.

She edged toward the phone, thinking to call for help, until Edwin stayed her hand.

“It’s all right,” he said. “Stony is simply having a good time.”

“Thank the Lord. I thought it would be necessary to subdue him.”

Edwin chortled at the notion of Agnes overpowering Stony.

“Ho ho. You’ve got an audience now.”

Stony sobered just slightly.

“I asure you I am all right. For the first time in my life I am. Where are the children? I want to see the children. We will turn somersaults and dance. Can I go get them?”

At the end of the hall, Missy had dressed for the day and was started for the kitchen when she heard the ruckus in the living room. It sounded as though her father were being attacked by a ferocious animal. She retreated to alert Evie.

“There’s a big monster in there; it’s fighting Dad, maybe killing him.”

“Let’s save him.”

They each grabbed a weapon, Missy a toy golf club, Evie a baseball bat. They then peeped into the hall. All at once it came bounding directly at them. The girls stood back, weapons poised. Evie devised the attack strategy.

“You whack its head. I will go for its knees.”

They no sooner took their positions than Stony’s head poked inside the room.

POK! WHACK!

He crashed to the floor, putting a painful carpet burn on his nose.

“It’s Uncle Stony,” cried Evie.

“Uncle Stony! We thought you were a monster.”

He rolled on his back, chuckling.

“And so I am. Kids, can you forgive me for the way I treated you before?”

To which the replies were, “Of course,” and “We love you, Uncle Stony.”

“What do you want for Christmas, Uncle Stony?” they wondered.

“I have mine already - friendship, love; most of all, forgiveness. I seek nothing more. Christmas lives in my heart and I have the rest of my life to celebrate it. I owe it all to your family, to Santa Claus and a very special ghost.”

“And yourself,” Edwin amended, standing at the doorway.

“If you were not a special person yourself, it would not have happened,” added Agnes, crowding beside her husband.

“Of course he’s special. He’s Uncle Stony,” Evie said with conviction.

“Amen,” everybody said at once, laughing.

* * *

For the rest of their lives they were to keep Christmas all three hundred sixty-five days of the year. Gentle reader, we come to the end to our tale.

What? “Incomplete,” you said?

Well, yes, you do have the right to know. There certainly are a good many loose threads concerning the rest of the players. In little nutshells, then, I shall explain what happened to them.

NOPE PARLIADGE. Saw his own soul in a mirror one day. It was gangrenous. He went off to a life of quiet contemplation and self examination.

JANE PARLIADGE. On her own, became resourceful, soon a successful business-woman.

MS. SCREWNIE JONES. Fell in with televangelists and gave her all to televised salvation.

“BEGGAR BILL” SCOTT. Begged an average ninety-five dollars per day. Invested it well and lived long and comfortably.

DERRY O‘FLYNN. Stony used his time of remembrance wisely. He came to her rescue; they wed shortly thereafter, to become proud parents of four children, all boys.

COREY. The orphan got adopted into a family of substance.

MIKEY POST. Discovered to have debilitating illness, giving a false appearance of parental abuse. His parents exonerated, Mikey moved home. Eventually cured. Grew to play college football, later the Police Chief.

THE OTHER FOSTER KIDS. Eventually returned to their parents in good circumstance.

MR. SNUGGLY. Sewn with new ears and eyes, remained with the family the rest of his days, quaffing warm cocoa, inseparable from his truest love, Evie.

JACK SPRUCE. Without Edwin’s saving influence, his progress was slow and torturous. Eventually adopted a new set of Explanations For Life. To wit, “Give all to love; do unto others, turn the other cheek; serve humankind; honor Christmas with all your heart.”

Merry Christmas, my friends. It is now truly

THE END

Free short stories and novelettes

Monday, October 26, 2020

WALKS OF PEACE

Saturday, October 17, 2020

The Pterodactyl

Don Quixote

Thursday, October 15, 2020

OLD TIGERS

Thursday, October 1, 2020

EBENEZER'S GHOST

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