He stood motionless for a long moment, shaking his head despondently. And as he stood there without the strength or spirit to move, two boys rounded the corner at a run and crashed into him.
They stopped, recovering their own balance, glaring down at him as if the collision had been his fault instead of their own. “Watch it, mister!” the first boy snapped.
“Look where you’re goin’,” his companion said sullenly. Neither one of them made any move to help an elderly man get to his feet.
The first boy looked Santa up and down, seeing his classic red suit and white beard, and his face twisted. “Hey, mister,” he sneered, “you oughta get yourself another outfit.” He waved his hand. “What do you want to dress up like that loser for?” The two boys started past him.
Catching his breath, Santa Claus called out, “Say, boys—”
They stopped, turning back with impatient faces. “Yeah?” the first boy asked.
“May I ask you something?” Santa said as pleasantly as he could manage. “What did you get this Christmas?”
“The puce pop, man!” the boy answered, his face lighting up. “The greatest!”
“I thought I’d never come down!” his friend shouted, balancing on one foot as he remembered walking on air.
Santa Claus searched their faces, seeing nothing but selfish satisfaction. Remembering what had made him begin giving his gifts on this special day, so long ago, he asked softly, “And what did you give this Christmas?”
The boys stared at him uncomprehendingly.
“What did we what?” the second boy asked.
“Give,” Santa said again.
“ ‘Give’?” The first boy turned to his pal, equally blank-faced. “What’s he talkin’ about?”
The second boy waved his hand, wiping away the question and the sight of the strange old man in the Santa suit along with it. “Who cares?” he said sourly.
They turned away and walked on again, leaving the formerly merriest man in the world looking the saddest, and feeling the loneliest.
Santa’s sleigh returned to its welcome berth at the North Pole at last, much to the relief of the worried elves and Santa’s worried wife. As Anya and Dooley stood together, watching the sleigh draw near through the twinkling darkness, they both noted silently how much more slowly it flew than it had ever flown in the past . . . as if the weary, disheartened reindeer were pulling the weight of the world behind them.
At last they came in for their tunnel landing, stumbling ungracefully with fatigue as they slid to a stop. Santa Claus climbed down from his seat, and Anya’s smile of relief faded; her heart pinched with pain as she saw his face. Plainly this night had gone even worse than he or they had feared. She wondered what could possibly have happened to make her cheerful, beaming Claus look as haggard and depressed as though he had aged a hundred years in a night.
She hurried to his side, with Dooley following, as Boog, Honka, and Vout rushed to tend the drooping reindeer. “Where were you?” she asked, her voice tremulous with concern.
“Out,” he answered flatly, his voice as dull as his gaze. He began to walk back toward their house without another word, forcing her to follow.
She caught at his arm. “What’s the matter?” she asked, trying to make him stop and look at her.
But his only answer was to wave his hand at her in a hopeless, despairing gesture that told her he did not want to talk about it. He went on alone, leaving her to stand rooted where she was, the elves standing beside her, equally perplexed. She glanced at Dooley, who could only meet her alarmed stare with his own.
Fourteen
B.Z. leaned easily against his raised desk, glancing around his crowded office at the B.Z. Toy Company. The large room was packed wall to wall with reporters, photographers, and television camera crews, all eager to get the story on the elf who had scooped Santa Claus—and his magnanimous sponsor. Patch stood uncomfortably beside B.Z., ready, he hoped, to meet his public face to face at last.
“Ask him anything, boys,” B.Z. said grandly, gesturing toward Patch.
The reporters crowded forward, their voices rising in a clamor, vying for attention. “Where do you come from?” someone shouted at Patch.
“Top of the world,” he said matter-of-factly, with an elf-conscious smile.
“That’s how we all feel today!” B.Z. cried expansively, flinging his arms wide. His Christmas campaign had been a greater success than even his greediest dreams. Lollipops that let kids walk on air! What a gimmick. It was sure-fire, if he did say so himself. The B.Z. Toy Company was hot again, and no longer in hot water. He had never felt more brilliant, or more self-satisfied. Just wait till next year . . .
“Do you work for this company?” another reporter asked Patch. The nature of their relationship was of the greatest interest to everyone in the room today.
“Currently I’m elf-employed,” Patch said, with a modest shrug. B.Z. glanced at him, and opened his mouth.
“What’s in those lollipops?” the reporter demanded like a hound on the trail of a suspicious scent.
“Only natural ingredients,” B.Z. snapped, hastily and defensively, before Patch could even begin an explanation. “No additives.” Even he didn’t know what the secret was, and he was damned if he was going to let anybody else find out. Patch had assured him that it was perfectly harmless, and it must have been, because he hadn’t heard anything to the contrary.
A third reporter said, grinning, “Mr. Patch, has the National Space Agency contacted you yet?” Everyone in the room chuckled in amusement.
Everyone but Patch. “Who?” he asked blankly.
“The astronauts,” the reporter said.
Patch shook his head, the blank expression still on his face. “They’ll have to write to Santa Claus just like all the other boys and girls.”
B.Z. glanced over at Patch again, then back at the crowd of nonplussed reporters, with a fleeting frown. He realized suddenly that he should have known better than to let the elf speak for himself. Before anyone had the chance to probe Patch’s mystifying response further, and/or decide he was a nut case, B.Z. threw a paternal arm around Patch’s shoulder, smiling broadly and looking as much like Mr. Nice Guy as he could manage. The reporters took quick advantage of the photo opportunity. Smiling voraciously, B.Z. intoned, “All we want to do is bring joy and happiness to the children of the world. And that’s why I’m proud to announce that beginning today, my pal Patch here is exclusive with B.Z. Toys.”
Gasps and murmurs and excited whispering filled the room, as reporters scribbled hastily in pads. Cameras whirred and flashed as B.Z. and Patch posed arm in arm, with big matching grins on their faces. No one seemed to notice that Patch’s grin had a certain stiffness about it, which seemed to hide some other expression.
Overcome with the epiphany of the moment, B.Z. said grandly, “Boys, let me tell you—I owe all this good fortune to me, my elf, and I!”
But not everyone in the room smiled; not everyone there had as short a memory as B.Z. liked to hope the American public had.
“What about the fact that the Senate Subcommittee on Toy Safety cited this company for fifteen separate violations of—”
B.Z.’s mouth snapped shut, his toothy grin disappearing. He glared out over the crowd of reporters, trying to see who had dared to bring that piece of old news up again. The grin came back hastily, and he interrupted the rising flood of questions with false affability. “Okay, ladies and gentlemen, that’s it for now.” He wasn’t going to let some hotshot ruin his afternoon by making anybody start to think. Nipping the whole unpleasant matter swiftly in the bud, he said, “Thank you for coming,” and started forward, gesturing the reporters toward the doors.
At his cue, Towzer, Miss Abruzzi and, most importantly, his brutish chauffeur Grizzard, moved forward from their unobtrusive places along the wall to flank him, herding the press from the room.
As the last reporter was pushed rather unceremoniously out the doors, B.Z. remained behin
d with only Patch beside him. He locked the doors.
Patch looked up at the toy manufacturer, his face troubled. “What was that he said about a Senate Subcommittee?” He wasn’t quite certain what that was, but he understood “toy safety” and “violations” well enough.
B.Z. waved a heavy hand, sweeping the implications aside. “That’s just typical newspaper garbage. Silly stuff. Don’t take it seriously.” He snorted contemptuously.
But the frown did not fade from the elf’s face. “What was that business about our future plans?” Patch asked, still worried. In the very few minutes the Big Interview had lasted, he had heard a disquieting number of things he wasn’t sure he liked, let alone understood.
“The future is ours, Patch!” B.Z. said heartily, putting an arm around the elf’s narrow shoulders as if he could physically squeeze their wills into one.
“But I’m going back to the North Pole,” Patch protested.
B.Z. drew back, staring at him in disbelief. “Says who?” he demanded. This was the first time he’d ever heard about that. His eyes narrowed. Was Patch trying to hold him up for something?
But Patch only looked away toward the room’s wide window, which faced north. “Well . . . nobody, yet,” he said, a little wistfully. “But now that I’ve shown Santa Claus what I can do, it’s for sure he’ll send for me to come home.” His heart squeezed with longing inside him. The more time he had spent in the real world, the more he had realized how much he had left behind at the North Pole. The real world was no place for an elf—he found it far too complicated, contradictory, and confusing. He belonged back in his own enchanted village. He only wanted to be appreciated there, that was all. He had his pride, and it would not let him return until he had proved to Santa and all the rest of them how much they really needed him. All year long he had hoped for some message calling him home . . . but nothing had come, and so he had buried himself in his work, telling himself that his triumph would be the thing that made them admit how much they missed him . . .
“Why would you want to do that?” B.Z. said irritably, not hearing the longing in Patch’s voice, not wanting to know about it. “What does the North Pole have that New York doesn’t? Ice and polar bears.”
Patch looked back at him. “And Santa Claus. And my friends,” he said simply.
B.Z. shook his head in exasperation. The ungrateful little creep really seemed to mean it. He rubbed his chin, thinking furiously . . . He didn’t really need the elf anymore—just that secret ingredient. Patch could leave if he wanted to, but there had to be a way to make him leave that secret stuff behind.
Trying a new tack, B.Z. said, seemingly reasonable, “Awright, awright, I’ll tell you what. Just do me one favor before you go.” He watched Patch through narrowed eyes, his face a mask of friendly concern, seeing the elf’s hesitation, playing on his obvious vulnerability and need to be liked. Guilt could move more mountains than faith ever did. “Hey, sweetheart, c’mon . . . you owe me.” No, no, that wasn’t exactly it—“You owe those marvelous kids who put their faith in you, right? Am I right? C’mon, this is for them, for the kids of this miserable old world—” His voice took on a wheedling whine; he spread his arms like a preacher, then let them drop again, looking Patch in the eye. “So will you do it?” he asked.
“What is it?” Patch asked hesitantly, his face brightening with the thought of the children, his determination wavering.
B.Z. smiled like a barracuda about to swallow a minnow. He had him now . . . “This magic stuff, this reindeer cornflakes, whatever it is that made the kids float on air—what would happen if you, er, juiced up the formula? Made it stronger.”
Patch shrugged, surprised at the simpleness of the question. “Why it’s elf-explanatory,” he said. “It would make them fly.”
B.Z.’s jaw fell open, and flopped. “You mean fly? Like fly—” he gasped, waving his arms again.
“Like fly high in the sky.” Patch gestured at the ceiling. “Ten times the stardust gives you ten times the height, ten times the power. Twenty times the stardust—”
“Could you do that?” B.Z. burst out, unable to contain himself any longer. “Before you go. It won’t take long.”
“Lollipops?” Patch asked. His quick mind had already begun to work on the new challenge before he quite realized it; and, as usual, it failed to consider the consequences while it analyzed the technical aspects.
B.Z. shook his head emphatically. “No, we already did that. That’s yesterday’s news. The consumer always wants a new model.”
Patch frowned in thought, searching for inspiration. He looked up again after a moment. “Candy canes?”
B.Z.’s mouth stretched into a broad smile again. “Candy canes! They’re cute, they’re simple—Patch, you are some terrific elf!” he said sincerely.
Patch looked down, blushing, drinking in the sort of praise he had not heard in far too long. “Well . . . I could convert the machines to do candy canes—that would only take a week or two—and then, I suppose . . .” His voice trailed off; he was lost again in thought. It wouldn’t take too long. Then he could return to the North Pole feeling as if he had done right by the other noble toymaker who had helped him so much.
“Let’s see,” B.Z. interrupted, filling the void with his own thoughts, already planning his new selling strategy. “Let’s see, we’ll launch the ad campaign tomorrow—strike while the iron is hot, see—” he glanced up eagerly. “And can I promise delivery in three months?”
“Three months!” Patch protested. “But Christmas is a year away!”
B.Z. shook his head at his partner’s continuing naïveté. Some people never learned. “When you’ve got a hit like we do, the public doesn’t want to wait for a whole year,” he explained patiently. “They’re dying for a sequel.” His eyes filled with the vision of other sequels that the public had gulped down, in even greater numbers, by conditioned response “A sequel! Yeah, that’s it!” he shouted, as his most brilliant merchandising scheme yet struck him like a meteor. “We’ll bring it out on March 25th and we’ll call it Christmas II!”
“Maybe the whole idea’s no good anymore,” Santa Claus murmured unhappily. He sat at the table, his dinner lying untouched before him. Anya brought a hot apple pie to the table and set it down, still steaming from the oven, the smell of it as sweet as ambrosia. It had been Claus’s favorite for the past century, but tonight he didn’t even notice it sitting before him.
“What are you talking about?” Anya said, her forehead wrinkling with concern. “What idea?”
Claus struggled for a moment to form the word. “Christmas,” he said softly. Perhaps it had just gone on for too many years.
“Claus!” Anya exclaimed, her face filling with shock and disbelief. Christmas had a meaning far larger and more significant than simply the day Santa Claus delivered gifts. It had always been a day that existed to remind people of the goodness and belief, the sharing and generosity, that lay inside them waiting to be set free; it was a day that had been meant to remind them of how much unselfish love human beings were truly capable of. Christmas was not a fad, a thing so shallow that it lost its meaning because someone had finally grown tired of it.
But Claus only sighed. “The world’s a different place now, Anya,” he said morosely. “You don’t get to see it. Count yourself lucky.” He shook his head. “The people, they just don’t seem to care about giving a gift to see the light of happiness in a friend’s eyes. It . . .” He broke off, struggling to find the words to give shape to the formless sorrow that was weighing so heavily on his soul. “It . . . just doesn’t feel like Christmas anymore. Maybe . . . maybe I’m just an old fool.”
Anya moved quickly to his side and hugged him, holding him tightly against her heart, trying not to cry as sudden tears filled her eyes. “Old-fashioned, maybe,” she murmured fiercely. “But not a fool. Never a fool.”
But her husband only shook his head and didn’t answer.
Fifteen
Patch sat
behind the controls of his state-of-the-art control panel, overseeing the endless metal forest of robotic arms and automated machinery which produced more candy canes in an hour than he could have imagined producing in his wildest dreams. No need for awkward jury-rigged assembly lines made of giant tinker toys here. B.Z. did everything first class if there was money in it for him.
Patch watched the candy canes flow past him on the conveyor belt in an endless river of glowing puce. They shone so very brightly from the extra pinch of stardust inside every one that their glare made him squint. The machines droned on, chunk-chunk-chunk, a far drearier and more depressing sound than the music he had made for the elves to work to . . . but, then, there were no elves, or even human beings, working here. He had made everything bright colored, as it had been at the North Pole, and he had even put up his own private sign which read THE PATCH TOY CO. But in spite of these efforts to make it feel like home, this production line was as heartless as the human vulture who had provided it, a fact which Patch, with his innate belief in the good-heartedness of others, did not really understand.
He only knew that he was very unhappy—that he missed Santa and his friends more than he had ever dreamed possible, and that he had never appreciated any of them, or the wonderful village in which they existed, nearly enough. He had been elfish, he realized, thinking only of himself and his personal glory, not thinking enough about the real reason they were all there—to work together to make the best toys possible, unselfishly and lovingly, in order to bring happiness to others.