From the Improvement Era, December 1941 –

Santa Came on Wheels

By Larene King Bleecker

It was early in December when father first told us of his job at the logging camp. I was sitting between my two brothers on the long, rough slab seat near the fireplace. A back log blazed on the andirons, and the flames leaped up the chimney with a cheery sound. Outside, in the early winter evening, the snow was white on the ground, and the quaking aspens made a dark wall against the clearing.

“Hoggan’s Sawmill is such a long way, John. it must be sixty miles, or more,” said Mother, wiping her eyes on the corner of her apron.

“Will you be able to come home for Christmas, Father?” I asked.

The baby climbed up on Father’s knee and stared into his face with serious blue eyes. Grandma sniffed, and Aunt Margaret sat silent with her lips moving.

Father looked at the letter. “It says here I’ll have to be there by the eighteenth – that means I’ll have to leave right away.”

He thrust the letter back into his coat pocket. A little pulse throbbed at the top of his long pointed jaw. “I’ll be away until April, perhaps longer. Do you boys think you can take care of things?”

“They’re too young,” said Grandma, rocking back and forth energetically. “Peter sixteen – Alan fourteen. Pshh!”

“We’ll get along all right,” Peter answered, his red face gleaming in the firelight.

“Sure we will,” said Alan, with all the earnestness of a fourteen-year-old.

“Adelaide and I can pick up potatoes,” I boasted.

Everyone laughed, and for a moment the tension was broken, for they were remembering how my little sister and I had had our feet and hands frost-bitten while picking up potatoes for the neighbors. As our share, we got every fourth sack.

“Just think of two little girls, eight and ten, earning our winter potatoes,” Mother said, as though she could never get over the wonderment of it.

“We got enough for Lina too,” piped up Adelaide, from where she was sitting by Aunt Margaret. Lina was the cow.

“You certainly did,” Father said, turning toward the fire and spreading his strong brown hands to the blaze.

“Did you get our shoes today, Papa?” queried matter-of-fact Adelaide.

Father shook his head. “Webb had no shoes in children’s sizes. I’m sorry,”he added, seeing the worried look in Mother’s eyes. He spread his arms in a gesture of finality. Then seeing us all staring a thim as though he were somehow to blame, he strode about the room kicking Grandma’s braided rug out of the way.

“What on airth will they wear? They cain’t go barefoot this kind o’ weather,” Grandma said, looking at him accusingly.

Father paced the floor, while outside the wind blew. Suddenly he turned, and there was a strange light on his face. “The children will have shoes to wear by Christmas day,” he said. “I promise you this.”

Mother and Aunt Margaret sat very still, looking reverently up at Father’s face. Grandma, however, got up briskly and began to clear the table.

“Even the Lord cain’t get shoes if there’s none to get,” she declared, shipping each word off as though her voice were a pair of sharp scissors.

When Father left, Mother, Grandma, and Aunt Margaret went with him as far as Cove Fort.

The sun had gone down by the time they got back. The boys had milked the cow and carried in the wood, while Adelaide and I had the germade mush steaming in the kettle all ready to be served. Mother brought home some molasses, so we baked scones on the iron griddle, and had a great feast.

Grandma made a great show of hiding a package in her steamer trunk. We all wondered what was in it, and our eyes were so wide with curiosity that she said, “You’ll find out at Christmas, mebbie, ’f you’re good.”

The next week the boys worked at the wood-pile, cutting and sawing the logs into even lengths, and piling them end to end against the adobe wall, under the eaves of the house. Every night Mother would spin by the light of pine torches we held for her, the fine linsey cloth for our Christmas dresses. Mine and Adelaide’s were to be made just alike. The warp was white, and the filling blue and red. The pattern was to be three stripes of blue and two of red. They were to be made with tight waists and plain full skirts, and we were very proud of the effect.

Adelaide and I had gathered hops that summer and sold them for enough calico for three aprons. Mother’s was to be pink and white, Grandma’s blue, and Aunt Margaret’s red. We were working them in cross-stitch designs in rose leaf pattern. We hid them away in an Indian basket Grandma had once given me. It was hanging on a rafter above our bed. After the dishes were washed and the brass kettles polished, we would climb up the ladder and sit cross-legged on the bed and sew until Mother called us to help with supper.

The boys were making Christmas gifts down in the campers’ cabin. We often played guessing games to trap them into telling us what they were making, but they were too shrewd to get caught.

With everyone so busy, we didn’t mind the loneliness of Father’s absence so much. Every night Aunt Margaret read to us from the Bible. We loved the stories of David and Samuel, and Joseph in Egypt. It seemed as though they were real boys like Peter and Alan. But best of all, we liked the story of Jesus which Aunt Margaret was saving to read to us again on Christmas Eve.

In order to keep us from thinking too much about Father, Aunt Margaret often held school at night. “Might as well teach ’em here at home,” Grandma said. “They have no shoes to go elsewhere.”

One night we were sitting at the long, pine table doing arithmetic. We could hear the wind in the chimney, while every few moments Lina, the cow, would give a long, drawn-out moo. The dog, Coalie, kept trotting to the door and then back to the hearth.

Finally Peter laid down his slate and pencil, put on Father’s old mackinaw, and went outside. Coalie followed him out, sniffing at the sleeves of the jacket as though he knew the smell of Father’s clothes.

Mother let her knitting fall, and buried her face in Grandma’s lap. her shoulders moved up and down and Grandma patted her on the arm, then looked up fiercely at us children:

“Don’t gawp,” she warned us. There were tears in her bright, black eyes.

“Put your slates away and we’ll read for a change,” said Aunt Margaret in a cool voice. “Daphne, you may read ‘The Captain’s Daughter.’”

“Oh, please – mayn’t I read about Piccola’s Christmas?”

“Oh, yes, yes!” clamored Adelaide, “Piccola hadn’t a thing for Christmas, so the good Kris Kringle put a tiny bird in her shoe.”

Grandma sniffed. She said we were as bad off as this Piccola, so we might as well get prepared. One thing, she said, Piccola did have shoes, at which Mother’s shoulders shook harder than ever. Just as I was turning the pages of the reader, Peter bust into the room, his face red with excitement.

“A fire!” he yelled. “There’s afire at Baldy Rimm’s place!”

He ran back out with all of us trailing after him, and pointed west toward the deserted Rimm cabin. There, shining as plain as a star, was the red glow of a fire.

Who could they be? Had they come to settle? Perhaps they were homesteaders like ourselves. We danced up and down and hallooed with our hands cupped to our mouths, but only the echoes came back from the timbered wall. A wedge of sky, star-studded, shone above the black line of trees. Our shrill voices challenged the wolves at the edge of the clearing and close by, a cougar gave a snarling cry. The ruff on Coalie’s back stiffened.

“Quick! Inside!” Aunt Margaret called. “Be quiet!” Her voice was very stern.

As we ran toward the house, I took hold of Mother’s hand and she held it tightly in hers.

Once inside, Aunt Margaret slid the draw across the iron latch and dropped the clamp. Mother’s face was chalky white; Aunt Margaret’s thin lips were pressed tightly while the little brackets on each side of Grandma’s mouth were curved downward like a horseshoe.

Peter said we’d better keep the fire low just in case the campers might turn out to be those treacherous Navajoes. he stood up straight and tall, his nostrils flaring, his brown eyes squinting. How very much he looked like Father! All at once it seemed he had changed from a boy to a man.

“Whoever they are,” Aunt Margaret said, “I’m sure they’ll not molest us.”

“Of course they won’t! There’s nothing to be scairt of,” snapped Grandma. “Off to bed with you, and be quiet about it.”

During prayers, the baby sat bolt upright, his blue eyes fixed intently on the shining surface of the gun which Peter had taken from the wall and placed on the table. Everyone smiled when Adelaide finished her prayer by saying: “… and please, Lord, bless us that we’ll not get killed until Father comes home. Amen.”

Adelaide and I, from the top bed, could see the firelight flickering on the rafters above our heads, as we whispered excitedly together.

What if the Navajoes would set fire to our sheds and corral! What if our house should burn to the ground with us in it! Father wouldn’t be able to find even the spot where our house had stood. We speculated on this calamity until the firelight died down, and Grandma had covered the coals for the night.

The next day and night we watched for signs of the campers, but seeing none, we stopped talking about them, except to wonder if they had stopped at Webb’s store on their way out of the valley. Peter said he would find out when he went for the mail and supplies …

Our linsey dresses were done at last. Three days before Christmas, Mother said we might try them on. When we came out from behind the dressing curtain, everyone clapped. “Who are these two little strangers?” asked Mother. “they look like sticks of peppermint candy.”

The baby pointed his finger at the gay colors. “What’s dat?” he kept asking, solemnly.

Everyone laughed but Grandma. “I ain’t seen signs of any shoes,” she declared, going to the trunk and taking out the mysterious package. Sure enough it contained a roll of doeskin, thread, needles, and a packet of colored beads.

“The Lord helps them that help; themselves,” she said, cutting and stitching the doeskin into moccasins of various sizes.

Two days before Christmas we woke to the sound of rain; the wind came again, and until long after dark there was only the roaring of the timber, and the beating of the rain. Toward evening it began to snow, and Peter looked very despondent because he knew Mother would not let him go to Cove Fort for supplies and the mail if the storm continued. We did not mind doing without the supplies so much, but there might be a letter from Father.

Just before sunset the clouds broke apart and in the west the sun set in a gray sea of mist. That night the ice froze in the pools between every little hummock and ridge, and sheeted the level ground. We ran to the edge of the clearing to see the silver fronds at the quaking-aspens’ roots.

After breakfast the next morning, Mother said Peter could go if the weather remained clear. When Peter and Alan went to the stable for the burro, Adelaide and I followed. They lifted us to the saddle and let us ride form the barn to the house. The burro slipped and almost went down on the sheet ice, but we managed to stay on. Aunt Margaret advised Peter to take the west road to the Fort, as the stream on the south road might have swollen from the rains and would be too deep and swift. He said goodbye, after many last-minute instructions, and we waved until he disappeared in the distance.

The day turned out bright and clear. The sun shone warm on the slopes and the wind had died down. Alan and I found a blue spruce just beyond the quaking aspens and by the time Peter returned, we had it standing upright in the corner by the window, trimmed with scraps of cloth and bits of colored glass. When the fire light shone on the glass, it looked almost as gay as if we’d had real candles.

Peter brought the mail – letters from Father, and a card for Aunt Margaret with a red Santa Claus painted on it. She let us pin it to the top of the tree, and it looked very gay and bright. Peter said there had not been any strangers at Webb’s store, so he thought the campers must have gone the other way.

We hung our stockings above the fireplace under the mantel. First there was Peter’s, then Grandma’s then Mother’s, and so on down to the baby’s tiny one. We placed our gifts under the tree. Father’s were wrapped in heavy brown paper, and it seemed strange to think we could get mail from as far away as Hoggan’s Sawmill.

After supper, Aunt Margaret read to us about the birth of the Christ Child in far-away Judea. We sat so quietly that a little wind, moaning outside, sounded as though it too wanted to come into the light and warmth of our cheery room. Against the dusk, the frost on the window-pane raised fern-like patterns in delicately tinted etchings. Little fire motes gleamed red on the back of the chimney, and played at hide-and-go-seek. The fire gleamed on the soft yellow coat of the dog, stretched across the hearth-stone.

When we knelt down for prayers, we were all happy that it was Mother’s turn to pray, because we loved to hear the sweet tones of her voice.

“Father in Heaven,” she began, “we are so happy to be together in our warm shelter on this Christmas Eve, even though this is the first time we – we –” Her voice faltered.

We waited, silent for a tense moment, then Grandma got up to her feet. “I think the Lord knows what’s in our hearts this night, even though you cain’t say it, Sairey,” she said. “Off to bed with you, children, and be sure you go to sleep if you expect anything from Santa Claus.”

After we had gone to bed it seemed to us that we were wider awake than we’d been in our lives, though the low murmur of grown-up voices ceased after a while, and the shadows on the ceiling flickered out. Finally we slept. once I dreamed I heard Grandma say that either John or the Lord had forgotten the children’s shoes and she thought it was a good thing some folks had better memories …

When the light broke over the clearing, Adelaide and I got up, washed our faces and hands, and put on our new dresses. The moccasins Grandma had made were laid out for us by the hearth, and after we had tied them on, we stirred the fire and put on a rich pine log to get a bright, quick blaze.

“Christmas gift! Christmas gift!” we shouted, and everyone got up, dressed, and gathered around the fire. It was Alan’s turn to pray, but Mother said we could keep a little prayer in our hearts until after we had looked at our gifts.

Grandma said, “My goodness, I should think so. Let ’em have their things before they tear the roof off the house.”

Each stocking contained a stick of peppermint candy, some raisins, and an orange. In Adelaide’s and mine were thimbles that Father had sent from the camp. Peter got a mouth organ, and Alan, a jew’s-harp. When he played it, it sounded as though a humming-bird had somehow got into the house. There were fascinators for Mother and Aunt Margaret, and a paisley shoulder shawl for Grandma. The baby got a pair of red mittens. When we put them on his hands, he went from one to the other, holding them up and saying in his solemn way, “Wot’s dis?”

The boys had made a sled with carved runners, lined with iron from an old wagon-wheel rim. They had a real surprise for Mother. With their pocket knives, they had carved a miniature set of the Nativity. On a smooth pine board about the size of a small window-pane, they had arranged the little figures: Mary with the Christ Child in her arms; Joseph; the three Wise Men; and suspended above all was the Star (a glass bead tied to Grandma’s hat pin). No light could have been more glowing than that in Mother’s eyes as she gathered the boys in her arms and thanked them.

After we had all admired the boys’ fine workmanship, Adelaide and I gave the cross-stitch aprons we had made to Mother, Grandma, and Aunt Margaret, and they were so proud of them they wore them all the rest of the day.

When prayers and breakfast were over, we grew quiet, thinking of Father, and wondering if he missed being home on Christmas day. The boys did the chores, and came in laughing because they had given Lina, the cow, an apple (one of their own – in those days apples were very scarce) and she had tossed her head as much to say, “Merry Christmas, and thanks for the apple.”

“This has been a wonderful day,” Mother said later, as Adelaide and I were washing the dinner dishes.

“Well, I don’t see the shoes John promised the children. Looks like him or the Lord plumb forgot them,” piped Grandma, sweeping up the crumbs with brisk, swift motions.

Mother, who was knitting, thrust the free needle into the ball of yarn and laid the stocking in her work basket. “The day isn’t over with yet,” she answered.

“Let’s go out and try our sled – ought to be good coasting on the knoll,” suggested Alan. We all ran out, shouting and glad to be free to breathe the pure, cold air. But our feet were soon cold despite the heavy pieces of gunny sack we had wrapped around them, so after an hour or two we ran back to the house.

“Guess who has been here?” cried Aunt Margaret. Her eyes were shining, and Mother’s cheeks were pink.

We couldn’t answer, for by this time our eyes had traveled to the table where, shining and new, were four pairs of shoes.

“Father!” we yelled in chorus.

“No. Not Father. Guess again. Didn’t you see tracks in the yard – wheel tracks?” asked Mother.

“The Campers!” we shouted, jumping up and down.

Mother nodded.

Then we learned that they had been with a company en route to the gold mines in California. Sickness had delayed them and now they were going to Hoggan’s camp to stay until spring. They had run out of provisions and money, but had plenty of clothing and shoes, which they had intended to sell when they reached California. Mother had traded them some flour and bacon for the shoes.

We asked all about their visit, where they sat at the table to eat, and what they said, and how they looked. They had three children – two small boys and a girl about my age. We felt sad and disappointed. Visitors were so rare in those days, and it would have been such fun to see other children, and play with them. But when Mother suggested that we dry our feet and try on the shoes, we grew merry again. They were heavy shoes, with hooks up the front to hold the laces. When we got up to walk, we made so much noise that Grandma declared we sounded like a band of “Injuns.”

As she limped from the flour barrel to the cupboard and looked at the depleted store, she sniffed, and the brackets on each side of her mouth drew down into a horseshoe.

“Father promised us shoes,” said Adelaide, looking down at the shining black leather that encased her feet. “He promised, and the Lord has sent them to us.”

“At a price,” said Grandma. “At a price.”