HE HAS A VERY HAPPY CHRISTMAS

Christmas Eve! Home to a six-o'clock supper after the daily paper distribution was finished, and then to bed, "'Cause going to bed early makes Christmas come sooner, Mother!"

On the back porch, the tree, a big, bushy-branched fir, lay waiting to be carried into the front hall. The lower floor was filled with mysterious packages, so disguised by bulky wrappings that their contents could not even be surmised, and all over the house, from the attic where the tree decorations were stored, to the holly-trimmed parlor hovered an air of holiday expectancy.

He loved that thrill, did John. Earlier, the possibilities which Santa's visit held furnished it to him, for who was to know which of the many needs that personage would see fit to satisfy? And the very Christmas after he had exposed the old fellow as a delightful, kindly fraud, he had sheepishly asked his parents to decorate the tree and arrange the gifts as before, "'Cause being surprised is the best part of Christmas."

That night when he had caught Santa! The memory of it brought a retrospective smile to his lips, in spite of the shivers which the chilled bed sheets sent through his warm little body. Awakened by a noise below, he had drawn the old bathrobe about him as protection from the frosty air, and tiptoed into the dark hallway. Well around the stair landing, a scene met his eyes!

There stood the tree, wedged firmly into the soapbox support with flat irons around the base for ballast. In one corner of the room, a Noah's ark, which later came to an untimely end on a mud-puddle cruise, had spilled its a.s.sortment of cardboard animals out on the carpet. Near the doorway lay a red fireman's suit, and in the dining-room, bending over the candy-filled cornucopias on the table were his father and mother.

"W-where's Santa Claus?" he had stammered, not grasping the situation at first. A sharp, gasping breath of surprise came from his mother as his father broke into chagrined laughter.

"I guess you've found him, son," had been the reply. And that was the end of Santa Claus.

A few moments later, a long, empty freight train rattled cityward unnoticed, as John's regular breathing told off, faithfully as any timepiece, the fast lessening minutes which stood between him and Christmas Day.

He wakened with a start. The late, gray dawn of winter was peering in between the window shades and the sashes, casting hesitant shadows about the room. He rubbed his eyes sleepily for a moment, then, remembering, sprang to his feet and opened the blinds.

A dun railroad embankment lay before him, with lighter streaks which told where the shining rails lay. Over on the boulevards, the arc lights twinkled sleepily, their long night vigil nearly finished. The barren tree tops which skirted the park, made a lace work against the frosty, winter's sky, and here and there, chance rays of light threw piles of rubbish in the big lot into unlovely relief. The same kindly, grimy, disorderly neighborhood of the day before and the year before, and yet the spirit of Christmas cast a halo over the whole and beautified it in the boy's eyes.

"It's Christmas, it's Christmas," he repeated over and over again as he drew on his clothes.

Then for a tiptoed scamper down the stairs for a view of the surprises which were awaiting him in the hall below.

A scent of pine, reminiscent of the sweet-scented Michigan forests, made him sniff eagerly. There towered the tree on the spot where its predecessors had stood in front of the fireplace, so tall that the tip barely missed the ceiling. Gleaming spheres caught the light from the stair window in brilliant contrast with the dark, needled depths.

Cornucopias, candy laden, weighted the boughs. Sugar chains made symmetrical festoons of beads as they looped down from the upper branches, and innumerable candles stood stiffly in their holders, waiting for the taper in his father's hand to bring them to life.

Underneath the tree lay his presents. Not so many, perhaps, oh, sons of richer parents, as you may have had, but John's eyes grew wider and wider with delight as each object greeted him.

There lay the sled, long, low and scarlet, not as ornate as the expensive "Black Beauty," for which he had longed, but quite as serviceable. At the terminal of a railway system which encircled the tree base, stood a queer, foreign mechanical engine, with an abbreviated pa.s.senger car, and on a corner of the sheet which was to protect the carpet from candle drip, was a dry battery and diminutive electric motor. Then there were books--Optics, The Rover Boys, and others of their ilk--which would furnish recreation for months to come, regardless of his rapid reading.

Of course he turned the switch and listened to the hum of the little motor until the battery threatened to be exhausted; of course the railway was put into immediate and repeated operation, regardless of the noise which might awaken his parents. And he stood up, at least three times, sled pressed tightly against his chest, and made imaginary dashes down the park toboggan, outspeeding even the long bobsleds as the ice flew beneath him. Then he glanced at the t.i.tle pages of the books again and even read a page or two from each opening chapter that he might know which would have the honor of being chosen for first consumption by his hungry mind. Finally, he stretched out on his back beneath the tree and gazed upward, watching each glistening detail in utter content.

Voices upstairs told John that his parents had wakened at last. Up the winding flight as fast as his little legs could carry him, and into the big south room with a cry of, "Oh, Mother! Mother! Daddy! it's just fine!"

"Happy, son?" asked his mother as he snuggled down beside her on the bed.

He nodded. Happy? Who wouldn't be with all those treasures in his possession? Mr. Fletcher chuckled.

"There's a box on your mother's bureau which we forgot to put under the tree," he said. "You can open it here if you wish."

The boy was up and back in a trice, this time to his father's bed, where he sat and tugged at the pink string fastenings until a set of doll's dishes came in sight.

"That's in answer to that list of yours," he was told. "Think those will do for your flat, son?"

"Louise'll like 'em," he smiled unabashed. "I'll give 'em to her with my other present."

More chuckles, more smiles, and more laughter. What matter if all else in the world went wrong, if the Spirit of Christmas reigned supreme in that family for the day?

"What did you see in the parlor, John?" asked his father.

"Something in the parlor?" The boy was on his feet again. "Where?"

"Wait a minute until I get my bathrobe and I'll go with you."

A little later, the two descended the stairway, hand in hand. John's gaze followed his father's pointing finger as they stood on the parlor threshold. In front of the dead grate, was a three foot, denim-covered, cabinet. From the square opening at the top hung half a dozen or so of limp, dangling figures.

"Punch and Judy!" John could scarcely believe his eyes. "Oh, Daddy!

Daddy!"

In a moment, Punch was on his right hand and Judy on his left as he wiggled his fingers back and forth to see if they worked as did the showman's at Neighborhood Hall. Judy bobbed up on the stage as his father beamed down at him.

"Mr. Punch, Mr. Punch," she called. But her voice had neither the range nor the strength which Judy demanded to be successful, and he drew the marionettes off his fingers.

"Here," he said to his father, "you work 'em. Mine don't act right."

Nothing loath, Mr. Fletcher stretched himself out on the floor behind the little cabinet. John shifted to the front and watched eagerly with his head resting on his hands.

What a Punch and Judy show it was that ensued! Mr. Fletcher, drawing on his fertile imagination, invented a new set of domestic quarrels for the unhappy couple, brought in a doctor and a clown, (two lifelike dolls which supplemented the original, limited performers), and kept John shrieking with laughter until the ruddy-faced little devil brought the performance to a close in the time-honored way. Subdued laughter in the doorway made them both look up with a start. There stood Mrs. Fletcher, fully dressed, with a smile on her face.

"John senior," she ordered with mock severity, "go upstairs and dress yourself for breakfast immediately. I do believe you're the biggest boy of the two in spite of your age."

After the morning meal had been eaten, John devoured the contents of a candy-filled cornucopia from the tree, and drew on his stocking cap, coat, and mittens. Louise's presents were to be delivered, and that was a matter which brooked no unseemly delay.

Mrs. Martin's sister answered his ring at the apartment.

"Louise home?" he inquired eagerly.

Her aunt explained that Louise had gone out of town with her mother for a three-day Christmas visit.

"She'll be back, the day after tomorrow," she consoled him.

So he left the presents in her charge with instructions to give them to his lady on the very moment of her arrival, and scampered down the carpeted stairway again.

Sid DuPree met him in front of his house. John surveyed him warily.

"'Lo!"

"'Lo!"

"What'd your folks give you?"

"Oh, lots of things. What'd you get?"

Sid stopped a moment to recount his various gifts, lest one of them be omitted in the effort to impress his neighbor.

"'Nother football," he boasted. "Cost five dollars, it did."