Chapter Seven The Reindeer The next Christmas Eve Nicholas did not have such an easy time making his rounds of the village. To begin with, he was considerably amused and rather dismayed to discover that instead of one embroidered bag for each house, the children had followed little Frederick’s example and had each put out a woollen stocking. So with some families having five or six children, there was often quite a row of stockings nailed to the door. Of course Nicholas couldn’t very well just put one toy in each stocking as it made the rest of it look so flat and empty. Since he hadn’t stocked his sleigh with enough toys so that there would be several for each child, he found himself with an empty sleigh, and only half way through his list! "Luckily I have an extra supply of toys at home in the chest," he said to his horse Lufka as they returned to the cottage for more. Nicholas quickly loaded up the sleigh and off they went again to finish the rounds. When there were only a few houses left to visit, the tired old horse began to falter. "Come on old boy," encouraged Nicholas, but Lufka was getting too old to spend all night struggling around the village, and this particular night he had made two trips. As he plodded through a deep snow bank Lufka stumbled and the sleigh slid into a ditch. Crack! went one of the runners. Nicholas climbed down and after making sure that his horse was alright, shook his head at the sight of the disabled sleigh. Nicholas had to finish his rounds on foot that Christmas and the first pink streaks of dawn were brightening up the sky when page 22 |
12b |
that’s
not all. I don’t know how you would get into the
house any way because he’s put up boards over the
windows and the front and side doors. There’s not a
sign of life anywhere in the old house now. You would
think that it was disserted." "Why, the old man must be crazy." they all said. "He must be afraid of somebody." "Afraid nothing." one man remarked, "The only thing he’s afraid of is that someone will steal his money." "I’m sure Nicholas the wood carver will be interested in this news," said another. "One more child in the village, and such a lovely one too." "Nicholas already knows about her." they heard a deep voice say and the villagers turned to see it was the wood carver himself who had joined the group unnoticed. "Her name is Kathy. I once knew a girl with that name." he went on with a sad faraway look in his usually merry blue eyes as he remembered his little sister. "I’d like to do something special for the poor little girl." "How did you find out her name, Nicholas?" "She was wandering around in her yard just like a forlorn puppy who had been locked in," Nicholas answered. "I was passing that way and stopped at the gate so that I could talk to her. She says that she’s not allowed outside the fence and can only play in the yard for one hour a day. She also told me that her grandfather doesn’t want her to play with the other children from the village in case she talks about his gold and where he keeps it." page 27 |