Bertram and the Reindeer

Bertram and the Reindeer

By Paul T. Gilbert

Bertram was in the kitchen watching his mamma bake Christmas cookies.  One batch had come all hot and crisp from the oven, and now Bertram’s mamma was rolling out the last of the sweet, yellow dough and cutting it in the form of stars and reindeer and Santa Clauses and sleds.

“Mamma,” said Bertram, “why doesn’t Santa Clause give people the things they want for Christmas?”

“Don’t you generally get the things you want?” said his mamma.  “I don’t see that you have anything to complain of.”

“Oh, I don’t mean me,” said Bertram.  “I mean Mike Crowley, for instance.  He wanted a bicycle last year and didn’t get it, and Nadine wanted a violin – she’s a genius, everyone says.  I think it’s mean of Santa not to give them what they really want.”

“Sssh!” said Bertram’s mamma.  “What if Santa Clause should hear you?”  But she looked thoughtful.

“I don’t care if he does,” Bertram said.  “I don’t call it fair.”

“Santa Claus probably does the best he can,” said Bertram’s mother.  “I’m sure I wouldn’t want his job.”

“Oh, I should think it would be keen,” said Bertram.  “Gee, Mamma, I wash I was Santa Claus.  I’d give Ginny Banning a new doll and a doll buggy and a doll house, and I’d give Mike Crowley a bicycle and Nadine a violin, and I’d get even with George Fish.  I wouldn’t give him anything, the old greedy.”

“Why, how you talk!” said Bertram’s mamma.  “A fine Santa Claus you’d make.  What’s the matter with George Fish?  I always thought you two played so nicely together.”

“Well, he didn’t have to eat up Joe!” said Bertram.

“Joe?  Who’s he?” asked his mamma.

“Joe was my trained oyster.  I was teaching him to do tricks.”

“Well, that’s too bad,” said Bertram’s mamma.  “But I wouldn’t be so mean to George if I were you.  Anyway, you can thank your lucky stars that you’re not Santa Claus, climbing down all those sooty chimneys and wading through the wet snow.  You’d catch your death of cold, and then I’d have to doctor you and soak your feet in mustard water.  As if I didn’t have enough to do already.”

“Just the same,” said Bertram, “it would be a lot of fun to have a reindeer.  Some day may I have a reindeer, Mamma?”

“No, you can’t.  Here’s a cookie reindeer.  And now run along outdoors and play with your sled.”

So Bertram ate the cookie reindeer and went outdoors and played with his sled.

After supper that night – it was Christmas Eve – Bertram hung up one of his new stockings.  Then he went to bed to dream of Santa Clause.  He was right in the middle of his dream when he was waked up by a soft thud on the windowpane and a voice down below saying, “Hist!”

Bertram went to the window and looked out.  It had been snowing, and the world in the moonlight was all white.  Under the elm tree Bertram saw a reindeer, its whiskers white with frost.

“Was that you,” asked Bertram, “throwing snowballs at my window and saying, ‘Hist!’?”

“Yes,” said the reindeer.  “Is your name Bertram?”

“Yes,” replied Bertram.  “Were you looking for me?”

“Just a minute, then” said Bertram, “and I’ll let you come in.”

So Bertram went downstairs and opened the front door and let the reindeer in.  The reindeer wiped his feet on the door mat and came in and sat down on the couch.

“Santa Claus wants to know,” he said, “if you will help him out.”

“Are you one of Santa Claus’s reindeer?” asked Bertram.

“Don’t ask foolish questions,” said the reindeer.  “Come on and bring your sled if you want to play Santa.  There’s a costume for you in the sack – red coat, false face, whiskers, and everything.  But hurry up, will you?”

Bertram got dressed and put on his stocking cap and his pullover, but he was so excited that he forgot his rubbers.  Then he took his sled and followed the reindeer out to the back yard.  A big lumpy sack had been tossed down in the corner of the hedge.  A doll, a Teddy bear, and a stick-horse poked their heads out of it.

The reindeer fished into the bag and brought out a Santa Claus costume, and when Bertram put it on, the reindeer looked him over, and said, “I guess you’ll do.  You’re not so fat as Santa, but that will make it easier when it comes to chimneys.  Do you suppose you can drive me without jiggling the reins?”

Bertram said he thought he could.

“Well, hitch me up then,” said the reindeer, “and come on.  We’ll go to Ginny Banning’s house first.  The presents for her are right on top.”

So Bertram tied the reindeer to the sled by a rope, loaded the sack of presents on the sled, sat down behind it, and jiggled the reins and said, “Get up!”

“Don’t jiggle the reins, I tell you!” said the reindeer.  “It makes me very nervous.”

But the reindeer got up, and away they sped through the snowdrifts over to Ginny Banning’s house.

“Whoa!” said Bertram.  And the reindeer whoaed. 

Bertram looked up at the steep roof and the chimney which was buried under the snow.

“How are we going to get up there?” he asked.

“You’re a fine Santa Claus!” said the reindeer.  “Didn’t you bring along a ladder?” 

“I didn’t know we would need a ladder,” said Bertram, “but I think there’s one back of the garage.”

Bertram waded through the snow to the garage, dug the ladder out, and lugged it over to the house.  It was a very hard job, and Bertram was quite out of breath before he got the ladder in place.

“You go up first,” said the reindeer.  “Sling the pack over your shoulder.”

Bertram slung the heavy pack over his shoulder and started to climb up the ladder.  But it was just awfully rickety, and it shook and swayed so Bertram was afraid he would fall.

“Don’t jiggle so!” he called out to the reindeer, who was just behind him, prodding him with his horns.

“Don’t jiggle so yourself,” said the reindeer.  “And hurry up, will you?”

When Bertram finally got to the top, the wind was blowing the snow into his eyes so that he could hardly see, and the roof looked as steep and slippery as a toboggan slide.  Somehow he managed to scramble over to the chimney without breaking his neck, but it was all like a nightmare.

“Now, I’ll tie this rope around you,” said the reindeer, “and pop!  Down you go.”

“But what if I get stuck?” said Bertram.

“Oh, that’s nothing,” said the reindeer.  “Santa gets stuck lots of times.  It’s half the fun.  But hurry up!  You’re slower than molasses.”

The chimney was all black and sooty and it smelled worse than Daddy’s pipe.  And as he let himself down he wished with all his heart that he was home, safe in bed.

“Hang on tight to the rope and don’t drop me!” said Bertram, as he disappeared into the black flue.

It was a tight squeeze even for Bertram, and once he thought he was stuck fast.  But he reached the bottom at last, and in the moonlight filtering through the windows, he saw Ginny Banning’s stocking, long and limp, beside the fireplace.

Bertram opened the sack, but while he was wondering what to put into the stocking first, the reindeer hollered down the chimney, “Hist!  Hurry up!  Come on.”

And Bertram felt a tug at the rope.

“Wait a minute,” he hollered back.  “I can’t remember what she wanted.  I haven’t left anything yet.”  And Ginny’s little dog began to bark.

“They’re right on top, I told you, said the reindeer.  “Just leave anything then, and come on.”  And he gave the rope another tug.

So Bertram dove into the sack and pulled out the first thing he came to.  It was a stick-horse, and Ginny wasn’t a baby!

“Come on, now,” said the reindeer, when Bertram found himself back on the roof again.  Over to George Fish’s house,

“Oh, are we going there?” asked Bertram.  “I don’t like George Fish.  He ate up my trained oyster.”

“The last thing Santa told me,” said the reindeer, looking severely at Bertram, “Was not to forget George Fish.  There’s a boy for you,’ he said; ‘you want to do him handsome.’  Those were his very words.”

“Oh, all right then,” said Bertram.

So he hauled the ladder through the snow across the street, and climbed the rickety old thing, with the reindeer after him, up to the chimney of George Fish’s house.

But his feet were so soaked through by this time, because he had forgotten to put on his rubbers, that he began to sneeze, and when he landed at the bottom of the chimney, all he could do was to blow his nose and sneeze, “Quat-chieu!  Quat-chieu!”

And he woke up George Fish’s mamma.

“Who’s there?” she said, as she came out of the bedroom with her hair all done up in curl papers.  “Well, I declare!  If it’s not Santa Claus.  And sneezing his head off, too.  You might have known you’d catch cold on a night like this without your rubbers.  Take off those wet shoes right away, and I’ll make you some chamomile tea and soak your feet in mustard water.”

So she took off Bertram’s shoes and stockings and went out into the kitchen to heat the water for the chamomile tea.  Bertram just hated chamomile tea.

Then the reindeer hollered down the chimney.  “Hist!  Come on!” he said. “We’ve got to go.”

“I can’t,” said Bertram.  “I’m barefooted and I’ve got to have chamomile tea.”

“Have what!” said the reindeer.

“Chamomile tea!” shouted Bertram.

“Yes.  It’s coming,” said George Fish’s mamma.  “Just be patient a minute longer…Now!  Just swallow this pill first, and drink the tea while it’s nice and hot.  And here’s a tub of mustard water.”

So Bertram had to drink the nasty tea and sit there with his feet in mustard water while George Fish’s mamma told him what a good boy George was.

“Well,” she said at last, as she helped him on with his shoes and stockings, “you’ll feel better now.  And here’s a pair of George’s rubbers you can wear.  And thanks for all this nice big sack of presents.  George has been such a good boy, and deserves them.  I’ll see that he writes you a nice letter.  Well good-by.”

And before Bertram could explain that the presents weren’t all for George, George Fish’s mamma had opened the front door and let him out into the street.

“Oh, dear!” said Bertram, when he found himself alone.  “Now Mike Crowley won’t have any Merry Christmas, and Nadine won’t get her violin.  And – and ---there won’t be anything for me!”

Bertram began to cry.

He couldn’t see the reindeer anywhere.  Only the empty sled and the ladder remained.  So Bertram took the sled and waded through the drifts back home.

And the door was locked. And Bertram had to go back and get the heavy ladder and crawl down the chimney into the parlor….

“Merry Christmas!” 

It was Bertram’s mamma, who had come to wake him up.  “Goodness!” she said.  “I thought you’d be up long ago.”

Then Bertram remembered what had happened and began to cry again.

“Why, why!  What are you crying for?” she said.  “Get into your clothes and come downstairs and see the lovely presents Santa has left for you and Baby Sam.”

And sure enough, Bertram’s stocking was filled with all sorts of things.  A candy cane was sticking out from the top of it, and in the toe he found a red apple and a silver dollar.  And on the floor there were a pair of skates, a stamp album, and a cowboy suit.

Then Ginny Banning came running over to show Bertram her new doll that Santa had brought.  “And I got a doll house and a doll’s buggy, too.” She said.  “And just think!  Mike Crowley got a bicycle, and Nadine got a violin!  She was so happy she just cried.”

“I guess,” thought Bertram, “Santa must have finished up the job himself.  Anyway, he did it better than I could.”