Ana Tărăntuș

The Christmas Present

by Richmal Crompton

The Christmas Present is not a traditional

Christmas story, but it is a rather peculiar and amusing one
about a wonderful gift that didn't cost a thing. The story first
appeared in Truth magazine in 1922.
Alfred C. Patstone, Farm Road, 1997

Mary Clay looked out of the window of the old farmhouse. The view was dreary enough—hill
and field and woodland, bare, colorless, mist-covered- with no other house in sight. She had never been
a woman to crave for company. She liked sewing. She was passionately fond of reading. She was not
fond of talking. Probably she could have been very happy at Cromb Farm—alone. Before her marriage
she had looked forward to the long evenings with her sewing and reading. She knew that she would be
busy enough in the day, for the farmhouse was old and rambling, and she was to have no help in the
housework. But she looked forward to quiet, peaceful, lamplit evenings; and only lately, after ten years
of married life, had she reluctantly given up the hope of them. For peace was far enough from the old
farm kitchen in the evening. It was driven away by John Clay's loud voice, raised always in orders or
complaints, or in the stumbling, incoherent reading aloud of his newspaper.

Mary was a silent woman herself and a lover of silence. But John liked to hear the sound of his
voice; he liked to shout at her; to call for her from one room to another; above all, he liked to hear his
voice reading the paper out loud to her in the evening. She dreaded that most of all. It had lately seemed
to jar on her nerves till she felt she must scream aloud. His voice going on and on, raucous and sing-
song, became unspeakably irritating. His "Mary!" summoning her from her household work to
wherever he happened to be, his "Get my slippers," or "Bring me my pipe," exasperated her almost to
the point of rebellion. "Get your own slippers" had trembled on her lips, but had never passed them,
for she was a woman who could not bear anger. Noise of any kind appalled her.
She had borne it for ten years, so surely she could go on with it. Yet today, as she gazed hopelessly
at the wintry country side, she became acutely conscious that she could not go on with it.
Something must happen. Yet what was there that could happen? It was Christmas next week.
She smiled ironically at the thought. Then she noticed the figure of her husband coming up the road.
He came in at the gate and round to the side-door.
"Mary!"

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She went slowly in answer to the summons. He held a letter in his hand.
"Met the postman," he said. "From your aunt."
She opened the letter and read it in silence. Both of them knew quite well what it contained.
"She wants us to go over for Christmas again," said Mary.
He began to grumble.
"She's as deaf as a post. She's 'most as deaf as her mother was. She ought to know better than to ask
folks over when she can't hear a word any one says."
Mary said nothing. He always grumbled about the invitation at first, but really he wanted to
go. He liked to talk with her uncle. He liked the change of going down to the village for a few days
and hearing all its gossip. He could quite well leave the farm to the "hands" for that time.
The Crewe deafness was proverbial. Mary's great-grandmother had gone stone deaf at the age
of thirty-five; her daughter had inherited the affliction and her grand-daughter, the aunt with whom
Mary had spent her childhood, had inherited it also at exactly the same age. "All right," he said at last,
grudgingly, as though in answer to her silence, "we'd better go. Write and say we'll go."
*****
It was Christmas Eve. They were in the kitchen of her uncle's farmhouse. The deaf old woman
sat in her chair by the fire knitting. Upon her sunken face there was a curious sardonic smile that was
her habitual expression. The two men stood in the doorway. Mary sat at the table looking aimlessly
out of the window. Outside, the snow fell in blinding showers. Inside, the fire gleamed on to the copper
pots and pans, the crockery on the old oak dresser, the hams hanging from the ceiling. Suddenly James
turned.
"Jane!" he said. The deaf woman never stirred.
"Jane!" Still there was no response upon the enigmatic old face by the fireside.
"Jane!" She turned slightly towards the voice.
"Get them photos from upstairs to show John," he bawled.
"What about boats?" she said.
"Photos!" roared her husband.
"Coats?" she quavered.
Mary looked from one to the other. The man made a gesture of irritation and went from the
room. He came back with a pile of picture postcards in his hand.
"It's quicker to do a thing oneself," he grumbled. "They're what my brother sent from Switzerland,
where he's working now. It's a fine land, to judge from the views of it."

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John took them from his hand. "She gets worse?" he said nodding towards the old woman.
She was sitting gazing at the fire, her lips curved into the curious smile. Her husband shrugged his
shoulders. "Aye. She's nigh as bad as her mother was."
"And her grandmother."
"Aye. It takes longer to tell her to do something than to do it myself. And deaf folks get a bit stupid,
too. Can't see what you mean. They're best let alone."
The other man nodded and lit his pipe. Then James opened the door.
"The snow's stopped," he said. "Shall we go to the end of the village and back?"
The other nodded, and took his cap from behind the door. A gust of cold air filled the room as they
went out. Mary took a paper-backed book from the table and came over to the fireplace.
"Mary!"
She started. It was not the sharp, querulous voice of the deaf old woman, it was more like the voice
of the young aunt whom Mary remembered in childhood. The old woman was leaning forward,
looking at her intently.
"Mary! A happy Christmas to 'ee."
And, as if in spite of herself, Mary answered in her ordinary low tones.
"The same to you, auntie."
"Thank 'ee. Thank 'ee."
Mary gasped.
"Aunt! Can you hear me speaking like this?"
The old woman laughed, silently, rocking to and fro in her chair as if with pent-up merriment of
years.
"Yes, I can hear 'ee, child. I've allus heard 'ee."
Mary clasped her hand eagerly.
"Then—you're cured, Aunt—"
"Ay. I'm cured as far as there was ever anything to be cured."
"You—?"
"I was never deaf, child, nor never will be, please God. I've took you all in fine."
Mary stood up in bewilderment.
"You? Never deaf?"
The old woman chuckled again.

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"No, nor my mother—nor her mother neither." Mary shrank back from her.
"I—I don't know what you mean," she said, unsteadily. "Have you been—pretending?"
"I'll make you a Christmas present of it, dearie," said the old woman. "My mother made me a
Christmas present of it when I was your age, and her mother made her one. I haven't a lass of my
own to give it to, so I give it to you. It can come on quite sudden like, if you want it, and then you
can hear what you choose and not hear what you choose. Do you see?" She leant nearer and
whispered, "You're shut out of it all—of having to fetch and carry for 'em, answer their daft
questions and run their errands like a dog. I've watched you, my lass. You don't get much peace,
do you?"
Mary was trembling.
"Oh, I don't know what to think," she said. "I—I couldn't do it."
"Do what you like," said the old woman. "Take it as a present, anyways—the Crewe deafness for
a Christmas present," she chuckled. "Use it or not as you like. You'll find it main amusin',
anyways."
And into the old face there came again that curious smile as if she carried in her heart some jest fit
for the gods on Olympus. The door opened suddenly with another gust of cold air, and the two
men came in again, covered with fine snow.
"I—I'll not do it," whispered Mary, trembling.
"We didn't get far. It's coming on again," remarked John, hanging up his cap.
The old woman rose and began to lay the supper, silently and deftly, moving from cupboard to
table without looking up. Mary sat by the fire, motionless and speechless, her eyes fixed on the
glowing coals.
"Any signs o' the deafness in her?" whispered James, looking towards Mary. "It come on my wife
jus' when she was that age." "Aye. So I've heered."
Then he said loudly, "Mary!"
A faint pink colour came into her cheeks, but she did not show by look or movement that she had
heard. James looked significantly at her husband.
The old woman stood still for a minute with a cup in each hand and smiled her slow, subtle smile.

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Teodora Tărăntuș

The Bremen Town Musicians

by The Brothers Grimm

The Brothers Grimm tell the tale of outcast animals-- a donkey, dog, cat, and
rooster-- who find a new home, though they never actually make it to the town
of Bremen. They foil the robbers with their individual talents; part of the second
volume of Grimm's fairytale collection, "Kinder- und Hausmärchen," translated
asChildren's and Household Tales

A certain man had a donkey, which had carried the corn-sacks to the
mill indefatigably for many a long year; but his strength was going, and he was growing more and
more unfit for work. Then his master began to consider how he might best save his keep; but the
donkey, seeing that no good wind was blowing, ran away and set out on the road to Bremen.
"There," he thought, "I can surely be town-musician." When he had walked some distance, he
found a hound lying on the road, gasping like one who had run till he was tired. "What are you
gasping so for, you big fellow?" asked the donkey.
"Ah," replied the hound, "as I am old, and daily grow weaker, and no longer can hunt, my master
wanted to kill me, so I took to flight; but now how am I to earn my bread?"
"I tell you what," said the donkey, "I am going to Bremen, and shall be town-musician there; go
with me and engage yourself also as a musician. I will play the lute, and you shall beat the
kettledrum."The hound agreed, and on they went.
Before long they came to a cat, sitting on the path, with a face like three rainy days! "Now
then, old shaver, what has gone askew with you?" asked the donkey.
"Who can be merry when his neck is in danger?" answered the cat. "Because I am now getting old,
and my teeth are worn to stumps, and I prefer to sit by the fire and spin, rather than hunt about
after mice, my mistress wanted to drown me, so I ran away. But now good advice is scarce. Where
am I to go?"
"Go with us to Bremen. You understand night-music, you can be a town-musician."
The cat thought well of it, and went with them. After this the three fugitives came to a farm-yard,
where the cock was sitting upon the gate, crowing with all his might. "Your crow goes through
and through one," said the donkey. "What is the matter?"
"I have been foretelling fine weather, because it is the day on which Our Lady washes the Christ-
child's little shirts, and wants to dry them," said the cock; "but guests are coming for Sunday, so
the housewife has no pity, and has told the cook that she intends to eat me in the soup to-morrow,
and this evening I am to have my head cut off. Now I am crowing at full pitch while I can."
"Ah, but red-comb," said the donkey, "you had better come away with us. We are going to Bremen;
you can find something better than death everywhere: you have a good voice, and if we make
music together it must have some quality!"
The cock agreed to this plan, and all four went on together. They could not, however, reach
the city of Bremen in one day, and in the evening they came to a forest where they meant to pass
the night. The donkey and the hound laid themselves down under a large tree, the cat and the cock
settled themselves in the branches; but the cock flew right to the top, where he was most safe.

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Before he went to sleep he looked round on all four sides, and thought he saw in the distance a
little spark burning; so he called out to his companions that there must be a house not far off, for
he saw a light. The donkey said, "If so, we had better get up and go on, for the shelter here is bad."
The hound thought that a few bones with some meat on would do him good too!
So they made their way to the place where the light was, and soon saw it shine brighter and
grow larger, until they came to a well-lighted robber's house. The donkey, as the biggest, went to
the window and looked in.
"What do you see, my grey-horse?" asked the cock. "What do I see?" answered the donkey; "a
table covered with good things to eat and drink, and robbers sitting at it enjoying themselves."
"That would be the sort of thing for us," said the cock. "Yes, yes; ah, how I wish we were there!"
said the donkey.
Then the animals took counsel together how they should manage to drive away the robbers,
and at last they thought of a plan. The donkey was to place himself with his fore-feet upon the
window-ledge, the hound was to jump on the donkey's back, the cat was to climb upon the dog,
and lastly the cock was to fly up and perch upon the head of the cat.
When this was done, at a given signal, they began to perform their music together: the
donkey brayed, the hound barked, the cat mewed, and the cock crowed; then they burst through
the window into the room, so that the glass clattered! At this horrible din, the robbers sprang up,
thinking no otherwise than that a ghost had come in, and fled in a great fright out into the forest.
The four companions now sat down at the table, well content with what was left, and ate as if they
were going to fast for a month.
As soon as the four minstrels had done, they put out the light, and each sought for himself a
sleeping-place according to his nature and to what suited him. The donkey laid himself down upon
some straw in the yard, the hound behind the door, the cat upon the hearth near the warm ashes,
and the cock perched himself upon a beam of the roof; and being tired from their long walk, they
soon went to sleep.
When it was past midnight, and the robbers saw from afar that the light was no longer
burning in their house, and all appeared quiet, the captain said, "We ought not to have let ourselves
be frightened out of our wits;" and ordered one of them to go and examine the house.
The messenger finding all still, went into the kitchen to light a candle, and, taking the
glistening fiery eyes of the cat for live coals, he held a lucifer-match to them to light it. But the cat
did not understand the joke, and flew in his face, spitting and scratching. He was dreadfully
frightened, and ran to the back-door, but the dog, who lay there sprang up and bit his leg; and as
he ran across the yard by the straw-heap, the donkey gave him a smart kick with its hind foot. The
cock, too, who had been awakened by the noise, and had become lively, cried down from the beam,
"Cock-a-doodle-doo!"
Then the robber ran back as fast as he could to his captain, and said, "Ah, there is a horrible
witch sitting in the house, who spat on me and scratched my face with her long claws; and by the
door stands a man with a knife, who stabbed me in the leg; and in the yard there lies a black
monster, who beat me with a wooden club; and above, upon the roof, sits the judge, who called
out, 'Bring the rogue here to me!' so I got away as well as I could." After this the robbers did not
trust themselves in the house again; but it suited the four musicians of Bremen so well that they
did not care to leave it any more. And the mouth of him who last told this story is still warm.