Produced by Al Haines
The morning after Christmas Eve is the worst morning-after there is.
The very house suffers the headache that follows a prolonged spree.
Remorse stalks at large; remorse for the things one gave—and did not
give—and got.
Everybody must act a general glee which can be felt onlyspecifically, if at all. Everybody must exclaim about everything Oh!and Ah! and How Sweet of You! and Isn't it Perfectly Dear! The veryTHING I Wanted! and How DID you EVER Guess it?
Christmas morning in the town of Carthage is a day when most of thepeople keep close at home, for Christmas is another passover. It isSanta Claus that passes over.
People in Carthage are not rich; the shops are not grandiose, andinter-family presents are apt to be trivial and futile—or worse yet,utile.
The Carthaginian mother generally finds that Father has credited thehat she got last fall, to this Christmas; the elder brothers receivewarm under-things and the young ones brass-toed boots, mitts andmufflers. The girls may find something ornamental in theirstockings, and their stockings may be silk or nearly—but then girlshave to be foolishly diked up anyway, or they will never be marriedout. Dressing up daughters comes under the head of window-display orcoupons, and is charged off to publicity.
Nearly everybody in Carthage—except Mrs. Ulysses S. G.Budlong—celebrates Christmas behind closed doors. People find iteasier to rhapsodize when the collateral is not shown. It is amazinghow far a Carthaginian can go on the most meager donation. Theformula is usually: "We had Such a lovely Christmas at our house.What did I get? Oh, so many things I can't reMember!"
But Mrs. Ulysses S. G. Budlong does not celebrate her Christmassesbehind closed doors—or rather she did not: a strange change cameover her this last Christmas. She used to open her doorswide—metaphorically, that is; for there was a storm-door with aspring on it to keep the cold draught out of the hall.
As regular as Christmas itself was the oh-quite-informal receptionMrs. Budlong gave to mitigate the ineffable stupidity of Christmasafternoon: that dolorous period when one meditates the ancientplatitude that anticipation is better than realization; and suddenlyunderstands why it is blesseder to give than to receive: because onedoes not have to wear what one gives away.
On Christmas Mrs. U. S. G. Budlong took all the gifts she hadgleaned, and piled them on and around the baby grand piano in theback parlor. There was a piano lamp there, one of those illuminatedumbrellas—about as large and as useful as a date-palm tree.
Along about that time in the afternoon when the Christmas dinnerbecomes a matter of hopeless remorse, Mrs. Budlong's neighbors wereexpected to drop in and view the