Page 77 of The Christmas Invitation
‘Look at all these old boxes of crackers in the display cases!’ I exclaimed, fascinated. ‘I love this Zoo box. Do you think that dates from the sixties?’ I asked Henry.
‘Probably, going by the clothes the children are wearing on the box front,’ he agreed.
‘We’ll have to bring you back another day, dear, so you can have a better look around,’ promised Clara. ‘After Christmas, when they reopen.’
‘That will be New Year – if you’re still here by then, of course,’ said Lex.
‘We hope she will be,’ Henry said. ‘Come on. Teddy’s just vanished into the Christmas shop.’
‘The entrance to Santa’s Grotto is just off it,’ Lex explained to me as we threaded our way through racks of sparkling baubles, a rainbow of tinsel, festoons of fairy lights and great stacks of the various kinds of Marwood crackers. ‘I always take him in and keep him occupied while Clara and Henry look for stocking fillers.’
Teddy reappeared from behind an illuminated wire polar bear and, taking both our hands again, urged us towards the arched door hung with the ‘Santa’s Grotto Entrance’ sign.
‘Looks like you’re both going,’ said Clara, amused. ‘See you later.’
There was a queue of excited children that stretched from the entrance, along a snowy scene of lit fir trees and fairy lights and over a small wooden bridge to the door of Santa’s cottage. When we’d shuffled nearer, we could see the man himself when the door curtain was drawn back tolet in the next child, sitting in a big chair by a flickering fake log fire.
The children and parents were admitted through the door by a tall, green-clad teenage elf with a dark-skinned, serious face, horn-rimmed glasses and a very sweet smile.
The children must have made their exit from the other side, for no one came out again. It probably led straight back into the shop, I thought, as we inched over the bridge and stopped by a tableau of large reindeer.
The nearest one suddenly made a whirring noise and, moving its head up and down, said cheerily, ‘Hi, I’m Rudolf!’
‘Hello, Rudolf,’ said Teddy, regarding him doubtfully, but that seemed to be the extent of his repertoire, for he fell silent until we heard him repeat himself ten minutes later as we finally arrived at the doorway.
‘Are you ready for the next one, Nick?’ asked the door elf, turning to look behind her through a gap in the curtain.
‘That’s Santa’s real name – Saint Nicholas,’ Teddy whispered to me. ‘Uncle Henry told me.’
‘Send ’em in,’ said a high-pitched, fluting voice.
It was dark in the grotto, but we could make out Father Christmas by the light of the fire and a few dim lanterns. He was a tiny and ancient-looking man with what was clearly his own silvery-white hair and long beard. He had been having a refreshing cup of tea, but handed the empty mug to another elf and said, ‘Ho, ho, ho, and who do we have here?’
Teddy approached him. ‘I’m Teddy Mariner and I’m eight.’ He frowned and then added suspiciously, ‘You’re very small and old, and you don’t look the same as you did when you came to my school yesterday.’
‘Good grief, have I changed sizeagain?’ exclaimed Santa, with commendable quick-wittedness. ‘When I’m away fromLapland, I never know what I’m going to look like from one day to the next. I could even be tall and black tomorrow.’
‘You can change colour, too?’ Teddy asked, impressed and round-eyed.
‘Yes, it’s one of my magic powers.’
‘I think you look nice now, even if you are smaller than your elves,’ Teddy told him.
‘Thank you. Perhaps I’ll stay like this today, then.’
‘Can I ask you something, Santa?’
‘Fire right ahead,’ said Santa warily.
‘Do you think Mummy will bring me a pony when she comes for Christmas? I put it at the top of the list I sent you.’
Father Christmas pursed his lips and ruminated. ‘How is she travelling? Car or train?’
‘Train, because she doesn’t drive.’
‘Pity,’ said Santa, shaking his head. ‘They won’t let ponies on the train. I think she’ll have to bring you something else off your list instead. Remind me of one or two other things you put on it?’
‘A castle, and some dragons to live in it. A real geologist’s hammer and goggles … and all the Narnia books in a box. I’ve seen them in the shop in Great Mummingandthey’ve got a pirate game with a real wooden treasure chest and gold coins.’ He paused. ‘If I did get the pony, I’d need a new riding hat, because my old one is too small … Oh, and I’d like some proper paints like artists have, because I’m too big for poster paints and anyway, they run. I might be an artist when I grow up, like Meg.’ He gestured to me, standing in the shadows with Lex. ‘I was going to be a jockey, but Lex says I’m going to be too big, like him.’
