One Horse Open Sleigh, C T [best books to read .TXT] 📗

      Jamie was riding in a one horse open sleigh over the snow covered river bridge and through the snow covered woods. The bells jingled on the harness of the large horse from which steam rose into the cold air. Aunt Beth held the reigns in her thick gloves. She also wore a big warm hat and coat. Jamie sat behind her back in the sleigh full of wrapped presents. The sleigh was moving toward Grandmother's house, the last stop on a long ride. Aunt Beth was distributing gifts to family, friends, and strangers all along the long route. Jamie was feeling restless.

      As the sleigh passed through a hail of black pine cones falling from the snowy canopy, Jamie's thoughts became mean spirited. This was probably not the fault of the dark pine cones hitting his bare head. There was a darkness in the boy himself same as in all mankind. Jamie had thrown his black wool hat into the snow a few miles back in childish protest when Aunt Beth would not let him stay at the warm inn where she had stopped to distribute gifts. She insisted that Jamie continue on with her, in the freezing cold, to Grandmother's house.

      In a mean mood, Jamie unwrapped a present behind Aunt Beth's back. After seeing it, he threw the present overboard into the snow! He did this once more and then again and again. Aunt Beth's head did not turn from the horse with bells full of steam. Jamie laughed as he unwrapped the gifts and then watched them fall into the snowy sleigh tracks. He threw the gift of a tea pot at a rock, where it broke, and the gift of a doll into the snowy brier.

      After Jamie had opened and tossed most of the gifts, the sleigh began to slow. When Jamie had thrown all the gifts, Aunt Beth slumped over in her seat and the horse stopped. The horses bells became silent. The reigns dropped from Aunt Beth's gloved hands into the snow. She was motionless as if dead or frozen. Jamie stood in the cold, still, and silent sleigh for a long moment.

      Then along the sleigh tracks appeared a handsome slim fellow all dressed in red.  He was gathering all the gifts which Jamie had thrown. He was bare headed himself and stepped lightly through the snow in his long boots. He mended the broken tea pot with the touch of his glove! And he re-wrapped the presents with the touch of his long dark red woolen cape! He carried the gifts to the open sleigh where Jamie sat and he put them back. He was not such an old fellow but far the wiser than Jamie and old enough to have a beard. Jamie was annoyed by this fellow, if not frightened or both.

      The fellow returned the reigns to Aunt Beth's gloved hands and helped her to sit up. Then he pet the horse. The fellow then pulled Jamie from the sleigh.  With a strength that Jamie had never felt, he threw Jamie high up into the cold air.  Jamie fell down into the snow. Aunt Beth's sleigh moved off with steam and bells, leaving Jamie behind. The handsome fellow in the dark red woolen cape stood very near Jamie looking down at him without a smile.

      “Maybe I'll freeze to death!” said Jamie.

      “You think that is all?” asked the handsome fellow. He pulled a bright woolen red hat out of his cape and covered his own hair. Then the fellow pulled Jamie's black hat out of his cape, the hat Jamie had thrown into the snow miles ago. He gave Jamie that black hat. “Merry Christmas,” he said.

      Jamie was then aware of reindeer and other animals in the snowy woods surrounding the fellow. The deer and rabbits and foxes and chipmunks and all the animals steamed like the horse.  The fellow gathered a snow ball in his hands.  He took a deep breath and blew upon the snowball and in Jamie's face. All the animals and the fellow vanished in a dense puff of snow in which Jamie heard the infant wail.

Text: CT
Publication Date: 01-10-2012

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