The Fat Man (21 page)

Finally, a MOO. I might just make it out of Pottersville after all.

Ginger and the rest of the herd busted through the arena wall like it was milking time and the farmer had cold hands. Butter and the other magnificent seven milkmaids each rode on a big cow, whooping and hollering a stampede that ran over everything. Some of the drummers and pipers scrambled up walls to get out of the way. The lords’ leashes were cut loose and they began to bounce willy-nilly into the stands.

At the first sign of trouble, the birds had stopped using me as a piñata, but one swan in particular was especially hungry and he wasn’t going to let a little old stampede stop him. His neck coiled back like a rattle-snake and he aimed his beak at my head, but this time I was ready. As he struck, I put the chain between my hands in his way.

CLANK!
The swan’s beak snapped the iron like it was made of paper. My arms were free and one swan was nursing a bent beak.

Another swan cocked his head back to attack, so I grabbed a couple of calling birds off my chest and aimed them at the swan. When the swan struck, I squeezed the calling birds by the neck and they pecked the swan’s eyes like they were on salary. The swan fell away and I tossed the two calling birds into the crowd. This was fun.

My feet were still shackled, so I hopped over to the French hens, tossing the other two calling birds at them like grenades. Being French, the hens skedaddled out of the way in a hot hurry and I slapped my foot chain under their guillotine and slammed the blade down.

I was free. Dingleberry would be proud. I looked like the hero in a
By George Adventure
.

“Hey, Gumdrop honey!” I heard Butter say above the din. I turned and there she was, riding Ginger. “Hop on. We’re not out of the woods yet, sugar.”

Butter pointed to the stands and I saw that Not So Tiny Tim was rounding up the drummers and pipers and pointing in my general direction. I took Butter’s hand and she pulled me up on Ginger and put me behind her. There was one bad-looking swan dead ahead, its wings spread and its neck coiled like a cobra. Butter looked over her shoulder at me and said, “Hold on tight, darling. Momma’s going through.” Butter gave Ginger a kick in the ribs and she charged. Cow 1, Swan 0.

Ginger headed to the nearest hole in the wall at a full gallop with me and Butter hanging on for dear life. The other cows and milkmaids pulled in right behind us, blocking us from most of the mob, but the chase had begun.

“We have to get to the bridge at the river before they cut us off,” I yelled to Butter.

“You are preaching to the choir, sugar,” Butter said. “Ginger here is running so fast we’re going to be toasting our escape in Kringle Town with milk shakes.”

We galloped at full throttle, not stopping for any lights. We had a pretty good lead ahead of the mob, but there were side streets and alleys everywhere; it was only a matter of time before something jumped out.

Drummers!

They skidded around a corner in front of us and brought a few pipers with them to block the street. They were a motley bunch, Yule Pirates, screaming and waving flutes and drumsticks to beat the band. Getting past them wasn’t going to be as easy as mowing down a swan.

“Any ideas?” Butter asked me, but my swash was unbuckled. If we charged them, there was a good chance that Butter and I would be yanked off and Ginger would be tenderized. The other milkmaids and cows might then make it through, and while it would be good for them, they wouldn’t be much help when it came to going to Misfit Isle and saving Santa. As bright as the full moon was, it wasn’t illuminating any escape paths on the dark street and my hope sank.

But then, the Lord works in mysterious ways.

The leaping lords do too.

They came bounding out into the street ahead of us like a house on fire, trying to help. But they were wild, launching off the sides of buildings like popcorn in a popper. Just like in the mansion, the lords rained down on the pipers and drummers like comets, crushing the menacing musicians like a jackhammer on an anthill. An instant later, the pipers and drummers were spread out across the intersection as flat as pancakes and the lords were arching back up into the sky.

“Go!” I yelled to Ginger. We had just a few seconds. If we could get the herd through fast enough, the only thing the lords would squash coming back down was the mob behind us. Ginger put her head down and ran, and the other cows were close at her hoofs.

The next thing I heard behind me was the wet, sticky
SPLAT
of a few swans and Pottersville citizens meeting the business end of a leaping lord’s boot. It was a beautiful sound, giving us a little more distance. And we were going to need it too. I looked up the street and there were the Six Geese a-Laying waiting for us. By the stack of eggs behind them, it looked like they had plenty of ammunition.

The first egg caught me in the shoulder and lit a pain inferno! The eggs were hard-boiled, cooked to hurt. We were about to be stoned to death by a gaggle of geese.

But sometimes you just get lucky. You might remember in
A Christmas Carol
how the Cratchit kids loved chowing on goose, making a lot of happy noise when Momma Cratchit served up even the scrawniest bird. Years back, some of the Cratchit cousins had crossed the bridge to Pottersville, miffed that Dickens had not featured them in a sequel. The Cratchit cousins were the worst gang of hooligans you ever saw, closer to a pack of werewolves, but they loved a good goose too. The next thing I knew the Cratchit cousins—out for their nightly crime spree stroll—sprung out at the Six Geese a-Laying like an Apache war tribe. The geese never knew what hit them, their necks were wrung by cold, grimy, hungry hands. A second later, the Cratchits hauled off their kill to some dark cave, leaving nothing behind but some feathers and some geese grease.

Holding on to Butter, I tried to take inventory of who or what could still stop us as we rumbled to the bridge. I had taken care of the Three French Hens by hitting them with the Four Calling Birds, killing seven birds with one stone. I didn’t know how many swans were out of commission and the Cratchit cousins had eighty-sixed the geese. I wasn’t worried about the turtle doves because we could hear them three blocks over, lost and arguing.

That left the partridge and a handful of swans. If we got lucky, we might be able to outrun them and Not So Tiny Tim’s mob.

We didn’t get lucky.

Ginger skidded around a corner on two hoofs and then came to a quick stop in the middle of a junction where five streets spilled into a huge square. Coming out of the street straight ahead of us sat the partridge, feathers ruffled. The other three streets seemed empty, but the smirk on the partridge’s beak made me hesitate. The little bird skipped forward a little and waved his pear tree branch at Ginger. “Try and run over me, you big dairy truck,” he said, “and I’ll grind your legs into chipped beef.” Ginger took a step back and I can’t say that I blame her.

I scanned the three streets for a trap. I couldn’t see anything, but I could hear the awful hissings of swans. But the sound was bouncing off the buildings and alley walls, so I couldn’t tell from which street and how many swans there were.

The partridge gave a short little laugh. “I know what you’re thinking. Did I kill four swans or five? Well, to tell you the truth, in all the excitement, I kind of lost track myself. But seeing as how if you choose wrong, there might be a hard-beaked swan ready to take your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?”

I was in a spot and the partridge knew it. I know I got a couple of swans when I busted out of the Five Golden Rings and the leaping lords mashed at least a couple more. Were there enough left to fill the three alleys? The Pottersville mob was closing in.

“What do you want to do, darling?” Butter asked.

“Any idea which street is a straight shot to the bridge?” I whispered.

“I think the one on the right,” Butter said. “But wouldn’t that be the one they block?”

“Or that is what they would want us to think,” I said. “Go right.”

“You got it, sweetie,” Butter said. Then with her right hand, the milkmaid ripped off her bonnet and waved it in a big circle. “Forward, ho!”

Ginger blasted across the square, sparks kicking off her hoofs. The rest of the cows rumbled right behind, pounding the earth so hard it almost shook your teeth out. By the way the partridge was swearing, I knew we picked the right street. I could see the bridge just up the hill. Once we crossed to the other side of the bridge, getting back to Kringle Town was a cinch.

But why make things easy? To this day, I don’t know what made me look at the cemetery, but I did.

“Hold on a second, would you, Ginger?” I said. “Stop right here.”

There just wasn’t something right about leaving Sherlock Stetson to rot in Potter’s Field. Even if the kids never cottoned to him, Sherlock Stetson was a good toy and a stand-up guy. I just couldn’t leave him.

I zigzagged through the graveyard as fast as I could in the moonlight. Butter, the milkmaids and the cows were waiting for me by the road, and I could hear the mob roaring up the hill. I found Sherlock Stetson in a few pieces and scooped him up in a jiffy, careful not to leave any parts behind. I stuffed him in my vest pocket and hightailed it back.

“Heck of a time to pay your respects,” Butter said. I had barely landed on Ginger’s back before our cattle drive had kicked back into high gear with one goal in mind: get all the way across the bridge before getting caught.

But because I stopped for Sherlock, we weren’t going to make it. I had worked enough Christmas Eves studying time, distance and speed to know that Not So Tiny Tim’s mob was faster. We would get to the bridge, but they’d swallow us up halfway there and that would be the end of that. A few hours later, Santa would walk into the trap Zsa Zsa set for him on Misfit Isle and then the Christmas light would be snuffed out. There would be no more silent nights, or holy ones. Heaven and nature wouldn’t sing; they’d gripe, cry and spit regret. In a few seconds, my world—the one I forgot to love enough, the one I thought wasn’t fair enough—would be done. I missed it already.

But then I got a great reminder that Christmas was about hope and miracles.

The rope shot up into the sky. It was almost silver in the starlight, climbing higher and higher until the end of it spread across the heavens like a galaxy of good wishes. The rope unfolded into a beautiful ring and fell around the moon like a hug from an old friend. It was the kind of sight you wished for when you needed a friend. It was a whole hatful of wishes.

George Bailey lassoed the moon.

From his hiding spot in Pottersville, the real-life hero of
By George Adventures
gave the rope a yank and the moon drifted down as easy as if he were reeling in a kite. We ducked under the moon as we came onto the bridge and then George steered the moon between the mob and us.

“Thanks, George. I guess you are real after all,” I said.

“Yep, yep, that’s right, Gumdrop, I’m always around,” By George said. “I’m kind of a top secret Santa’s Helper. You know the old boy can’t do it all, and he asked me to hang around and keep an eye on folks that need the most looking after. There are people everywhere, even in the darkest corners of our world, who need a second chance, and, you know, I believe everyone should get a second chance. They should get a third and fourth chance too. They should get as many chances as they want to live again.”

I found myself grinning like Dingleberry Fizz. The best part was that we were safe. George hadn’t disappeared. He hadn’t built skyscrapers a hundred stories high, or bridges a mile long. He hadn’t done anything for himself. The life he lived in
By George Adventures
was real. By saving the day, George inspired everyone to always be on the lookout for the other guy. It is a gift so simple, it’s no wonder I didn’t see it.

The worst part was that it might have been too late to share that gift. Right now, Zsa Zsa could be putting a stake of holly through the Fat Man’s heart, ending the Ho ho ho in all of us.

Suddenly, there was a crack and I saw Not So Tiny Tim using all his strength to try and squeeze under the moon. Since he was still trying to stop me, I figured I still had a chance to save Santa.

“Take care of him for me, will ya, George?” I said, pointing to Not So Tiny Tim as I took off for Misfit Isle.