| |
Before he left to meet his many obligations, Michael instructed me to go to the third floor, and find the faculty green room. (“It’s the room that isn’t green.”) I was told to wait there for a stage manager who had been appointed to train me.
The walls of the green room were painted light beige, and it was furnished with plain tables and folding chairs. Newspapers were stacked near a percolator and a tray of biscuits. A few serious-faced people drank coffee and scanned headlines in silence. No one looked twice at me.
On the wall, I found a bulletin board busy with notes, schedules and reminders. My eye went to the largest sheet, a chart listing each performer, and a box in which to indicate by check mark that they had arrived, presumably on time.
Secret Feast Call Sheet
Call Time 4:30 PM - Friday, Dec. 24
(Happy Christmas Eve!)
Principal Players
Father Christmas/ Kris - Michael Brams
Mother Solstice/ Iris - Charlotte Remy
Martin Piper - Martin Milberg
Grim Frost/ Evan - James Pym
Forest Players
Flutterbold - Nigel Storm
Drillmast – Ivan Holst
Lemuel Greenleaf - Kevin Liftin
Sara Greenleaf - Sara Niley-Liftin
Forest Abduction Brigade
Wheatbrew- Kenneth Kilser
Copper- Brenda Schoene
Branchstaff- Heinrich Schoene
I studied the list with fascination. Putting names to characters I had met, had believed in, less than twenty-four hours ago was new in my experience. I wanted to meet each of them before they put on these fanciful personas. As I stared at the typewritten sheet, I heard my name.
“Mannie Candler! Good to see you again.”
A young man with sandy blonde hair approached. It was Nate Garrick. “Recognize me?” he said. “Captain Magnificent, in person.”
Very North was full of surprises. This one turned my face red, with a combination of embarrassment and defensiveness.
“I never called you that,” I said, lying on an impulse.
Nate chuckled. “Not what I’ve heard. Hey, you look surprised. Didn’t anyone tell ya I’d be your stage manager?”
“No,” I said, and it came out impetuous.
“Figures. Everyone’s so busy.” Then he held out his hand. “Welcome aboard,” he said.
I didn’t offer my hand, but stood fixed to the spot, overthinking my next words, and so, said nothing.
“All right, we better get it out of the way,” said Nate. “Everyone says you’re jealous about me an’ Olivia. So, all I got to say to that is, I know how you feel.”
“You do?”
“She talks about you so much, I can’t tell if she cares a crap for me.” Next came the ingratiating smile. He mussed my hair with his hand. I glared.
“Right, we’ll leave it be. Ya ready to get to work?”
“Fine,” I said, very quietly.
Nate ignored my terrible manners, and spoke to me affably.
“We’ve got to sign you in, first,” he said. He pointed out a second sheet on the board. It was labeled Faculty Sign In. Near the end of the list, I saw my own name.
Mannie Candler – Apprentice
I knew instant delight in seeing myself acknowledged as an official part of this operation. My name on that sheet meant I belonged, even in modest capacity, to something wondrous in the world.
“All right,” said Nate, “We’ve got a lot to cover. Let’s start in the frock shop.”
The costume department was just down the hall. Amid the riot of clothes racks, sewing stations and walls hung with scraps and samples, half a dozen women in aprons busied themselves with repairs. Even on this upper floor, the temperature was cool enough that most of them wore sweaters. From the middle of the shop floor, a voice shouted “Hello Mannie!”
It was Olivia. She was sorting through the candidate’s colorful knitted sweaters. She wore a pair of wire rim glasses. I hadn’t known she ever needed them, but then, I saw her so seldom. Her hair was tied in a loose ponytail with candy-striped ribbon, and she sported a black turtleneck sweater. The overall effect was that she looked a few years older than she had at the party last Sunday. And I felt so much younger still when I answered ‘hello’ back, and my voice cracked.
“Another surprise, eh?” Nate clapped my back again. You couldn’t fault him for lack of exuberance.
“You work here?” I asked Olivia.
“I’m just volunteering for today. Nate actually gets paid to be here. Isn’t that great?”
“Yeah,” I said. “It must be the best job in the world.”
“Got that right,” Nate said.
“He’ll talk your ear off about it later. Let me show you the frock shop!”
Olivia took my hand and led me to the back of the wide room, past racks of clothes and bags of laundry.
“I want to show you the master wall first. It’s got everything.”
Before me, the entire story of the Secret Feast was laid out in costumes, mounted on pegs and displayed for optimal visibility. I could run the events of last night through my head as I scanned the display. They were nearly in order; the forest clothes of Lemuel and Flutterbold, the different coats and hats worn by Martin and Kris, Iris’s gowns and Evan’s antlered crown.
“These are the prototypes,” Nate said. “The crew make sure that every costume matches the concept perfectly. My mum’s in charge of it.”
“That’s how Nate got the job,” said Olivia with a wry smile.
“Let’s show him the masks.” Nate pulled me to a nearby corner. I saw three faces of Kris hanging on the wall. These were carefully crafted masks of Father Christmas, in different phases of frostbite. I was stunned and unsettled by the realistic depictions of Kris’s frozen expressions of agony.
“Michael is only on stage at the beginning of the Grim Frost sequence,” Nate explained. “Another performer takes over after the blackouts, wearing these masks.”
“They’re so realistic,” I said. I brushed the back of my hand against one and was surprised to find that it was made of carved wood.
“Martin finds the best artists in the world to make this stuff. He’s a genius. So’s Michael, of course.”
On an adjacent wall, I found the black animal masks of Evan’s servants. They were beautiful and forbidding. The deer mask of Silbersee sat on a nearby table.
“Look at this,” said Nate. “Inside the mask, by the mouth, there’s a kind of glass tube. It distorts the voice. Listen.”
He donned the mask and made a roaring noise into the glass receptacle. Indeed, it had an unearthly, animal quality to it. Thus had Cyrus Murney gone from affable Dad to daunting coachman.
“It’s fantastic,” I said as he put the mask back down on the worktable. “How long have you worked here?” I asked.
“Officially, it’s only my second year,” said Nate. “But I’ve been around a long time. You see that office door that says Eleanor Garrick?”
As soon as he mentioned it, I saw it. Eleanor Garrick - Wardrobe Mistress
“That’s my Mum,” he said proudly. “She’s a genius, too.”
I could see Eleanor Garrick through the window of her door. Her hands and arms were in constant motion as she spoke to one of her staff. As I watched, I saw her face turn toward the three of us. She got Nate’s attention and waved him over. Nate begged our pardon and went to talk to her. I welcomed the chance to speak to Olivia alone, if only for a few moments.
“I hope you don’t mind,” she said, as soon as Nate was gone. “He likes you. And the two of you have a long day ahead.”
By saying so, she made clear that she knew how I felt. That wasn’t surprising, but it put me at a disadvantage. I couldn’t feign indifference and didn’t want to.
“I guess he’s all right,” was the sharpest thing I could think to say.
“Yes, silly boy. He’s very all right.”
“But, he is your boyfriend,” I said.
“Oh, I suppose he is,” she said. “Don’t hold that against him. You’ll just make yourself miserable.”
I had never before felt so conscious of my lack of years. Not even a week ago, Olivia had seemed a kind of giddy and dreamy girl who talked of fanciful things like gnomes and Father Christmas. In soft lantern light, beneath the mistletoe, she had talked about the color of my eyes, and leaned close enough for me to kiss. But of course, that had been an illusion, part of the set-up for my grand surprise. She had been acting. Now I could see that she was a young woman, one who saw herself as significantly older than me. And I could not pretend to be any kind of rival to an impressive boy like Nate, a boy who was older still.
I felt my gaze avoiding Olivia’s. An uncomfortable moment or two passed. Then I gathered the presence of mind to speak again.
“Will you be with us today?”
“No. I’ve got to help out here. I’ll join the two of you at the lunch break. And after that, I’ve got to go home.”
I nodded and gave what I’m sure was a weak smile. She touched my arm.
“You’re going to have a wonderful night. Being in on this secret is the best thing ever!” Then she turned to Nate, who had finished talking to his mother.
He put his arm around her and kissed her quickly before turning his attention back to me. “Are you ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I told him. I decided not to hate him, nor to like him. I decided to love the place, and everything about it.
Nate took me through every inch of the complex. He showed me every hidden door, secret switch and concealed gimmick. The warehouse was like Professor Carabello’s conjuring table, exponentially expanded. With his guidance, I pulled on the levers that made holly wreaths rotate out of seemingly bare walls. I saw the hidden flutes, trumpets, bells and organ pipes that caused the mystic, musical blasts for Mother Solstice. Those sounds were played from an organ-like console, from the windowed booth on the third floor, overlooking the snow yard. I pressed three keys and created a trumpet blast in G major. I got to run my hands along the switches that controlled the colored lights beneath the snow. I made them swirl and dance, though without the practiced grace of the show operators.
In the course of the day, Nate introduced me to the entire cast. They regaled me with stories of past shows. Charlotte Remy, the Belgian actress who played Mother Solstice, talked about how much Trimble used to hate her, and how difficult it was to earn his trust enough to ride on his back. In performance, she had spoken a flawless, uninflected English, but in conversation, she had a pronounced Brussels accent. Brenda and Heinrich Schoene, a husband and wife team, told me of their travels with an Austrian circus. They now lived in Dunedin, and came to Christchurch every Christmas to play Copper and Branchstaff.
“Did you recognize me without my beard?” said Brenda. Her husband laughed and said, “He may wish he hadn’t.”
At every point along the way, Nate regaled me with stories and gossip. The Secret Feast had accumulated vast amounts of insider lore in its dozen years. I envied his lifelong access to it, and I wanted to know everything he had to tell me. I knew that Very North would occupy my thoughts for a long time. I knew it would be my goal to become a vital part of it myself. I didn’t want to tell him so, but he was helping to open up new worlds of possibility for me. The perpetual grin on my face must have given my feelings away, anyhow.
The luncheon interval arrived, and we returned to the green room. Steam trays had been set up, and inside them were slices of roast lamb and ample heaps of shepherd’s pie. Kevin Liftin invited Nate and I to sit with him and his wife Sara. We joined them for a few minutes, but once Olivia arrived, Nate got up and went to sit with her at a different table. I stayed with the Liftins for a few more minutes, then excused myself and walked over to the young couple. I had an uneasy feeling that maybe I wasn’t meant to intrude on Nate and Olivia. Then I decided I didn’t give a damn.
Olivia looked pleased to see me arrive. “Nate says you’re a keen learner.”
“Who wouldn’t be in a place like this.”
“I’m so glad you could make it. After what happened, my dad said you weren’t going to be here. Oh! Mannie, I’m so sorry about Audra!”
“I am too,” I said. “I mean, well, everything is so different now. I hardly remember what my life was like even last week.”
We were silent for a moment or two, and then Nate prompted Olivia to tell me about the long campaign to ensnare Clive into the scheme.
“He was quick to steal the letters from Kris,” she said. “But he remained skeptical about them until he met Flutterbold. Nate and I took him along on what we told him was a date. Flutterbold was to lure him onto the old dirt road, but Clive had figured out where the Moss Circle was, and he charged off on his own to find it. We were close by. Even when you were walking the circle, Mannie. We were just yards away, dressed in our tech blacks. I was so afraid you would spot us.”
“You were there?”
“More often than you know,” said Nate. “I’m the one who took the key from your hand and opened the passage doors for you.”
“And I led your parents to all the observation windows,” said Olivia. “We were watching when you taught the song to that boy.”
“Gordon? You saw that?”
“It was the most difficult task of my life not to laugh!”
“He was something else,” I admitted.
“As I was saying, I guided your parents. We saw you in Clive’s prison cell. We saw you in the ballroom. And I was one of those beastly robed servants, too.”
“Which one?”
“The unicorn.”
I barely remembered seeing a unicorn mask, but then my attention had been well taken with other matters.
“I had no idea,” I said. “All along I thought Clive had stolen your place here.”
“You know, I was a candidate last year,” she said.
“Really? You sure kept that secret from me!”
“I know! It wasn’t easy.”
Nate took Olivia’s hand. “Last year’s show was when I met her. She actually figured the whole works out.”
“Did you?”
Olivia smiled. “They had me going for a while. But sometime during the attack, I began to notice how much the Grim Frost moved like a puppet. I kept playing along, of course. It was delightful.”
“Mannie here bought the whole works,” said Nate.
“There’s nothing wrong with that,” said Olivia. “It’s sweet. And we want people to believe!” She may as well have patted my head and given me a lollipop.
I collected our combined trays and plates and took them to a nearby bin. On purpose, I stayed out of their way as the break came to a close. At a distance, I saw Nate pull Olivia close and kiss her. I broke off whatever remaining strands of hope or concern I was carrying about the matter. I was eager to return to the show.
After Olivia departed for home, Nate and I met up with Martin Milberg in the Chamber of Good Cheer. Martin knelt behind the elaborate mechanical toy theatre, an open toolbox by his side. Several of the little carved figures lay nearby.
“I thought you might want to see this,” Nate said, “since you like toy theatres so much.”
“How did you know that?” I asked.
“Like I said, Olivia’s talked about you,” and he flashed that smile, the one so winning it tweaked my distrust by reflex.
Martin spoke from within the back of the little stage. “Is that Mannie?”
“Yes sir,” I answered.
“Take a look at the stage. Go ahead and flip it on. Let me know if the figures are all standing upright. Sometimes they get snagged. Just holler if anything’s amiss.”
An all-new cast of characters emerged and danced around the circus ring. “We customize and change out the figures and backdrops for every performance,” said Nate. “Their movements will be the same, everything else is tailored for the night’s candidates. Tomorrow morning, they’ll find ‘em in their stockings. Oh, that reminds me. Nate, reach in and get that figure I left in the second drawer.”
Nate slid open a hidden drawer on the side of the theatre. He retrieved a figure that looked quite a bit like me.
“You were supposed to be in the show last night,” said Martin. “Your puppet likeness got snagged. Sorry about that. Things don’t always go a hundred per cent nifty, even at Very North. You can have it when we’re done tonight.”
I remembered a question, one of the many that had been in my mind since last night. “The music box played a song, a new song. Clive sang it at the cathedral last week. It was written by someone I know.”
Martin inched himself out from behind the proscenium stage. “By Rex Palmer, yeah, I know. Here, take a look beneath the floor. You’ll see a scroll of paper with holes punched in it.”
I did as he instructed. I wanted to spend hours examining the mechanisms that made the players and sets move, timed to the delicate music.
“I can punch any tune into paper with this system. Tonight, it’ll play ‘Drink To Me Only With Thine Eyes,’ and ‘Joy To The World.’ All nine of our visitors will see themselves in the show.”
“It’s Christmas Eve,” said Nate. “That’s always our largest bunch of candidates. Tonight, four of ‘em are here ‘cause their folks are rich. The other five of ‘em are here thanks to the foundation.”
I could think of no charity more wonderful than that which allowed poor children to spend a few hours at Very North. Nate, Martin and I watched the entire toy theatre sequence. Afterwards, Martin looked at his watched and huffed.
“Not much more time, boys. You should go get your frocks,” he said and hurried out of the Great Hall.
Nate’s mother found us as we approached the frock shop. Michael was walking by her side. “There you are,” she called out to Nate. “Thought you might have got lost.”
“Nate?” said Michael. “Not likely. He knows this place better than I do.” Then he looked at me. “Mannie, I’d like you to follow me. I’ll be turning myself into Kris soon, but first, I’ve got something for you.”
“Just have him back to me within the hour,” said Mrs. Garrick. Michael assured her that he would, and then he led me to an office around a corner, at the end of a concrete hall.
The office was nicely appointed, with a window that looked down over the snow yard. Two wooden desks were situated at right angles to each other. One bore a nameplate for Martin Milberg, the other for Michael Brams.
“This is where we conduct the business end of our operation,” Michael said. “Not so captivating as the other stops on your tour, I bet. Please, have a seat.” He pointed to a chair facing his own desk. He sat down, opened a drawer, and produced a scrapbook.
“Take a look through here, if you like. We don’t allow photographs of our show. So, this small collection of pictures is quite exclusive. They show the construction of Very North, and some of our cast trying on costumes. If anyone should write our history, I suppose these would be of interest.”
“Yes, sir!” I said. I took an eager look. A sheaf of loose papers was tucked in among the first few pages. It was a script, mostly typed, with lines added in pencil along the margins. I read a few lines from the near the end of the document. I recognized words I had heard Kris and Evan speak, with seeming spontaneity, just last night.
“I remember this,” I said. “You and Evan have this conversation every time?”
“Yes,” said Michael. “Evan can manifest jealous rage on command. And he creates the most perfect redemption at the end. Don’t you think?”
“Yes! He changed completely!”
“Without his utter commitment to the emotion of it, the whole charade would come undone,” said Michael. “I am regularly astounded at the skill of my artists.”
I leafed through the script. “It’s a lot to learn.”
“The real challenge is being ready to improvise. The key players in our drama, the candidates, have no script. They might say or do anything. We’ve mastered the art of ad lib. In this show, there’s no other way.”
I found the photographs. I was fascinated by the glimpses of actors trying on costumes, or clustered around sets still under construction.
“Those pictures are confidential,” he said, “as are the names of our performers. We run a clandestine operation. We conspire to create an evening of wonders, and then we disappear. It’s a special calling, and completely impractical.”
“It’s exactly what I would do, if I had loads of money,” I said, and quickly thought better of it. “I don’t mean you have loads of money or anything like that.”
“I once had some measure of wealth, Mannie. My father was an industrialist. He ran factories and firms in London. In his later years, he bought several concerns here in Christchurch. To my father’s lasting regret, I had neither head nor heart for business. When he passed away, Father divided his holdings between his brother, and his two children. That would be myself, and my brother Coswell.”
“So, did your father own Marbury Meats?”
“Yes, well spotted. It was part of my inheritance. I had no idea what to do with it.”
“So you turned it into Very North.”
“Not right away. I did my best to keep it going, but I failed.”
“It’s too bad. But, I like this a lot better,” I said cheerfully.
“So do I,” he agreed, then he sighed. “I was born to lose money. That’s what my father said, and my uncle has echoed the refrain many times.”
“What about your brother?”
“Cosgrove. He has managed all right, but these years have been hard.”
“I know. My father preaches about it.”
Michael shifted forward in his chair and changed the subject. “Did you know I was present at your pageant, in Christchurch Cathedral?”
“You mean last Sunday?”
“Yes, Mannie.”
“Then, you saw my reading.”
“Very dramatic. I was impressed.”
I could feel my face growing warm. “I feel a bit silly about it now.”
“I came to see you, and also Clive Murney. I spoke that night with Rex Palmer, and got from him the sheet music for the song.”
That night came back into my mind with force and clarity.
“I couldn’t believe it when I heard the music box playing it.”
“That’s the sort of surprise Martin and I strive for. Personal and meaningful.”
“So, you must have talked to...”
“Audra. Yes, absolutely.”
“Did you know her?”
“Very well, indeed,” he said. He got up from behind the desk, and moved to a chair adjacent to mine. “Mannie, did your aunt ever tell you about her life, her early years.”
“Sometimes.”
“Did she ever tell you that she was once married?”
“I knew she was once. Mother didn’t like to talk about it. Audra said Mum didn’t approve of the fellow.” With a sudden shock, I recalled something Audra had once said. “Oh my God! She told me his name was Michael!”
“Yes, Mannie. That would be me. I was your uncle. Before you were born, of course.”
I had now a thousand questions, but no words to carry them. I just gazed at him and stammered a bit.
“It didn’t last very long, Mannie. We were young. Neither of us knew our own hearts. So, it wasn’t meant to be. But, we loved each other. Be sure of that. She was one of my closest friends, her whole life.”
“She was?” I said, and now I was glad I was sitting down, because I could feel my legs going weak. “Why didn’t I ever meet you before?”
“Auckland is a pretty long way. And around your mother, I was a sore topic.”
“Why?”
“To her, I’ve always been a troublemaker. A radical. She’s not entirely wrong. As a student, I was quite the idealist, and so was Audra. We wanted to change the world.”
I remembered something Audra had said to me once. “Were you a priest?” I asked Michael.
“I was in Anglican seminary. I was soon to be ordained, but...”
“Did Audra stop you?”
“No. She encouraged me. But I asked a lot of questions, and when I didn’t like the answers, I pushed back. Eventually, I decided it was in everyone’s best interests that I part amicably with the church, and the church agreed.”
He reached over to the desk and grabbed a manila envelope. “Now, here is what I wanted you to see.” He handed the envelope to me. I unwrapped the string and opened the flap. Inside were two photographs.
The first was of Audra and Michael, together, in front of a chapel doorway.
“That was our wedding day,” he said. “You see, we were just children, really.”
They looked like the two happiest people in the world in that photograph.
“Look at the second one. I think you’ll find it interesting.”
The second picture was of Audra, dressed in a flowing gown, holly in her hair, holding the scepter of Mother Solstice. Her face glowed with the wisdom of ages and her eyes saw through me from beyond years.
“She’s Mother Solstice,” I said.
“She was the first. Twelve years ago, in our premiere production. That was in Auckland. It was on a much smaller scale. We had to learn everything the hard way. But, she created the role. She wrote much of it.”
“Wait. In the story. Kris was a priest, and Iris...”
“It was partly inspired by our own story. When we began rehearsals, Father Christmas was supposed to be the one with all the powers. But, the more we practiced, the more it became clear that Iris was the true force.”
“So who was Evan based on? Anybody real?”
“Hmm? Not quite. I mean, my brother Cosgrove can become cross with me, but he doesn’t have fangs. And he was never a romantic rival.”
“But was there a rival of some kind?”
“Oh my. Let’s just say some stories are best retold as fiction. We all wound up just as happy as the heroes of the story.”
“How long did Audra play in this?”
“The first four years. Three different actresses have played the part. Charlotte is marvelous, don’t you think?”
“Yes. She is.”
There was a silence, and Michael took the picture of Audra from my hand. He held it, and tears began to roll down his cheek. “Audra was to have played the role of Iris last night. That was our secret plan. Of course, that would have exposed the ruse for you. But we didn’t mind. She wanted to play it one more time, and she wanted, more than anything, for you to be there, to see her.”
I took Michael’s hand for a moment, then I dissolved. He embraced me and said, “I’m sorry.” Then for a while, there was nothing for us to do but cry. Martin looked in on us, and gave a consoling smile, then told Michael that he would be needed in ten minutes.
Michael struggled to collect himself. “I knew this would happen,” he said. “I can’t tell you, Mannie, how happy I am that you are here. I only wish we could come back next year and do it all again.”
“Can’t we?” I said.
“It’s a year of sorrows. This is our final season, at least in this venue.”
“Why!” I said.
“I no longer own Marbury Meats, or the building. We’ve been leasing it for the last five years. The new owners will take full possession of it as soon as we’re done.”
“But, we can move this somewhere else,” I said, “Right?”
“This whole enterprise, grand as it is, loses money every year. It’s a kind of miracle that we made it this far. But Mannie, I want you to know, you have seen Very North at its best. This year, everything came together as never before. We finish this adventure by reaching a summit.”
I raised a few more objections. There had to be a way. I had just discovered Very North. I wasn’t ready to lose it.
“Mannie, I must ask you to keep a confidence. We decided not to tell the cast and crew until our last performance is finished. I hope you understand.”
I nodded, and I understood well. Every joy carries a sorrow on its back.
“Now, no regrets, young man. Cherish every bit of this night. Relish your every turn, on-stage and off. All right?”
He got up and went back to the desk. Finding a handkerchief there, he passed it to me.
“Something else,” he said. “Your father and I talked for a while, when I came to visit earlier this week.”
“About me?”
“Of course. I gather you touched off a bit of a storm, at the breakfast table.”
“Oh no! He told you about that?!”
Michael smiled. “When I was in seminary, I set off many such storms, on precisely the same topic. No matter how I tried, I could not accept the idea of Hell. Scores of professors tried to argue me into it. But there was no means by which I could square the idea of eternal torment with a loving God.”
I felt a sinking in my gut, an ingrained pang of guilt whenever I dared to doubt the teachings of those who had raised and loved me. I never imagined that anyone else ever thought these things.
“If it’s weighing on your heart, think about this. Our first Christmas together, Audra and I went to a faculty dinner. Someone sat at the piano and played The First Noel. And Audra and I, we sang our own words to the chorus. It caught on with the young students there, and they all joined in. I’m sure you know the tune.
Noel, Noel
No Hell, No Hell
Love One Another
And All Shall Be Well
“That was our version. It made some people angry, and it gave comfort to others. It’s not up to me to tell anyone how to think or feel. But if it ever helps you, sing it, and remember us.”
With that, he placed the photograph of Audra as Iris in my hand. “This is yours now,” he said. “If you’re going to the memorial service in Auckland, I’ll see you there.”
Martin Milberg was waiting for Michael in the office doorway. Michael embraced Martin, put his head on the other’s shoulder for a moment. “Come on now,” said Martin. “Time to turn you into Father Christmas,” and they were gone.