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“I quit,” said Hackleman, “and I don’t think that will do you much good.”

And Hackleman was right. His quitting did the paper no good. It was a disaster, for in many ways he was the paper. However, there was no wailing or gnashing of teeth in the paper’s executive offices—only a calm, patient wistfulness. Hackleman had quit before, but had never managed to stay away from the paper for more than twenty-four hours. His whole life was the paper, and his talking of quitting it was like a trout’s talking of quitting a mountain stream to get a job clerking in a five-and-ten.

Setting a new record for an absence from the paper, Hackleman returned to his desk twenty-seven hours after quitting. He was slightly drunk and surly, and looked no one in the eye.

As I passed his desk, quietly and respectfully, he mumbled something to me.

“Beg your pardon?” I said.

“I said Merry Christmas,” said Hackleman.

“And a Merry Christmas to you.”

“Well, sir,” he said, “it won’t be long now, will it, until old soup-for-brains with the long white beard will come a-jingling over our housetops with goodies for us all.”

“No—guess not.”

“A man who whips little reindeer is capable of anything,” said Hackleman. “Yes—I suppose.”

“Bring me up to date, will you, kid? What’s this goddamn contest all about?”

The committee that was supposed to be running the contest was top-heavy with local celebrities who were too busy and important to do a lick of work on the contest—the mayor, the president of a big manufacturing company, and the chairman of the Real Estate Board. Hackleman kept me on as his assistant, and it was up to us and some small fry from the Chamber of Commerce to do the spadework.

Every night we went out to look at entries, and there were thousands of them. We were trying to make a list of the twenty best displays from which the committee would choose a winner on Christmas Eve. The Chamber of Commerce underlings scouted the south side of town, while Hackleman and I scouted the north.

It should have been pleasant. The weather was crisp, not bitter; the stars were out every night, bright, hard, and cold against a black velvet sky. Snow, while cleared from the streets, lay on yards and rooftops, making all the world seem soft and clean; and our car radio sang Christmas carols.

But it wasn’t pleasant, because Hackleman talked most of the time, making a bitter indictment against Christmas.

One time, I was listening to a broadcast of a children’s choir singing “Silent Night,” and was as close to heaven as I could get without being pure and dead. Hackleman suddenly changed stations to fill the car with the clangor of a jazz band.

“Wha’d you do that for?” I said.

“They’re running it into the ground,” said Hackleman peevishly. “We’ve heard it eight times already tonight. They sell Christmas the way they sell cigarettes—just keep hammering away at the same old line over and over again. I’ve got Christmas coming out of my ears.”

“They’re not selling it,” I said. “They’re just happy about it.”

“Just another form of department store advertising.”

I twisted the dial back to the station carrying the children’s choir. “If you don’t mind, I’d enjoy hearing this to the end,” I said. “Then you can change it again.”

“Sleee-eeep in heav-en-ly peace,” piped the small, sweet voices. And then the announcer broke in. “This fifteen-minute interlude of Christmas favorites,” he said, “has been brought to you by Bullard Brothers Department Store, which is open until ten o’clock every evening except Sunday. Don’t wait until the last minute to do your Christmas shopping. Avoid the rush.”

“There!” said Hackleman triumphantly.

“That’s a side issue,” I said. “The main thing is that the Savior was born on Christmas.”

“Wrong again,” said Hackleman. “Nobody knows when he was born. There’s nothing in the Bible to tell you. Not a word.”

“You’re the last man I’d come to for an expert opinion on the Bible,” I said heatedly.

“I memorized it when I was a kid,” said