Margarita Spalding Gerry

“ The jack-in-the-box was cut short in the midst of a horrible grimace.
"Was the boy pleased with his toys?" asked Joseph Schotz from his end of the room. His voice was wistful; he had never needed to use his skill for the delight of children of his own.
"Yes, my friend."
[28]
"Yes, there is indeed a change in the Man since his first visit," thought Joseph. The smile with which the guest looked up from his toys warmed the sick man's heart, about which a chill had been gathering.
"But he wants more. He always does." There was the purest delight in the father's face as he spoke. ”

“ He smiled whimsically. "I am trying to give him all the toys I—didn't have. And"—his voice died away, and he forced the words with difficulty—"he must have all that I meant to give the boy who—went away."
"You mustn't spoil him," said Schotz, after a moment, with the perfunctory morality of the childless man.
[29]
The smile broke out again. "Bless you, you can't spoil children with love. Why, my boy plays with his soldiers, but he doesn't know that war is anything but a game. I wish his father could win battles with toy soldiers and tin swords." His eyes were drawn back to the counter. ”

“ Then Joseph saw that he was changed from the man who had sought the shop the December gone by. There was sorrow in the eyes, but there was no more despair.
"Some toy soldiers, please," the stranger said to the little girl who waited behind the counter. His tone had both firmness and purpose in it, [26] but it had changed into mere kindness when he turned again to Joseph.
"What do you think of our new general, friend Schotz?" he asked.
"He knows how to win victories," replied Joseph, "but—"
"It is long, is it not, too long? Would your Napoleon have ended it sooner?" ”

“ One set of men was intrenched behind all the boxes within sight. Advance and retreat—shifting to right and to left—both sides alert, one would have said—they seemed so under the great hands that hovered over them—the besieged army handled with the same cool intelligence—both sides manœuvred for position.
The cuckoo-clock in the corner struck eleven. The little clerk stared with mouth open at the big [30] man who played with toys. Schotz watched him with questioning eyes as the stranger knitted shaggy brows over some problem that baffled him. ”

“ The little shop was a modest place. On one side was a counter where, safe under glass, were home-made candies and cakes, with a rosy-cheeked apple or two. But, lining the walls, tumbling over shelves, crowded into old-fashioned presses, were the toys. There were dolls, of course, patrician wax dolls with delicate eyebrows of real hair, hearty, wooden-jointed dolls that were a real comfort to little mothers. There were wheels of fortune where one could see [12] a steeple-chase if he spun hard enough to make the horses vault the hurdles. ”

“ After all, he is a soldier, and he must be punished for the good of the others. And that boy—like so many other boys—would have been a hero, not a deserter, at another turn of the wheel. It is idleness that makes traitors of them. Where can I find a man who will end all this? ”

“ I thought, my wife, that the end of life had come for me when I knew that I should have to sit here in the shop the rest of the days of my life and make toys for children. Now I know that it was but the beginning. He taught me. There could be nothing greater. The toys will live in the homes of the children. They will find them, too, the toys he bought for his boy—after he has gone. But not every one will know the work that they have done. Nor will all the toys the President left be so easily discovered.... ”

“ He had a way of standing, sir, as if you couldn't dislodge him—that was Buonaparte."
Mrs. Schotz had gone back to the counter with the toys the stranger sought. With an irresolute effort he moved listlessly toward them. There was a whole regiment of little men in blue, and with them a gorgeous officer in gold-decked uniform waving his sword above a prancing steed. The Man laid his hand upon the toy and moved it absently into position at the head of the men. The brave general toppled spinelessly over when the great gnarled hand was removed. The woman shook her head. ”

“ Somewhere in the Eternal Consciousness must rest the knowledge. But how can I discover it? 'Such knowledge is too high; I cannot attain to it,'" groaned the Man.
With the thought he raised his eyes. He was opposite a young ladies' boarding-school. It was a decorous place, sedately retired on a terrace. A group of young women in billowing crinolines were returning from the daily walk. ”

“ His thoughts drifted to the armies facing each other in the cheerless, raw December weather—his army sodden with fogs, sullen with inaction. "The poor young fellow must be punished." The Man's heart ached with comprehension. ”

“ Men like that must learn to laugh or they cannot live."
"What does it matter?" she said, rallying him. "He is not thy Napoleon."
"No, he is not Napoleon," replied the man, quickly, looking down at his hand, still red from the pressure of the bony fingers. "No—Napoleon never played—with toys."
Joseph Schotz was weaker in the summer heat when the Man next came to the toy-shop. The wife was at market, so there was nobody [24] in the place save Joseph and the little neighbor girl who was being taught to take in pennies like a woman grown. ”

“ A man may be brave before bullets and yet quail before the doctor. The bed was brought down [37] into the little kitchen back of the shop. Joseph insisted on it.
"It is that I may be able to help you tend the shop," he said. But the real reason was that he might not be banished from the children's domain. He could still see Minna and Rosa and Bennie come for their toys.
Thus it happened that one morning Joseph sat propped up in his narrow wooden bed. Mrs. Schotz bustled, with much demonstration of activity, about her work. Joseph almost wished that she would go up-stairs. ”

“ While she reached for the toys the son had asked for, the Man, bent over the counter, fingered the dolls left lying there from the last small purchaser with clumsy, gentle fingers.
"Who makes that 'dolly' furniture?" he asked, idly. "I wish I could get any one to work for me one-half so well. Carved, too. I didn't know there were tools fine enough to make those tiny wreaths."
Mrs. Schotz shook her head at him good-humoredly.
[14]
"My man, he speak English. I—not—can." Following her gesture, the stranger saw, in the back part of the shop, a patient figure at work. ”

“ The officers looked white, and I was trembling. More soldiers came into the square, until everywhere there were angry faces and bodies swaying this way and that, while the men were thinking what evil they should do. At that moment a carriage drove up at full speed. [34] There was one man in it. He stood up; he was a tall man. A hesitating sort of shout went up from the soldiers. Then there was a great muttering, and every one rushed toward him, and some were shaking their fists. ”

“ He pored over the toys. The woman went back to her knitting. The click of needles or the noise of a tool raised or laid down was the only sound heard in the shop.
"Are you buying the soldiers for your boys? It's wonderful how they take to them these days." The voice of the cabinet-maker broke the stillness. ”

“ The sound of his wife's sobbing sank lower and lower. She crept close to her husband and laid her hand on his. He took it gently in his weak fingers, and [49] thus they remained. The room seemed empty.
"They killed him, too, thy Napoleon," at last his wife said, timidly. Joseph started. The name of the old god made him know how far he had gone. For a moment he felt shame, as though he, too, had betrayed. Then he spoke:
"If the Emperor, too, had had—toys—and if he had played with them; if he had been able to laugh at the world and—yes—a little at himself ”