Cafe Kringle

Sean called to the proprietor, “Mister, are you Santa? Coz if you are you didn't give me what I asked for.”

The round man glanced over his shoulder and brushed his long white beard. “Well, Sean, there was a small problem this year.” I laughed at the way Chris played along.


“You see, every year my intelligence network keeps track of good children and bad children, but as the kids get older sometimes we lose track of them.

“One day a pair of these men came to the North Pole demanding to see me. You see, they wanted a piece of my action. They planned on cornering the toy market of Chicago, but didn't want to bother with production.

“Of course I refused, but over the next several weeks my dock foreman noticed the elves were not packing nearly as much as they were producing.

“The Christmas Security Agency investigated. What they found astounded me. Those men in suits were paying several of my elves to smuggle presents out of the warehouse before being stored.

“Well, that led to the problem of where to store them. The bad elves had to recruit some of the reindeer. Not all of them, just five or six. They would then load up a small sleigh, one of my earliest models, and instruct the deer to fly to a few stores in Chicago.

“All this was done in the middle of the night, of course, while we all slept.

“When the CSA showed me the video I was very sad.

“Those elves are now serving three and a half centuries in the Faery Prison.”


“And the reindeer?” Sean asked.

“We never saw them again. Would you like another bowl of venison stew?”