THE KEY TO THE SNOWGLOBE

By Forest Riggs

Painfully crawling across the cold, wooden floor, he thought I must get to the trunk. The trunk. If I can just reach the trunk, this pain will end.”

Please allow me to present myself. My name is Osgood Merriweather, yes, one of those oddball names where both sound like last names. It has been confusing for me and for others my entire life, and that is now 62 years! I have lived with this curse of a name since my birth, however, somewhere along the way, I became simply Ozzie. For all practical purposes, it was much easier and afforded less confusion in school and other places where a first and last name are required in tandem.

On this chilly Christmas Eve and while snuggled in my easy chair with a glass of good cognac, I am reminded of a strange incident that occurred some many years ago.  I know this to be true because it happened to me. I have never told the story to anyone and for the most part, I have kept it tucked away in the webbed catacombs of my mind, only to surface now and then and usually around Christmas time. The recalling of this buried memory is usually brought about by my hearing a Christmas carol or seeing an image of Santa Claus, but usually, it is the swirling motions of thousands of tiny plastic snowflakes, trapped inside a glass bubble and whirling about some holiday scene when shaken. If I stare deeply into the globe and watch the white droplets fall and highlight the items within, I am taken back to that unusual Christmas Eve many years ago and what I discovered, or should I say, uncovered.

Though years of fast living and hard drinking have robbed me of my health and of some aspects and details in my memories, that night I recall vividly. I will do my best to recount what I can of the strange tale.

Our town, Miltonville, was nothing spectacular or out of the ordinary. By most standards, it was considered a bedroom community of neighboring Gasper, which is the Watuba County Seat.  With the shifting of the railroad in the late 1800s, as so often happened in those days, mostly due to commerce and development following the iron rails, Miltonville, by all accounts was by 1920 reduced to a crossroads with unused storefronts, a post office, and a few hundred residents. Those that stayed did so for various reasons; they could not afford to move, did not want to move or just simply chose to stay out of some sense of loyalty and a dislike of change. Over the years, Miltonville’s population would rise and fall depending on economic trends of the time and social trends regarding the desire for rural versus urban living. The little school never left the town and although the building had changed numerous times over the years, the Miltonville School offered a solid and decent education for anyone seeking it. A few stores came back, as families seeking an escape from Gasper, returned to the quiet little village and raised their children. All in all, it was not a bad place to live and grow old. I had done it; from first through high school graduation with the same group of kids with whom I started in the old school near the abandoned railroad station.

Most residents of Miltonville all knew each other and interacted normally as would happen in a small town; boy scouts, church activities, parades, picnics and of course, weddings and funerals. So the picture I paint is one of a small town, nothing spectacular and one that regardless of hurdles, existed and continued. To use the word thrive, would be wrong, as few if any, ever got rich or made a fortune in Miltonville.

Being a small town and filled with all sorts, we certainly had our town characters that made up the community; the town doctor, a couple of lawyers, a barber shop owned by a one-armed barber, a funeral director that scared the bejesus out of all the kids, Mr. Crapple the town banker and my father who for many years, performed the role of sheriff. The adults stayed busy with things like PTA, Rotary Club, The Elks Lodge, VFW Post and, of course, the Knights of Columbus. The Optimist Club was a big deal, always having a chili or spaghetti dinner to raise money for the school and occasional food drives and collections for the poor. Most memorable of all was that the Optimist and Rotary combined forces each winter to set-up and run a Christmas tree lot near the funeral home at the edge of town. Every year, about two weeks before Christmas the men would string the naked bulb lights, pull in a small trailer with side panels that lifted to make for an office and line all the parameters with old chicken-wire fences held up by pickets driven into the ground. It wasn’t much but it sure meant Christmas. All of us kids would anxiously await the truck from the North Pole bringing all the wonderfully smelling Christmas trees. Like my older brother and others, when I was of age, I took my turn unloading the trees and mounting them in wooden tripod stands. By the end of the day, your arms would be scratched up by the bristles and your hands would be covered in sticky, brown sap. It was Christmas!

The real character in our town was an odd little man known to all as Mr. Chris. I say oddly because he kept to himself and never mingled with the other town folk. Mr. Chris lived alone in a run-down old house if you could call it that, at the far end of town on the Gasper highway.  Mr. Chris’s house was about as bad an eyesore as anything could be. The fence had fallen down in most places, the yard had not been cared for in years, shingles were missing on the roof and vines and overgrown shrubbery had reclaimed the house. A dented mailbox stool at the end of the driveway, near the highway, and on it hung a rusted and bent piece of a metal box with peeling letters on the side. For as long as I, or anyone for that matter could remember, the remaining letters on the metal box were “g-l-e” and those barely legible. So it was that the house came to be known as “Gle’s” house. For years, the failing structure and its occupant came to be known simply as Gle. Mr. Chris, often the butt of many jokes and negative statements, became “Ole man Gle.” As he was known to have started and lost several failed businesses over the years and in general, had suffered more than most folks, his name was often used as a warning or threat.  People would say “Keep it up and you’ll end up like old man Gle.” Old man Gle had indeed had his share of failures. It seemed that everything he touched, withered and died or failed. There was a joke around Miltonville that even the sun stopped shining at the edge of his yard. The Gle house was known to be dark and cold.

In all my years, I had only seen Mr. Chris a few times, once at the hardware store buying rat poison, a couple of times at Wood’s Market buying groceries, mostly beer, chicken noodle soup and crackers and once standing just outside the Optimist Christmas Tree lot, just at dark when the string of naked bulbs revealed his rotund and disheveled form, standing in the wind. Like an old post, he just stood there staring into the clumps of Christmas trees with his strands of yellowed, white hair blowing in the chilly breeze. I looked at him for a long time as he stood there as if transfixed. When the wind blew and shifted the naked bulbs just a certain way, I thought for sure I could see tears coursing down his wrinkled cheeks. That image stuck with me for many years. Even now, when I pass the Christmas tree lot near the funeral home, no matter what time of year, I think of Mr. Chris and his crying in the wind that night long ago.

Now to the crux of my story.

I graduated from Miltonville Union High, went away to college at State and tried my hand at studying Criminal Justice- gonna be like the old man I suppose. College was just not for me, As much as I tried, the non-criminal justice courses became stumbling blocks and slowly caused me to lose my desire for a degree of any kind. I decided to quit and find some other career. I had no real desire to leave Miltonville and it pretty much looked like I would not be on the local law enforcement team, so I bounced around from job to job. None too great but enough to get by, eventually have my own apartment in the back of a larger home on State Street and keep my fridge stocked with cold beer and an occasional bottle of brandy. Over the years I worked in the hardware store,   an insurance company (I hated it) and even a few years at the new Middle School as a custodian. The janitor job was ok but cleaning toilets and mopping up vomited chocolate milk eventually got old and so I quit. Getting low on rent and beer money, I answered an ad in the Miltonville Gazette placed by creepy Mr. Archibald Keane from the Miltonville Funeral Home.  The ad described the position as “boy-Friday” type thing, perform odds and ends, answer the phone, some office work and assist with funerals and transporting the bodies. Mostly it was very easy to work and when I worked the night shifts, I spent my time smoking cigarettes, surfing the net or reading James Patterson novels. Occasionally I would be called to retrieve a body from the hospital in Gasper or the Miltonville Briar House nursing home on the outskirts of town. A new highway had come and businesses were starting to relocate or build out on the feeder road. It was this role at the funeral home that led me to the events of that Christmas Eve many years ago; a body removal.

We arrived at the dilapidated shack at about the same time with Sheriff Creech parking his blue and white cruiser in the shambles of what had been a driveway. I parked the black van, the one I used to transport bodies, along the road in front of the house. We approached the door and noticed the pile of newspapers, lightly dusted by the drifting snow.

“Yessir, sure likes something is not right here,” the sheriff stated as he knocked at the wooden door.

A faded sign hanging to the right of the door read “No Trespassing. Go Away!”  “Certainly not a friendly type,” Creech mumbled as he again struck the door.

I agreed.

“Mr. Chris…you in there. Its Sheriff Creech and Ozzie. Hello? Mr. Chris? Hello?”

The sheriff pushed the door open saying, “God I hate these kinds of things, ya never know what is waiting on the inside.”

With that, the door swung open and we were met with total darkness. It took a minute for our eyes to adjust to the undisturbed blackness. The house was cluttered, not much furniture and certainly not much comfort items. There was a large, overstuffed chair, a small table nearby, filled with empty beer cans and some magazines. A few feet in front of the chair there sat an old television set topped with rabbit ears on which were fastened two huge balls of aluminum foil. The set was large, almost refrigerator size with a small, green, oval viewing screen about midway up the cabinet. The sheriff took his flashlight and began looking for a light switch, which he found to the right of the front door entrance. Click! The dismal room was suddenly filled with yellowed light from a hanging bulb in the middle of the room. There was a wooden fireplace mantel, nothing fancy, but serving its purpose to hold an old, humpbacked clock that was not ticking. On either side of the clock were tall silver candlesticks, blackened with tarnish. The dark coating seemed to permeate all objects in the room. Again,

“Mr. Chris? Are you ok sir?” the sheriff called out.

Nothing. As we left the main room and headed through a door into what I later figured was the bedroom, where he lay. Sprawled on the floor, almost in a crawling position lay old Mr. Chris, the hermit of Gle House. One foot bare, one in a brown sock and a plaid robe covering his large body. The robe was old, worn and ripped in places where the flannel had simply given way with age.

At this point, the sheriff’s radio went off.

“Sheriff Creech, this is deputy Niebauer. Come in…”

The sheriff leaned into his collar mic and responded, “Creech here, go ahead.”

“Sheriff there’s been a pretty bad accident out on Highway 105, near the Gasper cut off. Someone called it in a few minutes ago, two cars collided after sliding on the iced blacktop. The caller said there are some bad injuries, over.”

“Ok Niebaur, hang on. I’m at old Mr. Chris’ house, the Gle house…found him here dead on the floor. Ozzie from the funeral home is with me. Looks like he fell from his chair and was crawling to the bedroom.”

The mic clicked with a scratch sound and Niebauer came back,

“Sheriff I think you need to get out to the crash site. The caller said one of injured is old Mr. Crapple from the bank.”

The sheriff let off the red button in the mic,

“Shit, this is NOT what I needed on Christmas Eve.” “Ozzie, can you take over here till I get back? Looks pretty innocent here, I don’t suspect any foul play. Just hang out until I get back and we can take some pics and then you can transport him to the Watuba County Medical Examiner. I doubt he has a doctor that will sign a certificate, so the county will want an autopsy.”

Looking around the room, especially since my eyes had adjusted to the dim light, I said, “I got it, Sheriff. You go to 105 and I’ll be here when you get back.”

Creech backed out of the room and in a moment, I heard the revving of his cruiser as he exited the drive and drove away.

“Oh my God. What have I done? There is the red trunk… just a reach away. If I can just get to the trunk. Where is my key? Where is my gold key? Oh God, what a mistake I have made.”

With the Sheriff gone, I looked around the room. It was dark and cold. Mr. Chris lay on the floor on his belly. I knelt beside him and noticed a dried, white foam around his lips. He eyes were wide open and his face held a frozen look of fear and determination. His left arm, sticking through a worn or ripped sleep was at his shoulder with his cold fingers spread as is trying to grip to wooden floorboards. His right arm was extended forward as far as it could go and his fist was clutched. His right leg, bare and bent at the knee, was cocked forward in a crawling position. He was crawling on the floor I thought. Without thinking I reached for his right hand and noticed a gold chain dangling between the cold fingers. Rigor had long gone, but he was cold and somewhat stiff. I pried open his fingers and to my surprise, there enwrapped among the chain and flesh, was a small, gold key. It looked like a miniature skeleton key. I took the chain and key from his fingers and as I stared at it, I began to recall a memory. On the few occasions I had seen Mr. Chris, he had around his neck and hanging, a gold chain with a tiny, gold skeleton key attached. It appeared he was definitely crawling when he died, but toward what. As I looked around the room, it was mostly empty with a small, twin bed and a nightstand. There was a lamp on the stand and I turned it on, yielding a little more light on the sad scene. At the foot of the bed there sat a red, camel back trunk. In the grays and muted colors of the room, the red trunk stood out like a beaming flare. I ran my fingers across the hump of the trunk and, in the lamplight, I could make out the intricate carvings and delicate engraving that had been crafted in the leather and metal of the trunk. Above the arched hasp of the lock was an ornately carved piece of tarnished brass, a nameplate of sorts. Deep into the aged metal, I could barely make out the work “Kringle.” As I stood in the dimly lit room, the wind knocked at the window and the snow was piling on the panes, more than it had been. A gust would rock the walls, the old panes would rattle, and the layer of soft snow would fall to the ground. I looked at Mr. Chris, the key now in my hand and the red truck with the “Kringle” nameplate. At least now I knew that name on the metal mailbox had at one time, before years of ice storms, rain and summer’s blistering heat had read KRINGLE. The years had reduced the name to Gle and that is what remained for as long as anyone could recall. Several minutes passed. I slipped the key into my pocket and found a bedspread to lay over the body of old Mr. Chris. There was a sadness in the air and I couldn’t exactly figure it out. He really was nothing to me, or to anyone in Miltonville for that matter; just an old man, a recluse who wanted nothing but to be left alone. I stared at the red trunk and as I did, I could see that Mr. Chris was practically pointing toward it and had apparently taken his last bits of strength trying to get to the red shape. In fact, he was practically pointing to the trunk with his right hand that held the key. From somewhere near the house a cat made a screeching sound and I heard a rustle below the window. I thought perhaps the cat had seen the lights, heard noises and wanted in from the cold wind and snow.

I’m not sure what came over me but curiosity won out. Thinking of Pandora’s Box, I walked to the foot of the bed and reached down to the red trunk. In order to lift the humpbacked lid, I had to move the trunk forward a few inches. Not sure what was inside but the box was pretty light and took no effort to nudge forward a few inches.

In the dim light, I thought to myself, “Ok Mr. Chris, I am gonna open this trunk and see what was so important that made you crawl to it as you died.”

The hasp was open, and the lid easily gave way as I lifted it. My nostrils flared with the flash of old, stale odors that quickly rushed from the trunk. I pushed the lid all the way back, revealing a beautiful pile of something red and lined with white fur. It appeared to be some sort of coat or jacket. As I lifted the red pile from the trunk, pants of the same material fell out and among the white-cuffed legs, an envelope dropped to the floor. I held the garment in my left hand and lifted the envelope with my right. Beautifully scrawled on the yellowed parchment, were the words, “To my loving son Kris.”

A rush of wind hitting the front door startled me as I turned to see if anyone had entered. Nothing. I looked back at the trunk and where the red pile had been, resting there sat a glass globe attached to a gold-colored base. I reached for the globe and upon lifting it out of the trunk, the letter again fell to my feet. I could see it was a snow globe. I held the globe to the light bulb and could then see the contents inside the glass. There was a beautiful white, castle type building inside. On each side of the turreted structure, there were great evergreen trees. Tall chimneys rose from the thatched roof and a tiny weather vane was perched atop the arch in the stones. At the base of the castle and at the end of a cobblestone path, there was a mailbox. Lettering on the side of the box read “Mr. and Mrs. Kris Kringle, North Pole.”

With my mouth hanging open, I shook the globe and watched as the snowflakes swirled and covered the castle, trees, and yard. It was magical as the drifts settled about the windows and steps of the castle inside the glass. When all the snow had settled onto the scene, I shook the globe again. It was beautiful, unlike any snow globe I had seen before. It was then I noticed a small keyhole in the yellow metal base of the globe. A small keyhole that was hidden by a tiny flap of metal. Shaking the globe had loosened the flap allowing the hole to be seen. There was nothing else in the trunk, just these few items that had apparently been there for a long, long time. My head was full of questions and I my mind was racing. Why would the old man so desperately want to reach this red trunk and for what?  A snow globe and an old red and white suit? I couldn’t make sense of it. Then there was the letter. On the back of the envelope, a red wax seal had been broken at some point and the packet crudely opened as if ripped open. None of it made sense to me. Not sure what came over me, or what tempting devil sat on my shoulder tempting me to pick up the trunk and secret it away to my van outside along the snow-covered road. I stood there for a minute, a moral debate in my mind; take the trunk, leave the trunk. If I took the trunk, I might find things that would lend sense to all or this night. If I left the trunk where it sat, the truth or story may never be known, IF there was one. One thing was clear, all of this, the trunk, the nameplate, the suit and the snow globe, even the tiny gold key, were all connected. And too, there was the letter. From all appearances a very important letter and one that had been read and tucked away into the red trunk along with the globe and furry suit.

“What does it all mean?” I wondered.

Knowing that Creech would be returning soon, I let the devil on my shoulder win and I carried the red trunk to the gurney in the waiting van. In my guilt, I draped over the red trunk a maroon velvet cover.

Just as I was returning to the house, the headlight of the sheriff cruiser blasted across the shiny ice, nearly blinding me. As I entered the house, Creech got out of his cruiser and came toward the door,

“Everything Ok here Ozzie?”

With a rush in my chest, I managed to get out, “Oh yes, Sheriff, everything is good. He’s still in the bedroom. What about the accident? Was it bad?”

Sheriff Creech looked at me and his face wilted.

“It was a bad one. Old Mr. Crapple is dead.  Looks like he hit his head when his car hit the other car and spun off the road into the ditch. I think he died fast.”

“And the other people?” I asked.

“They’ll be ok, their Jeep is pretty messed up, some bruises and scrapes. Out of towners, visiting family. The lady had a small laceration on her forehead, but she will be fine. Took her to County Hospital in Gasper.”

The sheriff, with his camera in hand, went about the house snapping pictures of everything. He took several of Mr. Chris and of the bedroom. I was glad he did not take the pictures when we first arrived. He would have seen the trunk in the pics and perhaps later wondered about it.

After a short time, Sheriff Creech said, Well Ozzie, I think we are done here. Let me give you handloading the body.”

“That would be great Sheriff, I can move them by myself, usually do, but an extra set of muscles is welcome.”

The wind was really kicking up outside the house as we carefully loaded the body on the gurney and rolled Mr. Chris out of his house for the last time.” With the body safely in the truck, I slammed the black doors and latched the handle. The Sheriff lighting a cigarette said, “You go ahead and take him to the County Morgue over in Watuba. I’ll head to the office and get started on the paperwork. I still have to write up the wreck and death of Mr. Crapple.”

He paused, and in the red glow of his sucking on the Winston, said, “Oh, by the way, don’t worry about Crapple, some outfit from Watuba picked up his body and Judge Criss will sign the certificate. He can go straight to the Mr. Keane…Oh yea Ozzie, Merry Christmas.”

I drove carefully over the frozen roads and did my best to avoid patches of black ice. I Left Mr. Chris’ body with Higdon, the morgue attendant, signed the paperwork and headed for my apartment. Fortunately, the snow had slowed to a few flakes drifting down here and there, but the wind pulled and pushed at the van until my arms and hands ached from holding tightly to the wheel. Some Christmas Eve I thought. My bottle of cognac would be waiting for me and a nice warm bed.

I bumped and slid along Elm Street and made my right onto State Street. There to the rear of the main house, stood my little apartment all dark except the colored lights from my small Christmas tree in the front window. In all the commotion and stress of navigating the ice-covered road, I had completely forgotten the red trunk under the maroon drape in the van.

 

Inside my warm apartment, I placed my tumbler of cognac on the table next to my recliner and went out in the cold to get the trunk from the van. I still felt a little guilty as I carried the trunk into my apartment and placed it on the floor near my chair. I took a sip of my cognac and sat on the recliner to open the trunk. I took out the red jacket and pants, I gripped the snow globe and gave it a good shaking before I set it on the table near my drink. As I fell back into my recliner, the swirling snow settled around the castle once more and all was snug at the North Pole. I remembered the chain and the key in my pocket and took it out, dangling it in front of the lamp on the table. Looking at the glass ball, I noticed the little metal flap had fallen closed over the tiny keyhole on the base. I stared at the key on the chain and again at the tiny keyhole on the globe. Did it fit? Would it fit? Carefully I laid the key and chain beside the snow globe and reached for the parchment envelope.

Nestled in my recliner and feeling the warmth of the cognac oozing through my body, I read:

“My Dear Son Kris,

 As you prepare to leave us here at our rightful place in the North Pole, I want to send you away with this red trunk that will contain reminders of your legacy and the magical life from which you are departing for the “normal, mortal life” that you so desire. Mamma and I feel sad and question if we have failed you, however in truth, you never wanted to carry on the Kringle tradition or live the life that was yours from birth. Because we are Kringles, descended from a long line of the same, once consecrated can live for centuries, if we choose. As a young man, you chose no consecration and to depart from the castle to go live among others in a mortal life- facing all the pain, agonies, disappointments and failures that plague the human existence. Of these things, we have none in our consecrated life. We Kringle men live our time bringing joy and happiness to the world, especially at Christmas. When we have served our legacy we retire and pass along our spirit to the next Kringle in line for the role. By choosing to not consecrate and to live a human life, the passage of my title to you, was broken. Your younger brother Nicholas will take your place and assume my role once I have stepped down. Though we don’t fully understand your choice, Momma and I allow you to go forth into a mortal world and life.

Kris my son, in the wisdom given to me by the great God of creation, I am, in this trunk sending you forth with a special gift that if and when needed, can return you to us and your rightful place among the Kringle men. I have had the little ones make a special snow globe for you, with a miniature replica of our castle here in the North Pole. It is my wish that it will serve as a beautiful reminder of your life here and as a beacon by which you might find your way back home. Attached to a golden chain I have placed a tiny key that will fit into the keyhole located under a metal flap on the base of the snow globe. If ever you tire of your mortal life and all that comes with it, insert the key, turn the lock and shake the globe. When the snow settles, you will be returned to the life that you left here. No time will have passed and you will resume your rightful place in the lineage of consecrated Kringle men. Once you pass from your mortal life, the magic of the globe and key will no longer exist. Your death will be like that of any man.

I wish you well my beautiful son and long for the day that I might see you return here amongst the Kringles and the little ones.

Loving you ever, your father, Kris Kringle.”

I let the letter fall to my lap as I pondered the story. So close was Mr. Chris to returning to his birthright. Only a few feet separated him from a mortal death and an unending magical life. I stared into the snow globe and with a little shake, brought the flakes to life again. As they settled onto the tiny castle and trees, I dozed with the gold chain and key tightly clasped in my hand.

 

 

 

Forest Riggs is a contributing writer for The Montrose Star, billed as an Entertainment Newspaper, and published on alternate Wednesdays. It is owned and operated by GLYP Media Services, a Texas minority-certified company founded in 1990.

No stranger to the adventures of life, Forest bills himself as a “raconteur with a gypsy spirit.” A former educator, public speaker, hospital administrator, counselor, and gay B&B owner, he was instrumental in the formation of OutSmart Magazine in the early 1990s. He has written for several newspapers, magazines, and other publications. Recently he completed a collection of short stories an about his beloved Galveston and is working on a novel.  He currently resides in Galveston, TX where he can be found wasting bait and searching for the meaning of life.