THE $141,000 CHRISTMAS CIGAR
Meyer, Ernest L.
The $141,000 Christmas Cigar By ERNEST L. MEYER IN those days, if you are to believe the annals of Old Milwaukee, Christmas in the home of the Gipfel family was a day of unvarying happiness. It...
...THE sofa was form-fitting...
...Over all the hill-tops is peace...
...Then she pulled down the window shades...
...He longed for the old, seasoned, form-fitting sofa at home...
...After smoking silently for half an hour, Papa Gipfel's head would gradually sink backwards, and then he would fall soundly asleep...
...He was in agony...
...Things went along in the old, smooth routine...
...It had been used by Bruno Gipfel almost a score of years, and its hills and valleys were perfectly adjusted to his eontours, especially after the added ballast of roast goose...
...They ate Koenigsberger Klops and Sauerbraten at Luchows...
...This was the amiable state of affairs in the Gipfel home until a friend of the family convinced Bruno that he ought to invest his $20,000 savings in the stock market which was going great guns at the time...
...In short, they went...
...The climax came on their first Christmas Day in New York...
...And the old form-fitting sofa caressed his limbs...
...whispered Mrs...
...But for Papa Gipfel there was a fly or two in the salve...
...Gipfel quietly put Out the smouldering cigar on the ash-tray where there was a little heap of charred paper...
...His 15-cent Christmas eigar had gone out...
...Acting on your instructions when you left New York, we have disposed of all the shares, and we are enclosing a bank draft for $141,000, the total proceeds less our usual commissions...
...Ueber alien Gipfel ist Ruh.'" cried Lisa, and ran out as fast as she could...
...Christmas Day came again, and again there was the singing of carols under the tender glow of the candles, the giving of gifts, the stuffed goose, and again Papa Gipfel performed valorously with the knife and fork...
...It was a message from his broker: "My Dear Mr...
...What is it you were burning there...
...Then, while Mrs...
...His stiff collar was making his eyes pop...
...Suddenly, with all his tortured soul, Papa Gipfel loathed the life of a New York financier...
...Nothing anywhere but stiff, hard Chippendale chairs...
...And then the child would be soundly scolded by Mrs...
...Bruno signed for it, and when child and messenger had left he balanced the letter in his palm and for ten minutes pondered whether even a letter from Olympus would be worth opening on such a perfect day...
...Bruno did, and acting on tips supplied by his friend, he increased his capital by ten times in one short, amazing year...
...Slowly, thoughtfully, he twisted the bank draft into a spill, lit it with a match, and held the flame to the cigar...
...THEY leased a fine apartment on the Drive...
...Gipfel had already laid out his Pantoffeln—heel-less carpet slippers with a rosebud design—his ashtray, and his 15-cent cigar, a special holiday dispensation for Papa Gipfel who otherwise smoked a nicotinic cabbage called Knaster in a china-bowl pipe...
...For Papa Bruno Gipfel the meal and the pleasant lassitude which it induced were the greatest boon of a great day...
...What celebrations and drinking of strong punch...
...But his appetite was still prodigious, and on occasions after a big banquet he feared that the meal would end disastrously with a cannonade of popping buttons...
...And the same friend—may the devil run off with him—convinced Gipfel that as a rising financier his place was in New York and not behind the counter of his little delicatessen store on Third Street...
...And one of the five Gipfel children, especially that young imp Lisa, was always sure to look into the parlor and come out again and announce to the family dramatically: "Ueber alien Gipfel ist Ruh...
...I smell something burning, Bruno," she said...
...For instance, he was measured for new clothes, as befits a financier, but the tailors haughtily refused to leave any slack in the trousers or roominess in the vest...
...It had its routine, to be sure, but it was a pleasant routine and one that left behind it a sweet savor...
...After gravely upholstering himself at the table for two hours, it was the habit of Papa Gipfel to unbutton the bottom two buttons of his vest and sink with a seraphic wheeze on the sofa in the parlor where Mrs...
...Gipfel: I am glad to inform you that the Mexicala Oil shares we held in your name went soaring with the last oil strike on Mexicala holdings...
...At the fifth course something told him that he ought to exercise restraint...
...There followed the ritual of the Christmas noon meal, called "dinner" in those obscure times, with its inevitable menu of the most succulent of geese stuffed with apples and raisins, great tankards of gravy, and platters of mashed potatoes, cauliflower, red cabbage, and kohlrabi...
...What elation in the modest brown frame house on North Avenue, Milwaukee...
...The Gipfels had accepted an invitation to have supper (called dinner in that weird town) at a fancy club...
...Again he arose, groaned -with bliss, and sought his humane sofa...
...Bruno Gipfel's fortune crashed with it, and all that remained was about $20,000, his original savings, and a bale of dubious shares of Mexicala Oil...
...Don't you dare say it...
...Suddenly his gray mustache slanted upward in a canny smile...
...Papa Gipfel looked at the beautifully engraved bank draft stupefied...
...Wife and children hailed the suggestion with applause...
...Lisa Gipfel, the child, was watching maliciously...
...And while he was enjoying his Christmas cigar in utter peace, the house bell rang and one of the children went to the door and came back with a registered special delivery letter...
...The tobacco never had tasted so fine...
...Gipfel looked at him with wonder and anxiety, his head fell back on the pillow and he slept with a great childish smile on his face...
...On Christmas morning the candles on the tree were lighted, the family gathered in that tranquil glow to sing "Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht," and then the great heaps of gaily-wrapped gifts were opened to squeals and "Achs...
...Tight pants, mamma, and choker collars, and those verdammte chip—chip—Chippendale chairs...
...He was in that enviable state composed of half-sleep and a full stomach...
...Gipfel for her irreverence, and the other children tittered, and so Christmas day was complete and everybody was happy...
...7'hey heard operas and symphonies...
...The Gipfel family returned to Milwaukee, and Bruno again took over his delicatessen shop on Third Street They reopened their home...
...Papa Gipfel automatically stuffed himself...
...But when he reached home his brow was clammy—and not even in their swank apartment was there a form-fitting sofa...
...Which would have been fair enough had Bruno Gipfel lived on crackers and milk as some financiers do...
...Finally he did open it...
...Gipfel came in from the sitting room...
...What suffering Papa Gipfel endured no one will ever know, for he was a brave man and made no moan...
...Himmel...
...The market crashed...
...His frantic eyes searched for a sofa in the big dining hall...
...Tight pants," replied Papa Gipfel, taking another hearty puff...
...Fate, and one of those periodic mysteries called panics, took the solution of Papa Gipfel's difficulties out of his hands...
...MRS...
...of delight...
Vol. 9 • December 1945 • No. 51
