"But, Mother, I want to go ice skating," little Rob Bhaer whined to his mother as she tried to decorate the Christmas tree.  She sighed to herself.  Jo had promised her son that they would go skating, but that was before she had realized how many things she had to do today.
     "We can't go to today, honey. How about next week?" she said, hoping to pacify her son.  She hated doing this—this breaking of promises—but sometimes, lately it seemed she was forced to do it more and more.
     "Next week won't be Christmas," Rob continued further.
     "I'm sorry sweetheart—"
     "I'll take him, Aunt Jo," Franz interrupted upon hearing their conversation.  He had been planning to go into town anyway, to pick up a present for Isabel.  Surely, he thought to himself, it would be no problem to take his cousin to the pond for a few hours.
     "Thank you, Franz. Try to be back an hour before dinner; I want to do something special this Christmas Eve."

     "Faster, Franz, faster!" Rob cried as he skated upon the coat of ice.  Franz held on to the little boy tightly, speeding upon the ice, their playful innocence and enjoyment filling the air.  Franz didn't know that he was skating closer and closer to a patch of thin ice; he did not know that he shouldn't have gone alone; he did not realize any of this until it was too late.  The pair crashed below, falling deep under the ice.
     The cold, well-below freezing water numbed Franz's body and he could no longer see Rob.  Everything became blurry—until, flash—he saw a speck of Rob's jacket. Not knowing where his sudden, unfamiliar strength came from, he lifted the boy out of the water.  As Rob's body lay somewhat safe on the banks of this deep hole, Franz's fell down, down till finally he could no longer breathe or hold his breath and felt himself drowning—dying. His eyes closed as he thought about his early life in Germany, his parents, their deaths when he was fifteen, he and his Uncle Fritz coming to America to start a new life and receive schooling, Aunt Jo, Plumfield, Isabel.  His whole life ending in this one moment.
     Suddenly he felt hands grabbing at his jacket, pulling him out of the hole and laying him next to Rob.  It took Franz several moments to come to, and when he did he weakly stood up to see who had pulled him out, but he could see no one.
     Quickly, Franz's impaired mind flew to Rob as the boy lay cold and blue. Franz took off his jacket and sweater from his own cold and blue body and put it around the child.  Gaining more unknown strength, Franz lifted the boy in to the wagon and sped back to Plumfield, his sickened mind remembering that Dr. Pierce was not in Concord for the holidays but in New York visiting relatives. . . .

     Jo Bhaer stood looking at the clock wondering where her nephew and her son were.  The children ran about the house, excited about what the next Christmas morning would bring.  Her sisters and parents were somewhere—she suspected with Asia and Nick, maybe in the dining room.  She stayed in her room, hoping to wrap some of the presents for the children.
     "Mrs. Jo," she heard Nat yell from the bottom floor.  "Come quick—it's Franz and Rob!"  Jo dropped the unwrapped gift which happened to be Dan's and raced to the front doors.
     Mrs. Bhaer ran to the wagon that was now swarmed with all the house's inhabitants and pushed through the crowd.  She soon saw Rob asleep, blue and wet.
     "What happened?" she called to Franz, who was shivering next to him, as she carried her son out of the wagon.
     "We-fell-through the-the-ice," Franz spoke, his words slurred and stuttered, and short of breath.
     "Let's get them in the house," Asia called as Franz preceded to get out of the wagon, but his body let him down and he collapsed to the ground.
     "They have hypothermia," Nan announced minutes later in the boys' rooms as Mrs. Jo began to take off Franz's and Rob's wet clothes.  "I saw it in one of Dr. Pierce's patients."
     "He gave him his own clothes," Jo mumbled to herself.  "We need Dr. Pierce."
     "He's not here," Nan continued.  "But I think he left a colleague there just in case."
     "Tell Nick to go get him.  Quickly!" she said, beginning to rub them and put them into warm dry clothes.

     "The little boy should recover completely, in time.  By pulling him out as quickly as he did, adding, though wet, the extra clothes and rushing him here that fast Franz very well saved your son's life."
     Jo breathed a sign of relief. "And Franz?"
     "I don't believe he will survive the night.  I'm sorry."  Dr. Baker continued, "I'll see myself out."

     Elsewhere in the cold, gloomy, sad house a tree stood undecorated and a dinner lay uneaten.  A pile full of presents rested undisturbed and unwrapped.  Christmas had seemed to disappear from the household and a cloud of darkness loomed over, threatening never to let go.

     Jo sat by her nephew's beside as Franz lay shivering asleep in a coma like the time when Nat hit his head in a fight a year or so ago.  She stared at the cold body as it became harder and harder for him to breathe, and took his hand.  Was it like losing a son? she wondered to herself and thought maybe she should send for Isabel.
     "Rob just awoke; he's asking for you," Nan said, willing herself not to cry.  Mrs. Jo got up and placed a hand on Nan's shoulder.  "He's going to die, isn't he?" the girl asked.
     Jo avoided the answer.  "Why don't you stay with him while I go check on Rob?"  Nan nodded in response.  It was odd to her; for as long as Nan had known Franz he had only gotten ill once, in that Measles epidemic, and even then he had been up and around trying to help Mrs. Jo in any way he could.  Never had he been in bed so sick, so weak.
     The young boy so lucky to be alive smiled at the sight of his mother.  Still very much confused regarding the whole incident, he only remembered a small portion of what had happened, which Jo thought of as a good thing.  I'm so blessed to have my son, she thought to herself, reminded of how close she had come to losing him.  She stayed hours by his bedside until soon she and the rest of Plumfield were asleep.

     "Wake up—it's Christmas!" she heard the children call to one another as she woke up the next morning, and Jo almost forgot the night's misfortune, until those joyous sounds were silenced.  Oh God, no, she thought, thinking the worst, remembering that she had not fallen asleep in Rob's room but actually Franz's.
     But, he wasn't dead—no, he was sitting up, eyes wide open.  Mrs. Bhaer turned to him, astonished and amazed.  "Franz?" she called out happily, hugging him, but his only response was, "What happened?"
     "The doctor said you wouldn't live out the night."  Also just as confused as Rob was, Franz began to tell Mrs. Jo about what had happened, how he had been lifted out of the water by an unknown stranger and the so many miraculous things that had led Rob and Franz to still be with them.
     "Hark the herald angels sing, glory to the newborn King!" Meg Brooks' voice rang through the room, followed by the rest of  Plumfield, complete with presents and food.
     Doctor Pierce and his colleague were dumbfounded.  They never found out how Franz managed to survive and no one ever came forward as to pulling him out of that icy cold water. It was truly and simply a Christmas miracle.

THE END

E-mail Josephine at: BaSk546840@aol.com

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