‘Johnny Smith,’ read Santa Claus, and, with a shake of the head, he dipped his pen into a bottle of black, black ink.
‘He still worries the cat in spite of all that has been said to him, and I hear he has been poking his mother’s canary bird with a stick.’ Santa Claus’s merry face was now very sober indeed. ‘His name must be crossed out, though I don’t like to do it.’
And with his long pen Santa Claus slowly drew a heavy black line through the name ‘Johnny Smith.’
‘Oh! Oh!’ sighed the Brownies, shaking their heads. ‘Too bad! Too bad!’
‘He will have nothing in his stocking next Christmas but a lump of coal,’ said one Brownie in a low voice to his neighbor.
‘And an apple with a bite in it,’ added another Brownie, looking sad.
‘But if he is a good boy between now and Christmas, you will put his name back in the Book of Good Children, won’t you, Santa Claus?’ asked several Brownies, eager to be as hopeful as they could.
The Little Brown Boy did not hear Santa Claus’s answer. The Book of Good Children! So that is what it was all about! The Little Brown Boy held tightly to the window-sill and almost put his head into the room.
Of course he knew what the Book of Good Children was. We all do. The Book in which Santa Claus keeps the names of all the Children whom he is to visit on Christmas Eve. What surprised the Little Brown Boy was that Santa Claus had actually crossed out a little boy’s name from his Book. Though his mother had often warned him just before Christmas that this might happen to him, he had never believed that Santa Claus would do such a thing.