Gus. Well now, that’s clevah, deucedly clevah!
Santa. Oh Gussie! Gussie! Would you add insult to injury by mocking a poor old man whose only daughter is about to break her father’s heart by becoming the wife of a potato-masher?
Gus. Pardon me, your majesty, but the potato-masher seems to have crushed us very successfully. He has quite a fetching way with the ladies too. I couldn’t have managed that little romance better myself.
Santa. But what is to be done to avert this dreadful calamity?
Gus. Send the terrier away, of course.
Santa. Impossible! The man would die of cold and hunger. You seem to forget, Gussie, that we are surrounded with ice and snow, piled mountain-high. How many brave explorers from the land of mortals have lost their lives in the attempt to penetrate the mysteries of the North Pole.
Gus. But can you not take the man away as you brought him here?
Santa. Have you also forgotten that one of the conditions of my becoming immortal and the Christmas Saint was that I was not to leave these icy fastnesses but once each year? I can not take this man away until next year on Christmas Eve, in that time who knows what dreadful things may happen?
(completely un-nerved
Gus. Your majesty, give me leave to think.