ERBzine 8211: Martin - Tarzan's Christmas

"It's a silly, repetitive song," said Tarzan. "What would anyone even do with a partridge in a pear tree, let alone 10 lords a leaping? I see enough of that when the adjournment gavel comes down at Parliament. Now, five golden rings, that has some promise. They could be melted down into ingots and stored in our vaults."

"Really, Tarzan," said Jane. "You need to show some Christmas spirit. What about six geese a laying? You do enjoy a couple of big fried eggs at breakfast, along with a rasher of raw Horta bacon."

"Breakfast?" said Tarzan. "That's why God made chickens. Goose eggs have never done anything for me except leave me with a spell of amnesia. And who needs twelve drummers drumming when we've got the Waziri living next door with that incessant thumping on their tomtoms until 2 a.m. every morning!"

“Well," said Jane, "if you don't like the song why don't you try writing some new lyrics for me to sing?”

"Now that's an idea," said Tarzan. He sat down at the piano and began plinking away at the familiar melody, stopping every few bars to write lines on a piece of paper. Just as Tarzan had a knack for learning new languages, he had also developed a flair for learning musical instruments. He taught himself the piano after first learning the guitar, taking a few lessons from Korak, who had been taught to play by his barracks buddies in the Army. Once Tarzan had gotten the hang of the instrument, he had quit the lessons and gone ahead and become fully proficient on his own, just like many of his fans in the Edgar Rice Burroughs community.

At last he finished and spun around on the piano stool, smiling at Jane. "Okay, listen to this," he said. Jane sat down with a look of eagerness on her face.

Tarzan began singing: "On the first day of Christmas, my dear Jane gave to me (Tarzan looked lovingly at Jane and she tilted her head, smiling back.) "...a slain bara in a tall tree."

“All right, all right," said Tarzan. "Here's the real song. On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, a snobbish butler with a goatee...”

Tarzan grinned and sang, "On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...a monkey and a calliope."

"Thanks for agreeing with me, my dear," said Tarzan, crumpling up the paper with the notes he had made. "I told you it was a silly song."

The Sound of Christmas

Jane had some chestnuts roasting on an open fire.

“That's a nice blaze," said Tarzan. "The fire is so delightful. You would even say it glows.”

Jane herself glowed at the compliment, then looked toward the open window and asked Tarzan: "Do you hear what I hear?".

Tarzan had a keen sense of hearing but he kidded Jane: "Hear what?" he said.

“Oh surely Tarzan you can hear the sleighbells ring, are you listening?”

“Yes, I hear that," said the ape man. "It sounds like a song, a song high above the trees. Do you want me to investigate?”

"Please," said Jane.

"You can count on me," replied Tarzan.

Brightly shone the moon that night. It shone through a light rain, but heedless of the wind and weather, the ape-man placed his ear to the ground. There was a distinct "thumpety thump thump" sound which Tarzan identified as a small herd of Bara the deer and some other large object.

Then, from up on the housetop, Tarzan heard a whistle, the snapping of tanned leather and the sound of jingling bells as something soared over his head.

However, misfortune seemed his lot because, at that moment, the ape man was peppered from above with a deluge of spilled candy canes which, in the misty rain, had become moist and were sticking to his body, naked but for a loin cloth. "Ugh," he snarled, ripping the offending sugar-laden cylinders from his skin, "these have all the tender sweetness of a seasick crocodile."

Annoyed, he began stomping the confectionaries into the ground so they were indistinguishable from the rest of the jungle floor.

Jane hurried from the bungalow. "We've had a visitor. Come look under the tree." She saw the ape-man's face and stopped short: "Is something the matter?"

"Not any more Jane," said Tarzan, swallowing a stray chunk of candy which had become lodged in his gums. "From now on, our troubles will be out of sight."

One Evening at the North Pole

Santa Claus rubbed his temple with the eraser end of his pencil and mumbled outloud, "Oh my, oh my, oh my."

"What's the matter, Santa?" asked chief elf Tommy Tinker.

Santa looked again at the ledger before him. "It's Tarzan," he revealed. "I just can't figure out whether to classify him as naughty or nice."

“I thought Tarzan was nice," said Tommy. "I mean...hero of the jungle, helper of the helpless, vindicator of the victims.”

“Oh, he does all that," admitted Santa. "But two wrongs don't make a right, you know, and he does have some black marks against him.”

"Like what?" the nosey elf asked.

“Like theft," said Santa, "stealing Opar's gold and then not even sharing it with the Waziri and, after all, they helped him carry it out. Then he goes off on jungle jaunts without telling his wife where he's going or how long he'll be gone. And he kills people. Oh, I suppose in most cases they deserve it, but he doesn't actually follow due process.”

“Sounds bad to me," Tommy agreed. "Why don't you just give him coal in his stocking?”

Santa tossed his pen on the desk and sighed: "That's another problem. He doesn't own any socks."