Risk to Santa Clauses
Risk for Santa Clauses is a short story by Siegfried Lenz published in 1957.
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During the Second World War, a Colonel Köhnke ordered a Santa Claus in Demyansk for Christmas Eve. When he does not arrive in the shelter, he sends a man out to look for Santa Claus. When he didn't come back either, the colonel left the shelter himself with some people to look for the missing people. First the soldier is found out of the shelter - wounded but still alive -, then the fallen Santa Claus. Colonel Köhnke remembers the picture. This action is reported in flashbacks by the first-person narrator.
After the Second World War, the first-person narrator who was sent out by Colonel Köhnke outside Demyansk to look for Santa Claus and was wounded in the process, had to earn money as a temporary Santa Claus and hired a Mr. Mulka in a restaurant. Disguised as Santa Claus, he is sent to Hochfeld, where he is supposed to bring Christmas joy to a family. He joined the Köhnke family, where he recognized his old colonel. The mess follows. Herr Köhnke and the first-person narrator talk about Christmas; Herr Köhnke doesn't recognize the soldier from before. It becomes clear that both are still suffering a lot from the horrors of the war and have not yet come to terms with what they experienced.
Back at Mulka's pub, the first-person narrator has to drink a schnapps because the risk as a temporary Santa Claus is too great.