As a surprise Christmas gift, Halleys Comet took Erbert and Gerbert to the North Pole to visit Santa Claus. While touring, Santa's workshop, they met Tappy, one of Santa's leprechaun helpers. Tappy originally received his nickname because as a young apprentice elf many centuries ago, his job was to tap the red strip into the candy canes that went into children's stockings. Of course, that was long ago and he had graduated to become one of the most important leprechauns in the workshop. Tappy, you see, was the custodian of Santa's vat of "little dust," and it was in explaining the nature and use of "little dust" that Tappy solved one of the great mysteries of Christmas.

We have all wondered how Santa Claus is able to get all of those toys into one sleigh on Christmas Eve for his trip around the world. Well, Tappy had the answer. You see, just before Santa Claus loads his sleigh, all of the toys pass down a conveyor belt in front of Tappy. He then puts one grain of "little dust" on each toy, and that makes the toy so small that you can barely see it with a magnifying glass. Santa then piles all of the toys into his bag and takes off. He carries with him, though, a large sack of "big dust." Just before he puts a toy under the Christmas tree or something into a stocking, Santa places on grain of "big dust" on that toy, thus restoring it to its original size.

You can see how important Tappy is to Santa's operation. Without his "little dust", Santa would have to make thousands and thousands of trips to deliver toys all over the world, and probably wouldn't finish until sometime around the Fourth of July.