“What’s impaling?” asked Jenna.
“Never mind your dad, he’s just teasing.”
Barry laughed. “Aren’t you supposed to be making dinner for the lady?” he asked.
“We officially begin our arrangement on Monday. In fact, she is making dinner for us tomorrow. At least she invited us to dine with her.”
“Is that right?” I asked.
“She was up here just before the two of you came down.”
“This should be interesting,” I decided.
We finished the meal and, after thanking Barry profusely for his help, we cleared away the dishes. Then I dove into a pile of receipts and ledgers, while Keri put Jenna to bed.
“Can Daddy read me a story?” she asked.
“Not tonight, honey. Daddy has a lot of work to do.”
“It doesn’t have to be a long one,” she pleaded.
“Not tonight, honey. Some other time.”
A disappointed child was tucked under the covers and went to sleep yearning for “some other time.”
Chapter III
UNDAY WAS NOT proclaimed the “day of rest” by a mother with a family to ready for church, but such is the irony of piousness. Upon our return home at the conclusion of the day’s “churching,” we reveled in the discovery of a glorious new lifestyle. In our last apartment we had had such little space we found ourselves looking for ways to spend our Sunday afternoons outside the home. Now we defiantly spread our things, and ourselves, throughout our quarters. I napped in front of the drawing room fireplace while Keri read in the bedroom and Jenna played quietly in the nursery. What we may have lost in family togetherness we more than made up for in sanity.
At quarter to six Keri woke me, and after washing up, we descended the stairs to Mary’s dining room. It smelled wonderfully of roast beef and gravy and freshly baked rolls. The dining room was spacious and, in typical Victorian style, the floor was covered with a colorful Persian rug that stopped short of the walls, leaving a border of the polished hardwood floor exposed. The room was built around a large, rectangular, white-laced dining table. A Strauss crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling directly above the center of the table, suspended above a vase of freshly cut flowers. The east wall had an elaborate built-in china closet displaying the home’s exquisite porcelain dinnerware. On the opposite wall was a fireplace, as ornately carved as the parlor fireplace, but of lighter wood. The mantel extended to the ceiling, and the firebox and hearth were tiled in marbled blue-and-white patterns. To either side of the fireplace were walnut side chairs with Gothic carved backs and tucked haircloth upholstery.
Mary met us at the doorway and thanked us graciously for joining her.
“I’m so glad that you could come!” she said.
“The pleasure is ours,” I assured her.
“You really shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble,” said Keri.
Mary was a hostess of the highest order and would not feel the affair worthwhile had she not gone to a lot of trouble.
“It was no trouble at all,” she said instinctively.
The place settings were immaculate and beautiful, and the china plates were trimmed in 24 karat gold.
“Please sit down,” she urged, motioning us to some chairs. We took our seats and waited for her to join us.
“I always pray before I eat,” she said. “Would you please join me?”
We bowed our heads.
“Dear Lord, thank you for this bounty which we have during this blessed Christmas season. Thank you for these new friends. Please bless them in their needs and their desires. Amen.”
We lifted our heads.
“Thank you,” I said.
Mary uncovered a woven basket of steaming rolls, broke them apart, and placed one on each of our plates. She then filled our goblets with water and the food-laden platters were passed around the table.
“So how are your quarters?” Mary asked. “Have you moved in all your things?”
“We have,” Keri replied.
“There was enough room in the attic? I was afraid it might be a little cramped.”
“Plenty,” I assured her. “We don’t own much furniture.” I lifted another spoonful from my plate then added, “You really have some beautiful things up there.”
She smiled. “Yes. That’s mostly my David’s doing. David loved to collect things. As a businessman, he traveled all around the world. He always brought something back from each journey. In his spare time he became very knowledgeable about furniture and antiques. A few years before he died he had started collecting Bibles.”
I bobbed my head in interest.
“See this Bible over here?” she said. She motioned to a large, leather-bound book sitting alone on a black lacquer papier-mâché table inlaid with mother-of-pearl. “That Bible is over two hundred and fifty years old. It was one of David’s favorite finds,” she shared joyously. “He brought it back from Britain. Collectors call it the ‘wicked’ Bible. In the first printing the printer made an error, and in Exodus they omitted the word ‘not’ from the seventh commandment. It reads ‘Thou shalt commit adultery.’ ”
“That’s deplorable,” Keri chuckled.
Mary laughed out loud. “It’s true,” she said. “After supper you’re welcome to look it up. The British crown fined the printer three hundred pounds for the mistake.”
“That was a costly mistake,” I said.
“It was a very popular version,” she said, smiling mischievously. “In the front parlor is a French Bible with what they call fore-edge painting. If you fan the pages back there is a watercolor of the Nativity. It was a unique art form of the period. Upstairs in the attic is a Bible box that David bought for it, but I think the book is so beautiful that I leave it out.”
“The Christmas Box,” I said.
She looked surprised at my familiarity with the box.
“Yes, there is a Nativity scene etched in the wood—of the Madonna and the Baby Jesus.”
“I saw it up there. It’s very beautiful.”
“It’s not from France, though,” she explained. “I believe it was from Sweden. Fine box-making was an art in the Scandinavian countries. When David passed away I received not a few requests to purchase the Bibles. Except for the Bible I donated to the church, and the three that I still have, I sold the rest. I just couldn’t part with these three. David took such joy in them. They were his favorite treasures.”
“Where is the third Bible?” I asked.
“I keep it in the den, for my personal reading. I’m sure there are some collectors that would have my head for doing so, but it has special significance to me.” She looked down at Jenna.
“But enough of these old things, tell me about your sweet little three-year-old,” she said kindly.
Jenna had been sitting quietly, cautiously sampling her food, largely ignored by all of us. She looked up shyly.
“Jenna is going to be four in January,” Keri said.
“I’m going to be this many,” Jenna said proudly, extending a hand with one digit inverted.
“That is a wonderful age!” Mary exclaimed. “Do you like your new home?”
“I like my bed,” she said matter-of-factly.
“She’s glad to get out of her crib,” Keri explained. “We didn’t have room in our last apartment for a bed. She was devastated when she found out that she was the only one in her dance class who slept in a crib.”
Mary smiled sympathetically.
“Oh, speaking of dance,” Keri remembered, turning to me, “Jenna’s Christmas dance recital is this Saturday. Can you make it?”
I frowned. “I’m afraid not. Saturday is going to be a busy day at the shop with all the December weddings and Christmas formals.”
“It must be a very busy time of the year for your type of business,” Mary offered.
“It is,” I replied, “but it drops off in January.”
She nodded politely then turned to Keri. “Well, I, for one, am glad that Jenna likes
it here. And, if you’re wanting for company, I would love to take Richard’s place at that dance recital.”
“You are more than welcome to join us,” Keri said. Jenna smiled.
“Then it’s a date. And,” she said, looking at Jenna, “for the little dancer, I made some chocolate Christmas pudding. Would you like some?”
Jenna smiled hungrily.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Mary said, turning to us. “She hasn’t finished her supper.”
“Of course not,” Keri said. “That was very thoughtful of you.”
Mary excused herself from the table and returned carrying a tray of crystal bowls filled with steaming pudding. She served Jenna first.
“This is very good,” I said, plunging a spoonful into my mouth.
“Everything is delicious,” Keri said. “Thank you.”
The conversation lulled while we enjoyed the dessert. Jenna was the first to break the silence.
“I know why flies come in the house,” she announced unexpectedly.
We looked at her curiously.
“You do?” Mary asked.
Jenna looked at us seriously. “They come in to find their friends . . .”
We all stifled a laugh, as the little girl was in earnest.
“. . . and then we kill them.”
Keri and I looked at each other and burst out laughing.
“My, you are a little thinker,” Mary said. She chuckled, then leaned over and gave Jenna a hug.
“I’d like to propose a toast,” Mary said. She raised a crystal glass of wine. Following Mary’s lead we poured our glasses half full of the rose liquid and held them in the air.
“To a new friendship and a wonderful Christmas.”
“Hear, hear,” I said emphatically.
“A wonderful Christmas,” Keri repeated.
The rest of the evening was spent in pleasant conversation, punctuated with laughter. When we had finished eating, we lavishly praised Mary for a wonderful meal and transported the dishes to the kitchen. Mary firmly insisted on cleaning up the dishes herself, so reluctantly we left her to the chore and returned upstairs to our wing.
“I feel like I’ve known her all my life,” Keri said.
“Like a grandmother,” I observed.
Jenna smiled and raced up the stairs ahead of us.
The ritual of cohabitation took on a natural and casual openness welcomed by all. It soon became clear to Keri and me that Mary had solicited a family to move in with her more for the sake of “family” than real physical need. She could easily have hired servants, as there obviously had been in the past, and she seemed to trouble herself immensely to make our stay amiable, to the extent of hiring out any chore that Keri or I might find overly tedious or time-consuming, except when said chore would invoke a vicarious act of a familial nature. Bringing home the Christmas tree was such an occasion. Mary, upon finding the largest, most perfectly shaped tree in the lot, offered to purchase a second pine for our quarters. She was absolutely delighted when Keri suggested that we might all enjoy sharing the same tree together. We brought the tree home and after much fussing, the fresh scent of evergreen permeated the den. Not surprisingly, the room became a favorite place for us to congregate after supper. We enjoyed Mary’s company as much as she desired ours, and Jenna accepted her readily as a surrogate grandmother.
Some people were born to work for others. Not in a mindless, servile way—rather, they simply work better in a set regimen of daily tasks and functions. Others were born of the entrepreneurial spirit and enjoy the demands of self-determination and the roll of the dice. Much to my detriment, I was born of the latter spirit. Frankly, that spirit was just as potent a draw to return to my hometown as the quaint streets and white-capped mountains I had grown up loving. As I said before, Keri and I had left Southern California for the opportunity to operate a formal-wear business. Though formal-wear rental is quite common now, at the time it was new and untested and therefore exciting. The opportunity came by way of a friend who found himself in a small town just north of Salt Lake City, called Bountiful, for a wedding. That is when he met my future partner, an enterprising tailor who had begun leasing elaborate bridal gowns, and soon discovered a greater need for suitable accoutrements for the bride’s and bridesmaids’ counterparts.
As necessity is the mother of profit, he began renting a line of men’s dinner jackets with great success. It was at this time that my friend, while dressed in one of those suits, had, unbeknownst to me, engaged the proprietor in a lengthy discussion on the state and future of his business. Having been impressed with expectations of my marketing prowess, the owner called me directly and after many long-distance phone conversations offered to sell me a portion of the new company in exchange for my expertise and a small cash outlay, which Keri and I managed to scrape together. The opportunity was all we could have hoped for, and the business showed signs of great promise.
Under my direction, we increased our market by producing picture catalogs of our suits and sending them to dressmakers and wedding halls outside of the metropolitan area. They became the retailers of our suits, which they rented to their clientele, and received no small commission in the transaction. The paperwork of this new venture was enormous and complex, but the success of my ideas consumed me and I found myself gradually drawn away from the comparatively relaxed environment of home. In modern business vernacular, there is a popular term: “opportunity costs.” The term is based on the assumption that since all resources, mainly time and money, are limited, the successful businessman weighs all ventures based on what opportunities are to be lost in the transaction. Perhaps if I had seen my daughter’s longing eyes staring back at me from the gold-plated scales, I would have rethought my priorities. I adroitly rationalized my absence from home on necessity and told myself that my family would someday welcome the sacrifice by feasting, with me, on the fruits of my labors. In retrospect, I should have tasted those fruits for bitterness a little more often.
Chapter IV
DON’T RECALL the exact night when the dreams began. The angel dreams. It should be stated that I am a believer in angels, though not the picture-book kind with wings and harps. Such angelic accoutrements seem as nonsensical to me as devils sporting horns and carrying pitchforks. To me, angel wings are merely symbolic of their role as divine messengers. Notwithstanding my rather dogmatic opinions on the matter, the fact that the angel in my dream descended from the sky with outspread wings did not bother me. In fact, the only thing I found disturbing at all about the dream was its frequent recurrence and the dream’s strange conclusion. In the dream I find myself alone in a large open field. The air is filled with soft, beautiful strains of music flowing as sweet and melodic as a mountain brook. I look up and see an angel with wings outspread descending gradually from heaven. Then, when we are not an arm’s length removed, I look into its cherubic face, its eyes turn up toward heaven, and the angel turns to stone.
Though I have vague recollections of the dream haunting my sleep more than once after we moved into the Parkin home, it seemed to have grown clearer and more distinct with each passing slumber. This night it was alive, rich in color and sound and detail, occupying my every thought with its surrealism. I awoke suddenly, expecting all traces of the nocturnal vision to vanish with my consciousness, but it didn’t. This night the music remained. A soft, silvery tune plucked sweetly as a lullaby. A lullaby of unknown origin.
Except tonight the music had an origin.
I sat up in bed, listening intently while my eyes adjusted to the darkness. I found the flashlight kept in the pine nightstand next to our bed, pulled on a terry-cloth robe, and walked quietly from the room, following the music. I felt my way down the hall past the nursery where I stopped and looked in at Jenna. She lay fast asleep, undisturbed by the tones. I followed the music to the end of the hall, pausing where the melody seemed to have originated, from behind the attic door. I grasped the handle and opened the door slowly. The flashlight illuminated the
room, creating long, creeping shadows. Apprehensively, I climbed the stairs toward the music. The room was still and, except for the music, lifeless. As I panned the room with the light, my heart quickened. The cradle was uncovered. The dusty, draped sheet that had concealed it now lay crumpled at its base on the attic floor. Anxiously, I continued my examination, until I had centered the light on the source of the enchanted disturbance. It was the ornate heirloom box that Barry and I had discovered the afternoon that we had moved in our belongings. The Christmas Box. I hadn’t known at the time it was capable of music. How odd it should start playing in the middle of the night. I looked around once more to be sure that I was alone, then balanced the flashlight on one end so that its beam illuminated the rafters and lit the whole attic. I lifted the box and inspected it for a lever with which to turn off the music. The box was dusty and heavy and appeared just as we had seen it a few days previous. I inspected it more closely but could find no key and no spring, in fact no mechanism of any type. It was simply a wooden box. I unclasped the silver buckle and opened the lid slowly. The music stopped. I moved the flashlight close to examine the box. Inside lay several parchment documents. I reached in and lifted the top page. It was a letter. A hand written letter, brittle with age and slightly yellowed. I held it near the flashlight to read. The handwriting was beautiful and disciplined.
December 6, 1914
My Beloved One,
I stopped. I have never been one to revel in the intrusion of another’s privacy, much less inclined to read someone else’s correspondence. Why then I was unable to resist reading the letter is as much a mystery to me as was the parchment itself. So strong was the compulsion that I finished the letter without so much as a second thought into the matter:
How cold the Christmas snows seem this year without you. Even the warmth of the fire does little but remind me of how I wish you were again by my side. I love you. How I love you.
I did not know why the letter beckoned me or even what significance it carried. Who was this Beloved One? Was this Mary’s writing? It had been written nearly twenty years before her husband had passed away. I set the letter back in the box and shut the lid. The music did not start up again. I left the attic and returned to my bed pondering the contents of the letter. The mystery as to why the Christmas Box had started playing music, even how it had played music, remained, for the night, unanswered.