“I can! I can!” He grinned. “If I can only keep the Judge from gobbling it all up!”
“We’ll string cranberries too. But first I must ask the children…”
It would be too awful, she thought, if they couldn’t come! She raced through breakfast. Before nine o’clock her feet were on the path to Little Syria.
The weather was still piercingly cold, but a great golden sun made a difference. Nuthatches were running nimbly up and down the trees; chickadees were calling; squirrels were frolicking. On the slough side there were muskrat houses and small mysterious-looking tracks—rabbits, probably.
But even morning sunshine could not make Little Syria attractive as she approached it from the rear. Woodpiles, chicken houses, dump heaps were desolate mounds of snow. The little houses seemed half buried in it, and they needed paint. So did Mr. Meecham’s mansion. Ascending the street, along an Indian trail which had been shoveled through the snow, she saw Christmas wreaths and red paper bells in the windows. They went to her heart, and suddenly she wanted the children for their own sakes as well as her own.
“I’d like to do something for them! Oh, I hope they can come!”
In front of the Mohanna house Kalil and Yusef were tusseling with such vigor that Emily thought at first they were fighting. But when she came close she saw from their smiling faces that there was no break in the Damon-Pythias relationship. Kalil snatched off his cap, his eyes beaming.
“Hello, ma’am! You come to see us?”
“Yes, Kalil! Merry Christmas!”
“Merry Christmas!” he shouted, pumping her hand.
“What were you doing?”
“We were practising. How are you, ma’am? How is my grandpa?”
As usual Yusef let Kalil do the talking, but when Kalil released her hand he took it and pumped, too, a joyful, astonished—affectionate look on his round prosaic face. Emily put her arms across their shoulders.
“I want to see your mothers,” she said, and they climbed to the porch, and Kalil opened the door.
Mr. Mohanna was sitting on the floor, cross-legged, a red tasseled cap on his head. He was smoking a strange sort of pipe which stood on the floor beside him, a ropelike tube leading to his mouth. He rose in dignified welcome, and behind him the little wife fluttered and Layla danced, her long braids swinging.
“You have come again to my house, Miss! It is yours. You may burn it!”
“Merry Christmas!” said Emily to stem the tide of eloquence.
“I hope you will live to see many more holidays, Miss.”
“I came…” Emily began. She saw Mrs. Mohanna dart toward the kitchen and sought to restrain her from producing another feast. “Mrs. Mohanna, please, come back! Mr. Mohanna, I wish to talk with your wife.”
“But certainly! Honor us by taking a seat!”
“Won’t you please call her back? I can only stay a moment.”
It was useless! She found herself seated and relieved of her muff as before. The figs came out and the raisins and the nuts, and today there were pastries, too—round ones with a hole in the center, and glassy ones with big nuts inside, and a crusty brown one which seemed to be made in layers and was, she discovered, oozing honey.
“They are for Christmas!” Kalil explained excitedly.
“That’s baklawa.”
“It’s perfectly delicious.”
“You like it? Have another then!”
They were all looking on in delight.
“My father,” cried Layla. “May we show her the donkey?”
“You have a donkey?” asked Emily in surprise.
The children began to laugh. “It is the donkey on which the Blessed Virgin rides. See?” They led her to the small clay figure of a woman on a donkey. It stood about a foot away from a home-constructed cave holding a manger with toy sheep and cows around.
“When it comes near Christmas, ma’am, we make the cave. But we put the donkey way, way over there by the kitchen door. Every day we move it a little, just a little. And on the Night of the Birth it reaches the cave.”
“And that’s tonight!” cried Layla.
“Tonight!”
Even Yusef shouted, “Tonight!” and the parents turned radiant faces. Emily was suddenly swept with fear that the children might prefer to be at home for Christmas.
“What do you do on Christmas Day?” she asked.
Kalil shrugged. “Oh, we have dinner. The Night of the Birth is the important time. Then we move the donkey into the stable. And we all go to Mass. And when we come home we have sweets.”
“Then on Christmas afternoon,” said Emily timidly, looking at the father, “could the children come to my house for a party? Kalil and Layla, and I want Yusef, too, of course.”
“A party?” repeated the big man. He stared at her in bewilderment.
“Yes. A Christmas party.”
Kalil grasped his father’s hand. “Oh, please, my father! The boys at school went to a party once, but the Syrians weren’t invited. It was a birthday party.”
Layla had grasped her father’s other hand. She was imploring him in Arabic. The mother stared at her husband with bright pleading eyes.
Yusef turned and bolted out the door, plainly in search of his own parental permission.
“We’re going to have a Christmas tree,” said Emily.
“My father! You hear? A Christmas tree!”
“Yusef has a Christmas tree. His father has a store of his own. I carry the peddler’s pack. But you could look at Yusef’s tree.”
“Please, my father! We want to go to a party.”
Mr. Mohanna brushed at his eyes, but then he smiled, his teeth shining beneath the enormous mustache. He bowed to Emily.
“They may come. My thanks to you and your honored grandfather. Peace to his age!”
Yusef returned, shouting in Arabic. He could come, too.
The parents stood on the porch again as Emily departed, accompanied by Kalil and Yusef—and Layla, who put on her coat and scarf as before to join the guard of honor. This time Emily went up the hill to the corner where the shabbiness of Little Syria met the gentility of the town. The children left her there calling out “Merry Christmas!” and “Three o’clock!” That was the hour decided upon for the party.
Walking on down Pleasant Street she met Alice Morrison who lived near by in an old-fashioned house at the top of a sloping lawn. She was returning from town, her yellow hair blowing, her arms full of bundles.
They both sang out, “Merry Christmas!” and Alice cried, “I was just going to send you a note. Can you come to my house Friday afternoon? I’m giving a party.”
“The Browning Club?”
“No. Girls from my class, mostly. You know Betsy Ray and Tacy Kelly are in town. I want you to get better acquainted with them—and them with you.”
“I’d love it!” Emily went on in a glow. She was glad to be bolstered by Alice’s friendship, as well as by Little Syria’s devotion, before going to Aunt Sophie’s—her next stop. She dreaded going back into the yellow brick house after last night, which seemed now like a horrible dream.
But it wasn’t too difficult. Annette wasn’t at home. And Uncle Chester and Aunt Sophie, who were trimming their Christmas tree, did not protest too much.
“I know how you feel,” Aunt Sophie said. “Grandpa is getting pretty old. But won’t you be lonesome?”
“We’re giving a little party,” Emily said, smiling. “I didn’t want Grandpa to be too disappointed about not coming here, so I asked some Syrian children to come in.”
“Syrian?” Aunt Sophie’s tone expressed utter mystification.
“We got acquainted with them last summer. They used to sell us frogs’ legs. Grandpa’s very fond of them.”
Aunt Sophie knitted her brows. “Are they clean?”
“As clean as I’d be if I lived in Little Syria. They’re very nice and have beautiful manners.”
Uncle Chester smiled down. “Do you know, Emily,” he said, “you
remind me of your mother sometimes.”
“I do?” “Yes. Lottie was always taking an interest in foreigners. She used to tell me about the Poles in Binghamton.”
Emily looked up at him, her blue eyes luminous. Somehow her mother came to be more of a companion all the time!
She went on down Front Street and bought a tall hemlock. The grocer promised to deliver it at once. She bought a few ornaments to add to the old ones stored in the attic at home, and some gifts to supplement the skates and the doll.
“Let’s see! What did I want most when I was eight? A bottle of perfume! I longed for it!” she remembered, and bought some violet perfume and some red embroidered mittens—and picture books and games for the boys—and candy canes for them all.
“It’s fun to be getting Christmas ready for children,” she thought.
When she reached home her grandfather and the Judge were setting the tree up in the parlor.
“Here’s where your grandmother always put it.”
“I remember.”
“I’ve been invited to the party,” said the Judge. “I had to be asked after all the work I did, popping corn.”
“By Jingo, you ate more than you popped!” cried Grandpa Webster. He was more excited by the party than Emily had dreamed he would be.
That afternoon they strung the popcorn and made some of it into sticky balls. They strung cranberries, too, and garlanded the tree, and put on small white candles. Emily brought down the ornaments. During the years since her grandmother’s death they had always gone for Christmas to Aunt Sophie’s. The box was just as her grandmother had packed it last, each ball and star and angel folded in tissue paper.
“I remember some of these from when I was a little girl,” Emily said to Uncle Chester who had come in laden with packages for them only to be loaded with others to take home.
He inspected a rubicund Santa. “I remember that fellow from when I was a little boy.”
After supper, Emily and her grandfather wrapped the perfume and mittens, games and books. But they put the doll and skates in plain sight at the bottom of the tree.
When the fire was fixed for the night, Emily sat down at the piano.
“It came upon the midnight clear
That glorious song of old…”
Carols were like no other songs, she thought. They sounded so pure and sweet, as though they came from heaven. She sang “O Little Town of Bethlehem” and “Holy Night,” her grandfather joining in.
He was sitting in his easy chair and when she rose he called out, “Look, Emmy! It’s snowing! Just the thing for Christmas Eve!”
She went to the bay window. Out in the darkness big flakes like pieces of cotton were coming slowly down. She watched them, smiling, her hand on his shoulder.
He reached up and patted it. “I’m lucky to have you, Emmy. Christmas wouldn’t be much fun alone.”
“I’m lucky to have you,” she answered, a lump coming into her throat.
The party was a noteworthy success. The presents Emily and her grandfather opened in the morning, although much appreciated, and the turkey dinner at noon, were as nothing compared to the afternoon’s festivity. The snow had cleared and the sun shone brightly in a sky of flawless blue. Emily had shoveled the walks both front and back. Kalil and Yusef always came the back way, but maybe, she thought, for a party…! She was right. At three o’clock exactly three small figures came formally through the old front gate.
Feet stamped with care on the porch. The ancient doorbell gave out its gentle chime. Emily opened the door to see three shining faces. They all carried packages, and even before their wraps were removed they presented them with a graciousness at which Emily marveled.
“My mother hopes you will take this poor piece of lace. She made it herself.”
“These sweets are for you, my grandpa! Peace to your age!”
Even Yusef made his speech, and Layla was presented to Grandpa Webster, smiling.
“Bless my soul, what dimples! They’re like potholes!” he said.
They were all scrubbed and shining. The hair of the boys was plastered down with oil. Layla’s braids were tied with real ribbon. She wore the usual earrings and bracelets, and her eyes were rimmed with sooty black. But they were bright enough without it—especially when she saw the doll!
“Look, my brother! Look!” she cried when Emily pointed out the yellow-haired baby which had real lashes, eyes that opened and shut, and a pink dress. She snatched it to her bosom.
But Kalil was too busy to look. He and Yusef were shouting over their skates, and Grandpa Webster was chuckling. “You can play crack the whip on them, my lads! I’m going to watch you right out of my window.”
“And a book! A book in the English!”
“Smell me, my brother! Perfume! Flowers! Umm!”
There was such a clamor as the little house had not heard in years. Judge Hodges came in the midst of it, with more packages, and it started all over again.
They were fascinated by the piano. One by one they touched the keys. Emily played Christmas carols, and they listened with awed admiration. Layla knew “Holy Night,” and she sang it alone. She did, indeed, sing like a thrush.
“Layla has a talent for music. Maybe I could give her piano lessons,” Emily thought.
At last they trouped out to the Christmas table. Grandpa Webster said the blessing as usual, and Kalil, Layla and Yusef all crossed themselves and murmured. There were turkey sandwiches, dill pickles, Christmas cookies and cakes, and cups of hot cocoa with marshmallows floating on top.
When they rose the children murmured something again. It sounded like, “May your table last…forever.”
After supper the candles on the tree were lighted. Judge Hodges went home, Layla sat down with her doll and Yusef with a puzzle, and Kalil took his book and went to Grandpa Webster. He leaned against the old man.
“Won’t you read to me, my grandpa? I don’t know the English very well.”
“Emmy,” said her grandfather, opening the book, “we ought to help these children with their English.”
Emily was clearing the table, but she put down the plate she held in her hand. Of course, they could help them with their English!
“There’s something I can do with Grandpa,” she thought. “I’ll have them come here regularly. Maybe I ought to have some American children, too. That’s what they need most of all, to mix with Americans.”
She interrupted the reading. “Grandpa, I have a wonderful idea! Let’s get up a Boys’ Club—Kalil and Yusef and some American boys. They could meet here.”
Her grandfather stared admiringly. “Emmy, you’re a smart girl!”
She smiled at Kalil and Yusef. “Wouldn’t you like to belong to a club with some other boys?” she asked.
To her surprise they did not answer. Kalil looked at Yusef with a troubled face.
“Do you know what a club is?” she persisted.
“Yes,” said Kalil. “We know about clubs. But ma’am! American boys don’t like to play with us Syrians. Do they, Yusef?”
Yusef shook a sober head.
“Pooh!” said Emily. She knew he had a point, but she would handle it somehow. “Not all American boys are like the ones who teased you on the pond. We’ll get up a fine club if you’d like to join.”
“Oh yes!” cried Kalil. His eyes began to sparkle. “That would be dandy. Wouldn’t it, Yusef?”
Layla dropped her doll and came running. “Can I come too? Can I come to the Boys’ Club?”
“Of course,” Emily replied.
“But ma’am,” protested Kalil, looking anxious, “she’s only a girl.”
“Pooh!” said Emily again. “In America, Kalil, girls are important.”
“Are they?” he asked, staring.
“I’m going to give Layla piano lessons.”
“Piano—lessons?”
“I’m going to teach her to play the piano—if she wants to learn. Do you, Layla?”
Layla nodded dumbly
.
“She can come whenever the club meets. She can be an honorary member.”
Layla jumped so that her braids swung, her bracelets tinkled, and the air was suddenly full of violet perfume.
“I’m an honorable member of the Boys’ Club!” she sang. “I’m an honorable boy!”
15
Old Year into New
“GRANDPA,” EMILY REMARKED at breakfast, “I couldn’t handle this Boys’ Club without you. I love children, but I don’t know boys.”
“Well, I do!” he answered confidently, pouring maple syrup over three well-buttered pancakes. “I was a boy myself, and I had a boy of my own, and your grandmother and I practically raised your Uncle Chester. I’ll help you to keep them in order.”
“But what do you suppose they would like to do? Study something?”
“Not on your tintype! Not if they knew they were studying, that is! But Emmy, they’ll decide for themselves what they want to do. That part won’t be hard. The hard part will be, like Kalil said, to get some Americans to join.”
“I believe you’re right,” she answered soberly. People looked down on the Syrians—because they were poor, or because they spoke broken English, or because they lived by themselves and kept their foreign customs. She didn’t know why, exactly.
“Why do you think people feel so superior to the Syrians?”
“Just because the Syrians are different!” Grandpa Webster answered. “It’s human nature, I guess. Most of the folks who make fun of them don’t mean any harm. A few, though, are downright spiteful.”
“Like those boys who teased Kalil.”
“Yes. And Luther Whitlock down at the bank. The old bonehead! I told him a cute story about Kalil and he started running the Syrians down. Said this country was too full already, and they ought to have stayed where they belonged.”
“And he’s the president of our school board!” Emily exclaimed indignantly.
“That’s right. Now old Meecham who’s their neighbor speaks well of the Syrians. He says they’re honest and don’t make trouble. And do you know why they came to this country?”
“I don’t believe I do.”
“To get religious freedom. Just like our Pilgrim fathers! They’re Christians, the ones who live in Deep Valley, and Syria is mostly Moslem, I guess.”