A Light in the Window (25 page)

He thought of his mother as they dozed on the sofa under piles of blankets and the radiant heat of one large dog. She had loved Christmas like a child.

When he went home from seminary, most of the room he slept in would be filled with boxes, wrapping paper, and endless yards of her signature white satin ribbon.

The armoire would be stuffed with gifts she’d been making and buying all year, and the house would smell the way she loved it best—of cinnamon and cloves, oranges and onions, coffee with chickory, and baking bread.

She would expect him to bring his friends and make the house merry, and when they begged her to sit down at the table and stop serving, she would always say, “But it’s my joy!”—and really mean it.

Peggy Cramer had been with them for his mother’s last Christmas, and Tommy Noles and his fiancée, and Stuart Cullen had called long-distance. He remembered the call because Stuart had spent nearly an hour talking to his mother and making her laugh as she sat by the wall phone in the kitchen.

He automatically loved anyone who made his mother laugh.

He had given her the brooch that year, a lovely thing, costing far more than he could afford, but when he saw it in the jeweler’s window, he knew this was the gift that must try to convey his gratitude for the years of encouragement, for the fact that she had believed in him from the beginning, no matter what his father said to the contrary.

One small amethyst brooch with pearls had been required to speak volumes. Above all, he wanted it to say, Thanks for your support when you, more than anyone, wanted me to become a Baptist minister and I did the unthinkable and became an Episcopal priest.

That had been the coldest of affronts to her family and even to her own heart. But she loved him and stood with him, as stalwart as an armed regiment.

“Mother,” he had said, “there’s no way I can tell you ...”

“You needn’t try,” she told him. “I can see it all in your eyes.”

He looked at Dooley, asleep under the mountain of covers. It was almost this time last year that he had run away, racing down the mountain in a freezing wind on his Christmas bicycle, desperate to see the face of his own mother.

He prayed for Pauline Barlowe and the children scattered like so many kittens from a box.

“In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan ...”

He heard the faintest singing somewhere and sat up and listened. Barnabas growled.

“Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone ...

“Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow ...

“In the bleak midwinter, long ago ...”

Someone was singing his nearly favorite Christmas hymn, but who? And where was it coming from?

Barnabas bounded off the sofa, barking. “Angels in the garage!” he shouted, slipped his feet into frozen shoes.

A soprano and a baritone from the choir had pulled a sled to his house, wearing hobnail boots that bit into the ice. Lashed to the sled was a load of seasoned oak, and while it was no half-cord, it would give them respite.

They might as well have parked a Mercedes in the garage and presented him with the key. Gleeful, he and Dooley picked a log and split it into kindling.

Next, they chose a second log, as fuel for their supper.

Then they broke the chair into pieces, agreeing to save the folding tables for a Christmas Day blaze.

Things were definitely looking up, though there was no news from the outside world to prove it. The last report, the baritone said, was of helicopters dropping food into the coves and a forecast of freezing rain for tomorrow and the next day.

There was enough oak left to heat the study tomorrow, giving them a chance to write and read, instead of sitting in a frozen stupor, watching their breath vaporize on the air. He could not remember when his heart had felt so full of ease. A load of wood had been delivered and, with it, the spirit of Christmas.

“You know this one,” he said to Dooley, who was laying kindling over the crumpled newspaper. “Sing with me! ‘What can I give him, poor as I am? If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb ... if I were a wise man, I would do my part ...’ ” Hesitantly, Dooley joined in. “ ‘Yet what can I give him ... give my heart.’ ”

He held out hope until the morning she was to arrive. It had rained the day before, and now, at dawn, he heard the relentless freezing rain still rapping sharply against the windows. Flights would be canceled, airports shut down.

He prayed they would be able to go forward with the hanging of the greens and with the afternoon and midnight services on Christmas Eve. After the death of winter had lain upon them like a pall, they needed the breathing life of the Child; they were starving for it.

He continued to pray for Miss Rose and Uncle Billy, Miss Sadie and Louella, and for all who were elderly, sick, or without food or heat. He was bold to ask that angels be sent, and step on it.

He was going to the kitchen door to let Barnabas out when he did an odd thing. Without thinking, and out of sheer habit, he turned on the dial of the burner under the kettle.

The television blared in the study. The light came on in the hall. The kitchen radio announced a Toyota sale.

He shouted, “Hallelujah!” Dooley hollered, “Hot dog!” Barnabas barked wildly. And the washing machine went into a spin cycle in the garage.

He would never bet on it happening again, but he felt he had somehow managed to shut down, and then restore, power to an entire county.

When the phone rang, he jumped as if shot at.

“Father! I just had to talk to somebody ...”

“Margaret Ann ... what is it?”

“The most awful thing has happened. I hid all of Amy’s Santa Claus at Lisbeth’s house, and I was going to pick it up on Christmas Eve. Well, Father, you know that awful hole my sister lives in down by the town cemetery, and now she’s frozen in like ... like ...”

“A stick in a popsicle.”

“Yes! And there’s no way I can get my car out of the yard, Father, much less make it to Lisbeth’s. What can I do? It’s the prettiest little doll you ever saw, it wets like crazy, it cost somethin’ awful, and no check from her daddy since Easter. Oh, and there’s a little pink wagon with lights on it, and a nurse set, and a blue dress, and socks with lace. Oh, Father!” She was crying. “Amy is counting on Santa Claus!”

“I’ll see what I can do. Give me a half hour.”

Ron Malcolm’s son was out, helping the town crew spread salt and slag. Lew Boyd’s Esso was closed tight as a clam. The young man who once raked his leaves could not be found.

He called the baritone. “Is there any way I could borrow your hobnail boots for a couple of hours? Terrific. Just leave them inside your porch door.” He called the soprano. “What size are your hobnails? Perfect. We won’t come in, just set them on the stoop.”

“Dooley,” he shouted over a TV ball game, “can you come here a minute?”

“I ain’t doin’ this n’ more,” said Dooley, whose face was red as a lobster. He stomped along, carrying a doll and a wagon in a sack on his back. The rector’s sack contained a dress, socks, and nurse’s set, plus the doll carriage Margaret Ann had forgotten to mention.

“You fall and bust your butt,” said Dooley, “and you cain’t preach. I bust mine, I cain’t play football.”

“Good thinking.” He had to stomp hard on the crust of ice with each step in order to keep from falling. He would pay for this by morning in every aching muscle. “We’ve only got three more blocks to go. Just keep in mind those steaks sizzling in the skillet ... those oven-roasted potatoes with all the sour cream you can eat ... and that triple-chocolate cake, sent by some well-meaning parishioner before the storm, which is currently hidden in the freezer. You can devour the whole thing!”

Dooley grunted.

The Main Street Grill was dead as a doornail, which was a sorry sight to behold.

“Yo, Santy Claus!” called one of the town crew, who was sliding along Main Street, trying to dump salt.

“Bring me a dolly!” hollered another. “Blond hair, blue eyes—and a red pickup with a CD player!”

“Merry Christmas, Father! Merry Christmas, Dooley!” The crew boss grinned and waved. “A package of fifties will suit me just fine, thanks.”

“We’ll get right on it, boys. Clean your chimneys.”