The Christmas Tree (4 page)

Then I did remember hearing something about “sisters” while we were walking to the car, but since I didn't have any sisters I had assumed they weren't talking to me and had stopped listening.

The nun with the rosy cheeks was Sister Frances, who took charge then as she does now. “My name is Sister Frances,” she said. “Why don't you come on in and let me show you around.”

What choice did I have? I picked up my little bag and my satchel and went inside.

❄ ❄ ❄

Sister Anthony stopped talking, abruptly. “My goodness,” she said. “Look at the time. I can't believe I've rattled on like this.”

We'd been sitting there a long while. There was so much I wanted to ask her, so much I wanted to tell her, too, but I could see our time was up. So I thanked her for an interesting afternoon, and went on my way, surprised at how reluctant I was to leave.

Chapter Four

Friends

I didn't expect to see Sister­ Anthony again after that strange afternoon of companionship and revelation. Certainly I had no plans to ask about her tree again. I make it a rule never to interfere with the relationship between owners and their trees, no matter how tempting it is.

Many times, though, I felt the urge to talk to her. I didn't understand what it was, exactly, that drew me to her. I had plenty of people to talk plants with, and her cloistered life didn't seem to have anything in common with mine. I am a happy city boy. I may complain, like everyone else, about the noise and the inconvenience and the dirt, but I also love the possibility in it all. New York suits someone like me, who's congenitally unsettled. Orphans and nuns were not on my agenda.

I decided the connection I felt with Sister Anthony that day was born of fatigue and frustration. I'd just been working too hard. Brush Creek, indeed!

Then she called. It must have been early autumn. I can't place the date exactly. I only remember I had already found a Christmas tree for that year. I didn't need anything from her.

She was teaching a nature class and wanted to know if I would come and tell the children about how I find the Rockefeller Christmas tree. She was friendly on the phone, though slightly formal.

I could have made up an excuse. I usually do. But something, I didn't know what, made me say yes.

❄ ❄ ❄

I found her in the clearing, surrounded by a group of young children, who were maybe eight or nine years old. I stood at the edge and watched as she handed them pieces of colored paper.

“You're the sycamore group,” she was saying to the children holding red sheets, when she noticed me.

“Hello,” she said, waving me over. Her cheeks were bright from the nip in the air. “Let me finish up with this and I'll turn them over to you. Do you have some time? If you don't, I can do this later.”

I told her to go ahead. I had nothing else planned for the afternoon.

She had divided the class into kinds of trees, grouped by the color of the paper they'd been given. On each sheet she'd drawn a likeness of the bark, the fruit or seed, the twig, and the leaf of each kind of tree. The children were supposed to find examples and bring them in the next time they met.

I felt nervous as I watched their enthusiasm. This was a tough act to follow. Yet during my little presentation they listened closely and asked questions that seemed to spring from real curiosity. I had spoken to enough school groups to know that these kids had been in the hands of a gifted teacher.

When I was finished, they still weren't ready to leave.

“Tell us a story,” one of them called out.

Sister Anthony smiled, then with a look of mock seriousness stared up at the sky.

“Let me see,” she said, “where is the sun? Do we have enough time?”

It semed that this storytelling time was a ritual that concluded all of Sister Anthony's nature classes, since before she had a chance to finish asking her question the children were looking upward with the same mock seriousness and yelling: “Yes!”

“All right,” said Sister Anthony, then she paused.

“Would you like to hear about how I came to meet Tree?”

There were more shouts of “yes.” But before she began, she thanked me for coming and told me I didn't have to stay. “No, no, I'd like to hear this,” I said, despite the image of piles of unanswered telephone messages that flashed through my brain. I needed to find out what it was that had pulled me back there.

From the opening sentence, I could see the kids were willing to go wherever her story would take them. And so was I.

❄ ❄ ❄

Many years ago, a little girl came to Brush Creek to live. She was all alone in the world, and her name was Anna. I was that girl.

I had arrived after a long journey. Sister Frances—yes, she was here even then—led me up two flights of narrow stairs to my room, which was way up under the eaves. It was a tiny room, with a very big window right at the head of the bed. There was also a little bureau and a chair and a closet. It seemed very grand to me. I'd never had my own room before.

I remember Sister Frances saying, “You will say your prayers before you go to sleep, won't you?”

I nodded, but I wasn't sure I could live up to my end of the bargain. It's probably hard for you children to imagine, but I was quite out of the practice of saying my prayers. I'd been living in an orphanage for about a year and had forgotten how. I remember putting on my nightgown and hanging my satchel on a hook in the closet before crawling into bed. I tried to remember the bedtime prayer I used to say with my father, but I couldn't. Finally I simply said
thank you for letting me be in this beautiful place
, then turned on my stomach so I could look out of the window. In the black sky I saw tiny dots of light, so faint they looked like shiny little smudges. I didn't know what they were! As I fell asleep I told myself to ask Sister Frances in the morning.

My face was warm when I woke up. The sun was pouring in through the window.

I quickly dressed and went downstairs to find Sister Frances. No one was in the kitchen or anywhere in the house. I had no idea where everybody had gone and I was a little bit frightened.

I didn't know what to do, so I went into the big sitting room in the center of the house and just stood quietly and waited. Off in the distance I heard a lovely, silvery sound. I wanted to go outside and see what it was, but I was too afraid.

At last I saw a large group of nuns walking through the garden, coming toward the house. They'd been at morning prayer, though I didn't know it. Brush Creek and its routines were completely new to me.

“Ah, you're awake,” said Sister Frances when she saw me. She told me where everyone had been and asked me if I was hungry, which I was. I was still feeling a little shy though, so without saying a word I followed the nuns into the dining hall, just beyond the kitchen. Oh, that breakfast tasted so delicious, though it was just a bowl of oatmeal. I must have gotten a strong appetite from the fresh air that had filled my room the night before.

The food gave me the courage to walk right up to Sister Frances after breakfast. “Could you tell me something?” I asked her.

Later, Sister Frances would tell me she was delighted to see me speak so boldly. She wasn't sure how I would adjust to my new home. As you all know, many of the visiting nuns at Brush Creek work with children, but I was the first child to actually live at the convent. It was slightly unusual, but times were different then. It had all been arranged by my aunt, my only surviving relative. She herself was a nun who lived very far away, but she had once spent time on retreat at Brush Creek.

But to get back to my story.

Sister Frances told me she would try to answer my question.

“What are those little dots outside my window?” I asked.

By then we had been joined by Sister Lucia, who didn't have much patience, I'm afraid.

“What do you mean, little dots?” she said.

I don't think Sister Lucia meant to sound as sharp as she did, but she scared me nevertheless. I replied, “Up in the sky.”

Sister Frances must have seen how frightened I was. She knelt down so her eyes were level with mine, as if to comfort me.

“Those are stars, Anna. Of course you didn't see many in New York City.”

Her warmth gave me the courage to speak right up again. “Oh, yes, I did,” I said. “When I was very small, I saw a star in New York, but it was much brighter and bigger than any star I saw last night.”

“Ridiculous,” snapped Sister Lucia. “The child must have been dreaming. Go into the kitchen and see if you can be of some help.”

I looked up at Sister Frances for guidance. “Run along, Anna,” she said in a gentle voice.

I obeyed, feeling terribly sad that even here, in this beautiful place, I was made to feel so apart and alone—it was just like being at the Children's Home. Without thinking, I slipped out the kitchen door and began to run. I didn't know where I was going, I just wanted to be by myself.

The grass was wet. It was still early and the morning dew hadn't had a chance to dry in the sun. My feet were getting soaked, but I barely noticed.

I ran up the slope behind the convent, past the manicured hedges and the large square of earth that had been plowed for that year's vegetable garden. I ran past the apple orchard, where the trees were just beginning to bud with little bursts of light green.

My breath began to come in gasps but I kept running, right through a stand of tall evergreen trees until I came to a clearing on the other side. At first I was too winded to cry. All I wanted to do was rest. I flung myself to the ground and and found myself staring up at a big fat cloud that had just drifted over my head. Then, strangely, I no longer felt like crying at all. I was very calm, though I still felt lonely. I couldn't bear the thought of going back to that big house, which now didn't seem beautiful at all.

After the cloud passed, I sat up and for the first time since I had run out of the house, really noticed my surroundings. I was here—in this clearing, which was surrounded by grand trees, just as it is now. It seemed very cozy to me, like a private nook just for me. Except for the sound of birds cawing and twittering, I was alone.

And yet I felt as though someone was watching me. I looked all over but didn't see anyone. Then my eye caught sight of something on the other side of the clearing—something small. I walked over and couldn't help but laugh.

Can you guess what it was?

It was a perfect little tree, a miniature version of the huge evergreens standing at the edge of the clearing. It was just about my size!

“Oh, you are so beautiful,” I said, right out loud. “Can I touch you?”

I couldn't say for certain, but it seemed to me as though the tree's branches rippled ever so slightly.

Though I knew how scary strangers could be, I couldn't resist. Very carefully I reached out and patted the little tree's needles. I interpreted the fact that they were ticklish to my touch as a sign of friendliness.

Then without thinking about it I began to tell the tree things I had told no one else. How much I missed my mother and father. About Sister Lucia and Sister Frances and about how lonely I felt.

I talked for quite awhile. And when I stopped I sat down next to the tree. We stayed together contentedly, warming ourselves in the sun—and somehow I felt much better.

❄ ❄ ❄

Later, when I went back to the convent that first day, it was almost lunchtime. The nuns were upset and each let me know it in her own way.

“Where have you been?” snapped Sister Lucia, ignoring Sister Frances's warning look.

“Sister Lucia is only trying to tell you we've been worried,” said Sister Frances.

“Please don't worry,” was all I told them. I wasn't trying to hide anything from them, but I was afraid Sister Lucia would laugh at me if I told her about Tree. Funny, that's what I called him right from the start. Simply Tree, as though there were no others.

Luckily the lunch bell rang and the empty dining room suddenly filled with nuns. My disappearance was forgotten.

After lunch, I ran up the stairs to my room and went right to my closet to get my satchel. I ran down so fast I almost knocked over one of the sisters, who was carrying a big load of dishes over to the sink.

“Slow down, child,” she said to me.

I had to force myself to walk to the door. The instant I crossed the threshold, though, I began to run, leaping across the grass, which by then was dry and springy. When I reached the clearing I made myself slow down. I didn't want to alarm my new friend. I understood that he probably wasn't used to noisy little girls. The only sound was a faint
check check check
coming from somewhere above my head. Squinting against the sunlight, I peered into the thick green needles of the surrounding evergreens.