Angels (12 page)

The rest of the program will be a surprise for our little family, but in the second grade’s scene, “Let It Snow,” Coleman stars as Frosty the Snowgirl! I don’t know if she was chosen for her small size, or because Miss Seaman wants to make up for being so mean to her. Anyway, Coleman is tickled pink, and I made her an adorable costume, with Styrofoam balls for her head (cut-out eyes and a carrot nose) and torso, and white tights, and a cardboard top hat Sarah Ann got in Chapel Hill, painted white and covered in sparkles. She looks cute as a button in it.

Coleman is the only one in the class who has to wear a costume—the other children wear clothes they’d wear in the snow, if it ever snowed here. Dinah will wear her new red corduroy dress, and her navy blue winter coat, and a white knit cap and scarf I knitted for her last Christmas. She’ll burn up, but she won’t be onstage long.

Coleman doesn’t have to sing—she just dances around the stage while the others sing “Let It Snow” and “Frosty.” (The word about Coleman’s singing ability—or lack of it—may have spread—I’m sure Miss Seaman heard about it from Clara Hatley. Coleman has a nice soft speaking voice, but she can’t carry a tune, and she croaks like a frog when she sings. Mary Louise says never mind; at her church’s carol festival, Coleman will be surrounded with strong voices, and no one will notice. Anyway, the Lord will think her voice is beautiful, and that’s what matters.)

When Miss Seaman sent around the Radio City Music Hall program, she also sent Coleman some articles on a Presbyterian church in New York City that has a “Blessing of the Animals” ceremony. Coleman decided we should do the same thing here. She loves animals, and she also likes the way all the churches join together for the New York event. She still goes to the Methodist Church, so first she called on Mr. Galloway, the Methodist minister, to ask if the Methodists would host an animal-blessing program, but he declined, and so did the Baptists. Coleman told Dinah that the ministers all looked at her like she was suggesting something heathenish.

Well, maybe it’s heathenish to them, but obviously not for that New York City Presbyterian church—nor, as it turns out, ours! When Coleman approached Mr. Guthrie, who shares her love for animals, he said our church will be glad to do it. They’re going to follow the format of the New York church with a six o’clock service right after the Youth Fellowship meets at five on the last Sunday before Christmas. Mr. Guthrie told Coleman he’d get in touch with the other clergy, but Aunt Mary Louise has already talked to Dr. Coker, and the Byrds’ church will definitely participate in the service. Naturally, we’ll all be there, including Peter.

As soon as the word got around, people started talking about what a good idea it is. (Sarah Ann made copies of the article about the service at the church in New York and sent them to a lot of people, and I think they’re excited about being like a church in New York.) I hear the Methodists are sorry they aren’t hosting it. But that Hatley woman has been telling people she doesn’t approve of animals in church, and she has the best children’s choir—better than anything in New York, much better than anything around here. Hmph. Pride goeth before a fall. She must never have heard Mary Louise’s children’s choir. She’s in for a shock.

A big Christmas surprise has started, even though it’s still weeks till Christmas: a Byrd Construction Company truck was in the driveway when we came home from school, and men with ladders were crawlin’ all over the outside of the house and the roof. Miss Ida and Aunt Polly were sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee and lookin’ happy, but amazed.

“What’s goin’ on?” I asked.

“The men are repairing cracks and stopping up places the wind can come in,” Miss Ida said. “Mr. Sherrill called and said Olivia wouldn’t want us to suffer from the cold, so the estate is repairing the house, and they’re putting in a furnace to replace the one that died so long ago.”

I could hardly take it in. “You mean we won’t freeze this winter?”

Aunt Polly nodded. “That’s right. Ever since Mr. Sherrill called, I’ve been thanking God. If there was a single thing I wanted more than anything else—something that would make Christmas perfect—it’s a warm house. I never prayed for it, because it seemed like a sin. When you think of the baby Jesus being born in a stable—well, I felt as if I should be grateful for a roof over my head, and not complain about a little cold—”

“Not so little,” I whispered to Coleman, who had a big smile on her face. “Is this a Christmas present from you?”

“Not ‘zackly. Now don’t be askin’ so many questions,” she said, shakin’ her finger at me. “Christmas is comin’, and curiosity killed the cat.”

Well, cat or no cat, I was set on findin’ out, and so I asked Aunt Mary Louise when I got her by herself. The heat was mostly a present from Mr. Sherrill, with a lot of help from the Byrds, who did the work at the house, including installin’ the new furnace that Mr. Sherrill bought. Coleman wanted to pay for it out of the estate, only Mr. Sherrill wouldn’t let her. When she told him how much we suffered from the cold last winter, he decided to do it himself. Everybody is keepin’ Miss Ida and Aunt Polly from knowin’ Mr. Sherrill paid, because they might not accept it—charity!!—so he arranged it all and told Miss Ida it came from the Fairgroves’ estate. (I think that was just a fib, real white, not a lie.) Anyway, whoever His earthly servants were, the warm house is surely a gift from God, and I am truly thankful. They turned on the heat already, and I can’t believe how warm the house feels.

We went to the tree lighting at the courthouse last night, and it was bee-uti-full. The tree’s not as big as the one in New York—we’ve seen that one on TV, and it’s a giant—but the one downtown is the biggest anybody ever saw around here, and when the colored lights all went on at once, I gasped—it was like magic. The high school glee club led us in singing Christmas carols, which are some of my favorite songs in the whole world. I never get tired of hearin’ or singin’ ‘em.

After the tree lighting, we went to Aunt Mary Louise’s. There was a bunch of Byrds there—all sizes—and us, and Dr. and Miz Coker. We had the best supper—Aunt Mary Louise is near ‘bout as good a cook as Miss Ida. When we got home, like the song says, I fell asleep countin’ my blessings. I’m doing that every night till Christmas, and maybe from then on. It’s a happy way to go to sleep.

We went to the bazaar today and bought the tree, which is lovely, but I told Ida this tree will have lost all its needles by the 20th of December, which is nearly two weeks away, and if there are any left, we’ll probably set the house on fire if we turn on the tree lights at Coleman’s party. She smiled and said I was probably right, but that Mary Louise is driving us to Valley Stream on December 19th to buy a replacement tree. The girls can change the decorations and put what’s left of the first tree outside and cover it with food for the birds.

I started fussing about the extravagance, and she held up her hand to stop me. “This is Coleman’s first real Christmas, and her first birthday party, and her friends who helped her so much will be here on the twentieth. We can’t celebrate with a dead tree.”

She’s right, of course. This Christmas is special. It deserves two trees. A two-tree Christmas! What next?

We decorated the tree this evening, and it is bee-uti-full. All our ornaments are real old. Miss Ida says she and Aunt Polly had some of ‘em when they were little. And some of them I made in kindergarten and first grade, including the big star we put on top. Lots of our ornaments were made by friends, too. I love lookin’ at ‘em.

Miss Ida and Aunt Polly put a bunch of wrapped gifts under the tree, and they said we should open one from Miss Rena ‘cause it had to do with supper. So we did, and it was a ‘lectric fondue pot, and forks with long handles, and the rest of the present was in the kitchen—cheese and chocolate and stuff to make fondue, and the recipes. I never heard of fondue before, but the note from Miss Rena explained that folks mostly eat it in the real cold weather like in the Swiss mountains, where there’s snow. We used the forks to dip toasted bread cubes and vegetables in the cheese fondue, which is mostly melted cheese, and it was de-lish-us. We sat around the kitchen table and pigged out—twice! First on the cheese, and then we cleaned the pot and fixed the chocolate fondue—that’s melted chocolate—and dipped bits of pound cake in it. We played Christmas music on the radio, and it was lovely.

But I thought Coleman didn’t look as happy as I felt, and when we went to bed, I asked her what the matter was. Turns out she thought there ought to be an angel on top of the tree and a manger scene under the tree.

“I don’t know about an angel for the tree,” I said. “Some folk have a star, some an angel. Maybe we can buy an angel? But we have a manger scene—we usually put it up in the dining room, on the buffet.”

“Oh, let’s look at it tomorrow,” she said, her face lightin’ up. “An’ let’s us go to the store and buy us an angel for the treetop. It won’t hurt your feelin’s if we take down your star, will it?” I said it wouldn’t, and we went to sleep with her lookin’ ‘most as happy as I feel.

At breakfast, when I asked about the manger scene, Aunt Polly said, “We have two now—one was Olivia’s. I’ll unpack them both, and you can look at them after school. But I don’t know about an angel for the tree—they might not have anything very good in the stores here—”

“I saw one at the bazaar yesterday,” Coleman said. “It was real pretty.”

“It saw it, too,” I said. “It was grand, with a white satin dress and silver wings and halo.”

“‘Grand’ is right,” said Miss Ida. “It cost twenty dollars.”

“Good gracious!” Aunt Polly said, frownin’. “That’s way too much. I wish I’d known you wanted one—I could have made it. But I’m out of time—I couldn’t possibly get one done now.”

“May we look downtown and at the bazaar after school?” Coleman asked. “Maybe there’ll be a cheaper one.”

Miss Ida said we could, and all day we looked forward to shopping. But when we got downtown, there weren’t any nice angels anywhere, and the fancy angel we saw at the bazaar was gone. Coleman looked as near to cryin’ as I’ve ever seen her.

“Were you goin’ to pay twenty dollars?” I asked.

“I didn’t want to, ‘cause I’d have had to use the ‘mergency money Mr. Sherrill gave me,” she said. “But I got to get an angel for the top of the tree, before my angels come. I don’t want them to feel bad.”

“Oh, I see,” I said, tryin’ to figure out what to do. “Maybe if we worked together we could make one?”

“Not enough time,” she said. “Not to make somethin’ nice.”

I never saw her so downhearted, and I was worried about what to do, but when we got home, the bazaar angel was on our tree! Coleman clapped her hands. “It’s a Christmas miracle,” she said, with a great big smile.

I knew Aunt Polly must have bought it—Miss Ida was too busy to leave the kitchen—and in a way, it
was
a miracle, ‘cause Aunt Polly would have purely hated to spend that kind of money on something she could have made better. And I was sure she knew it was made by Miss Hatley, who was so hateful to Coleman about the Methodist choir. That would have been a bitter pill for Aunt Polly to swallow.

After seein’ the spankin’ new angel, the manger sets looked kind of sad, but Coleman said we’d fix ‘em, and we bathed and dried each little figure. Aunt Polly helped us with a little glue here and there, stickin’ bits in places, and touchin’ ‘em up with paint, and they look just fine. We put one set on the buffet in the dinin’ room, with pine branches around it, and one under the Christmas tree. They look lovely.

The days and nights are rushing by, with something to do every minute. The band and glee club concert was excellent—and the children’s pageant was truly wonderful! I shouldn’t say it, but the second grade was especially good. Coleman was adorable, dancing around like Shirley Temple, and Dinah looked pretty as a picture. But as good as they were, the Bethlehem scene was the best. Miss Seaman had tethered Rena’s goat, to make sure it didn’t run away, and she had managed to borrow a mangy-looking sheep, and even a little donkey. Best of all, she’d had big cutouts of camel silhouettes made, and behind the tiny three kings, three little boys pulled the camels along in red wagons! It was so cute I nearly cried. We waited around afterward to congratulate Miss Seaman, and they’re right: she’s a new person. The Lord is truly capable of miracles.

I never heard anything more beautiful than Mary Louise’s Carol Festival. I couldn’t pick out Coleman’s voice from the rest, but she was in the first row, and I could tell she was enjoying singing; her face glowed. I saw the Hatley woman in the congregation, looking pickle-faced, but she didn’t stay for refreshments. I’m not surprised. After all that bragging about
her
children’s choir, hearing Mary Louise’s must have been a revelation—and seeing Coleman singing must have been a surprise, too.

I enjoyed the “Let It Snow” program, and I was mighty proud of Coleman. But I touched the sheep, and it didn’t feel soft like Peter, but sort’a like steel wool, an’ it smelled bad. I felt real let down by that sheep.

The Blessing of the Animals was wonderful. The church was full, and a lot of people brought animals, mostly dogs, but a few cats in carriers, two bunnies, a raccoon, and a parrot. Some children brought their teddy bears and other stuffed animals. I wish I’d thought to bring Roo.

The dogs were pretty good—only one pooped and two barked. Peter behaved just fine. He kind of huddled down on the floor by our feet. (I think he was scared.) Coleman admired the service and was real glad the church did it. She loves critters, and children around here don’t always treat ‘em right. Miss Ida and Aunt Polly don’t know it, but Coleman and Freddy and me have had us some fights with children tormentin’ frogs in the pond behind the courthouse, and Ralph is not the only boy around here we’ve caught hurtin’ a dog. Coleman thinks they don’t know any better, and if we teach ‘em that all animals are God’s critters and He loves ‘em, they’ll stop tormentin’ ‘em. I pray she’s right, but I think some children are just bad. I bet anything Rotten Ralph is bullyin’ at his new school.