The Christmas Cantata (The Liturgical Mysteries) (12 page)

Bessie backed her wheelchair away from the piano.

"I wasn't in the choir."

"Can you tell me what happened on that Christmas Eve? There was a cantata that was scheduled to be sung, but as far as we can tell, it was never performed."

"I don't remember," she said. She spun her chair in a tight circle and rolled it toward a pair of double doors at the end of the room. Pete, Pauli Girl, and I watched in silence as the automatic doors swung open and Bessie Baker wheeled herself down the corridor.

"That went well," said Pete.

"She knows what happened," I said. "And she may be the only one."

* * *

"Merry Christmas, Hayden," chirped Helen Pigeon. She was walking across the frozen tundra of Sterling Park, loaded down with packages. "Done your shopping yet?"

"Not yet," I answered. "How are you this afternoon, Helen?" I was a little surprised by Helen's festive disposition. It was just yesterday that I saw Helen grab the clerk in Schrecker's Jewelry Store by the lapels and shake her like a terrier with a dead squirrel. Brittney Jo had gift-wrapped a package using
regular
cellophane tape instead of
magic transparent
cellophane tape. "
What were you thinking?!
" screamed Helen as the woman's head rattled back and forth. It took both Mr. Schrecker and myself to pull her off the poor woman, who then tried to retaliate by reaching under the counter for her canister of pepper spray. Luckily, it was empty since Brittney Jo had already used it on several customers in the past few days, and what might have been another shopping related tragedy was averted.

"I'm great," said Helen. "No, better than that. Wonderful! I've just been over to Schrecker's."

I froze. "Are there some bodies I should know about?"

Helen laughed. "No, silly! It's the oddest thing. I was over at the Ginger Cat for lunch and just in the worst mood. You know...the holiday grumps. I was talking to Annie about something or other, and then Georgia came in from Eden Books next door. The next thing you know, we're laughing and chatting about our kids, and singing funny Christmas carols." A look of confusion crossed Helen's face. "It was weird."

"Yeah," I agreed. "Weird."

"Annie and Georgia told me about your special music on Christmas Eve. It sounds wonderful! I can't wait to hear it."

"I think it's going to be good," I said.

"Anyway, I felt sort of guilty about yesterday, so I decided to go over to Schrecker's and apologize, and take Brittney Jo a jar of cherry preserves that I picked up at the Ginger Cat while I was there. She couldn't have been nicer. She and Luke are coming to our Christmas open-house on Saturday."

"Wow," I said.

"You and Meg are coming, aren't you? I found a fabulous new caterer this morning. She's all the rage."

"Umm...I can't say for sure. Meg is in charge of our holiday calendar."

"Well, of course she is! I'll give her a call just in case she forgot. Bye now! Merry Christmas!"

Helen almost skipped across the park.

Something was happening.

* * *

Our rehearsal on Thursday night went well. We knocked out the second movement of the cantata and reworked the first.

"This is just wonderful," Rebecca said. "I know the poem, but I've not ever sung anything using a text by Sara Teasdale. Do you think that the composer might have known her?"

The second movement was on a poem entitled
Stars
. It began with a marvelously haunting duet between the two bassoons. They were soon joined by the oboe carrying the melody, and by the time the choir came in two pages later, the mood was magical. And
this
was just with organ accompaniment. With the instruments added, I knew the effect would be spine-tingling.

Alone in the night

On a dark hill

With pines around me

Spicy and still,

And a heaven full of stars

Over my head,

White and topaz

And misty red;

Myriads with beating

Hearts of fire

That aeons

Cannot vex or tire;

Up the dome of heaven

Like a great hill,

I watch them marching

Stately and still,

And I know that I

Am honored to be

Witness

Of so much majesty.

"I've no idea if the composer knew her," I said, "but I think she certainly was a fan. Elle de Fournier not only set this poem, but another one in the last movement as well."

"I've never heard of her," said Phil Camp.

"Sara Teasdale lived in St. Louis, but moved to New York in the 1930s," Rebecca said. Rebecca was the town librarian and well versed in poetry. "She committed suicide, I think, but she was very influential and celebrated in the twenties and thirties."

"Popular with the girls," said Pete. "At least when I was in high school. They were always memorizing Sara Teasdale poems for English class. I was more an Edgar Allan Poe type of guy. You know, 'Quoth the raven, nevermore.'"

"I can just picture the shepherds looking up into the heavens on that night," Elaine said.

"Can we sing it again?" asked Marjorie. "Just one more time? I tell you, I can't get enough of this stuff."

Chapter 10

She delivered her cantata to Mr. Dearman, the choirmaster, at the beginning of November. He had specified the date, and even though she hadn't worked out the final movement, what she'd finished was enough for the choirmaster to get started on. Besides, she told herself, the alternate suggestion she'd provided for the ending would be fine for the premiere. She'd work out the final version later and have the whole thing completed by Christmas at the latest. It would be a present. Accompanying the score she gave to Mr. Dearman was a letter from Nadia Boulanger expressing her delight that one of her favorite pupils was composing again and that she was sure the premiere of La Chanson d'Adoration would be a wonderful success. The choirmaster was thrilled. The singers were thrilled. Everyone was thrilled. Rehearsals started almost immediately, although not really in earnest until after Thanksgiving.

The choir sounded good, she thought, and Stan Dearman had arranged for musicians to drive up from Asheville for the performance. The Christmas Eve service was scheduled for 10:30 in the evening and would last well past midnight, but the cantata would begin at ten o'clock. A pre-service concert.

It was a Thursday, she'd remember in years to come. Christmas Eve. The dress rehearsal had gone splendidly the previous evening, and the weather forecast (always a concern in late December) was for a clear, although cold, night. Perfect, she thought.

At three o'clock in the afternoon, she was fixing herself a cup of tea when there was a knock at her front door.

* * *

Meg and I decided to drop by her mother's house after choir rehearsal. In truth, we'd been invited for fruitcake and coffee. Many sons-in-law would view an invitation such as this as cruel and unusual punishment, but not me. Not only did I greatly enjoy Ruby's company, I really liked fruitcake, especially the homemade kind that had been soaked in rum for six months.

"Oh, I almost forgot," said Ruby, once we were seated at the kitchen table, our fruitcake topped with whipped cream placed delectably in front of us. "I have a present for you, Hayden. Let me get it."

She disappeared into the living room and came back a moment later with a wrapped box the size of a large book. I'd known Ruby longer than I'd known Meg. They were two peas in a pod, same beautiful smiles, same gray-blue eyes that conveyed a wicked sense of humor, and although Ruby's hair was now silver, one trip to Noylene's Beautifery, and they might be taken for sisters. She handed me the wrapped box.

"What's this?" I said. "It's not Christmas yet."

"I thought you could make use of this present ahead of time."

"So I should open it?"

"Absolutely!" said Ruby.

I removed the wrapping paper and looked down at a box of hand-rolled, authentic, one hundred percent Cuban cigars. Fifty
Romeo y Julietas
. Illegal in every state.

"
Mother!
" said Meg. "You know how I feel about cigars!"

"Wow!" I said. "This is incredible!"

"I got them from a gentleman friend that I met in Miami last summer," said Ruby. "He's Cuban."

"
Mother!
" said Meg again. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Ruby put on her most innocent expression. "I don't tell you everything, dear. Now eat your fruitcake."

"Don't worry," I said to Meg, conscious of the smile plastered across my face. "I won't smoke them all the first day."

"Humph," said Meg.

We ate our fruitcake and I filled Ruby in on the mystery of the Christmas cantata. Ruby always liked a good mystery.

"So you went and visited this English teacher at the nursing home?" Ruby said.