Jan Karon's Mitford Years

by Jan Karon

  “Now, then,” said Andrew, “this is wonderful. Raphael’s Virgin of Loreto. Look at the scarlet of her gown—something more like a rich coral, really.”

  “Rich coral. That sounds good.”

  Andrew thumbed the pages.

  “Giovanni Battista Salvi’s Madonna and Child with Angels. Again a gown of scarlet, with an overmantle of blue. Exquisite!”

  “Let me see.” He hiked his glasses farther up his nose. “Blue. Definitely blue. And scarlet. Yes! Mark that page, if you would.”

  Fred ducked through the door. “I brought th’ walnut chest from th’ warehouse. You want it in th’ window?” he asked Andrew.

  “Where the bookcase was sitting. I’ll give you a hand after lunch. How did the color come up under the wax?”

  “As good as it gets! It’s nearly twelve, I can run out for sandwiches. . . .”

  “Not for me,” said Andrew. “I’m going up the hill to sample a pasta dish invented by my beautiful wife.”

  “And I’m off to the Grill,” said Father Tim.

  It was the way he stood up, he remembered afterward—the way his leg had somehow twisted, causing him to lose his balance.

  As he grabbed for the sink with his left hand, he saw the angel tumble from his right; it seemed to take a very long time to fall. He heard a terrible sound escape his throat, something between a shout and a moan, as the figure crashed onto the slate floor.

  Finding his balance, he looked down in horror.

  The angel was shattered. He was shattered.

  There was a long silence in which he and Andrew and Fred stood frozen, unmoving. He realized that his mouth was still open, forming the shout he’d heard himself make.

  “Good Lord,” Andrew said at last.

  He wanted to burst into tears, but steeled himself. “What a bumbling fool . . .”

  “Please.” He felt Andrew’s hand on his shoulder. “No recriminations. The head is intact, and the wing isn’t so bad. What do you think, Fred? Can it be fixed?”

  “I think it would take . . .”—Fred cleared his throat—“a mighty long time. Th’ body’s in a lot of little pieces.”

  Father Tim stooped and picked up the head, and was somehow deeply moved to see the face still so serene, and so perfectly, perfectly satisfied.

  Fred stepped away and returned with a box and a broom. “Let me sweep up. You go on to th’ Grill.”

  “Yes,” he said, hoarse with regret. “Yes.”

  “I don’t reckon you’ll be back today.”

  “Oh, yes. I will. Time is running out.”

  “I’ll just put everything in this box,” said Fred.

  Andrew drew on his overcoat and muffler, looking solemn. “We can keep it and look at it again down the road. We may want to have a try at—”

  “No,” said Father Tim, shaking his head. “Let it go.”

  The adrenaline that pumped in him so furiously these last weeks had crashed with the angel. He felt confused, and suddenly old.

  They sat on the sofa with a bowl of popcorn between them. A small fire crackled on the hearth.

  “I finished early at the fire station and came looking for you at the Oxford. . . ,” she said.

  “You did?”

  “. . . to take you to lunch, but you’d already gone. Fred said I missed you by this much.”

  “How did you know where to find me?”

  “Everybody knows where to find you.”

  “They do?”

  “Yes, darling. Remember, this is a small town! Actually, I was in The Local and asked Avis if he’d seen you, and he said when he steps outside to smoke, he often sees you ‘messing around’ at the Oxford.”

  “Aha.”

  “Avette at the library said she’d seen you turn in there several times, and, of course, the Irish Woolen Shop, which is practically next door, said the same.”

  He’d never been fond of keeping a secret, at least not one of his own. Clearly, it wasn’t his long suit, and he wished she would wipe that grin off her face.

  She leaned her head to one side, her eyes blue and expectant. “So I don’t suppose you’d like to give me a clue?”

  “No deal. None. And stay away from the Oxford, you big snoop.”

  “But, Timothy, I wasn’t snooping! We’ve both been so busy, I was missing you—I thought it would be fun to have lunch.”

  “Tell that to the judge,” he said, pleased. “By the way, I wanted to drop off a note to my favorite author this morning, but your workroom door was locked.” Her workroom door had never been locked before. “So . . . what are you up to?”

  She took a handful of popcorn. “A little of this and a little of that,” she said, obviously pleased with herself.

  “Really?”

  “You know, the usual.”

  “Can you give me a clue?”

  “No deal. None.”

  “None?”

  She hammered down on the popcorn. “None! Christmas is coming, you know.”

  Which, of course, explained everything.

  He tucked the note in the pocket of her robe as she took her morning shower.

  Someone had done a study with six- to eight-year-olds, asking them to define love, and he’d run across the results on the Internet.

  When you love somebody, your eye lashes go up and down and little stars come out of you.

  When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You know that your name is safe in their mouth.

  Taking you to dinner Wednesday eve. Yours until heaven and then forever, T

  P.S. He calls His sheep by name, and our names are safe in His mouth.

  What had, in the beginning, belonged to him had come to belong to Andrew and Fred also. He felt he’d let everyone down by dropping the angel.

  He was willing, however, to let go of this needless guilt and move on.

  It was ironic that he’d lost two angels in recent years. Though it had been a glad sacrifice, he’d given the first to his next-door neighbor and tenant, Hélène Pringle, whose life had once been formed, quite literally, around the bronze and marble figure that now sat on her mantel.

  In any case, the clock was ticking on everything, including his lists. Sitting at his desk by the window, he turned to the back of the partially blank book in which he gathered and inscribed favorite quotes, and began to write.

  Dooley, digital camera

  Sammy, cable-knit sweater, L

  Sissy/Sassy, backpacks

  He got up and hurried along the hall to Cynthia’s workroom and knocked on the locked door. “Kavanagh, what about books for the girls?”

  “Little Women!”

  “Good,” he said, scribbling.

  “Narnia. Nancy Drew.”

  “What about Wind in the Willows?”

  “We gave them that last year!”

  “What do you think about Uncle Remus?” he called through the door.

  “Brilliant! They’ll love Uncle Remus, especially if their grandpaw reads it aloud to them.”

  “I thought we could stick all the books in their backpacks! Save on wrapping.”

  “Could you give Hope a call right away? Make sure she has these on hand or can order them in time. Oh, and, dearest—add Anne of Green Gables in the eight-volume set.”

  “Consider it done!” They were certainly doing their part for Happy Endings. “What about a housecoat for Louella?”

  “Perfect! Extra large, with sleeves, and a zipper in front. Leave the list on the kitchen island, and I’ll take care of what you can’t get to. And remember your haircut for the Christmas Eve service.”

  Blast. He’d rather take a whipping. . . .

  “I hear Joe Ivey is cutting hair at home,” she informed him.

  He wasn’t fond of yelling through a door. “I’ll take care of it! And by the way, what’s that smell coming from your workroom?”

  “Curiosity killed the cat, Timothy!”

  Back he trotted to his desk. Busy signal at Happy Endings. He hop
ed it was an incoming book order a half mile long.

  Puny, crock pot

  Nurses @ Hope House, chocolates, 4 dzn, reserve at Local

  Children’s Hosp., as above . . .

  Andrew, my cpy early ed. Oxfd Bk Eng Verse

  Fred, Garden spade, Dora’s Hdwe

  Jonathan Tolson and siblings, ask Cyn

  He heard his good dog thump from the sofa to the floor and pad to the desk, where he gazed up with brown and solemn eyes.

  “Hey, buddyroe.”

  And what might he give the one who had brightened his days and encouraged his spirits and forgiven his shortcomings and listened to him ramble while actually appearing interested?

  He scratched behind the pair of willing ears. “When we get out to Meadowgate, you can wallow in the creek, and I won’t yell; I won’t even try to stop you from chasing squirrels. After all, life is short, carpe diem!”

  Barnabas yawned.

  “In the meantime . . .”

  He opened the drawer and gave his dog one of the treats that caused his desk and everything in it to reek of smoked bacon.

  When he completed the gift list, he began another for food shopping. The list for Dooley’s welcome-home banquet was a no-brainer: steak and the ingredients for chocolate pie.

  Aloud, he counted heads for dinner on Christmas Day.

  “Dooley, Sammy, Lon Burtie, Poo, Jessie, Harley, Hélène, Louella, Scott Murphy, the two Kavanaghs . . . eleven!” Who else?

  “Lord, we have room for one more!”

  Oysters . . .

  But how many? Chances are, his favorite thing on the menu wouldn’t be so popular with this assembly.

  Two pints, he wrote.

  Heavy cream

  10-lb ham, bone in

  . . . He would bake the ham; Cynthia would trot out her unbeatable oyster pie, a vast bowl of ambrosia, and a sweet-potato casserole; Hélène would bring the haricots verts, and Harley had promised a pan of his famous fudge brownies. What’s more, Puny was baking a cheesecake and making cranberry relish; Louella was contributing yeast rolls from the Hope House kitchen; and rumor suggested that Esther Bolick was dropping off a two-layer orange marmalade . . .

  . . . altogether a veritable minefield for the family diabetic, but he’d gotten handy at negotiating minefields.

  He eyed the clock with anxiety, feeling pressed to quit the list and get down to the Oxford. But, no! Absolutely not. He forced himself to lean back in the chair as if he were actually relaxed.

  He was forthwith assaulted by the anxiety of moving ahead on his homily for the midnight Christmas Eve service at Lord’s Chapel, then rummaging through the basement for the Christmas-tree stand and calling The Local about the chocolates and ringing Hope to make sure she had everything on the list and checking with the Woolen Shop about Sammy’s sweater—

  Blast it! No! He would not forfeit the glad rewards of this rare, unhurried moment.

  He took a deep breath, exhaled, and closed his eyes.

  Thank you, Lord, for the grace of an untroubled spirit, and for the blessings which are ours in numbers too great to count or even recognize. . . .

  He sat for some time, giving thanks, and then, without precisely meaning to, remembering. . . .

  Sometime before Christmas, he noticed that his mother’s usually serene countenance was pale and drawn; she hardly seemed herself. Then came the terrible pain in her side.

  “Run!” commanded his father. “Get Peggy!”

  His heart pounding into his throat, he raced as fast as his legs would carry him to the small house behind the privet hedge at the end of the lane.

  It was late afternoon, and cold. He found Peggy hanging the wash on a line in front of her fireplace.

  “Somethin’s wrong with Mama! You got to come.”

  Peggy had put out the fire, thrown on her old gray coat, and hand in hand, they raced along the rutted and frozen lane.

  When they got to the big white house in the stand of oaks, the black Buick was gone.

  “Yo’ daddy done took ’er to Memphis,” said Peggy, squeezing his hand, hard.

  Memphis. Where the hospital was. He had held back his tears until now.

  For a long time, he stood at the front door to see if his father might change his mind and bring her home and let Dr. Franklin make her well with the medicine in his black bag.

  But the car didn’t appear along the driveway, and, shortly after dark, Peggy took him down the lane to her house and fed him cornbread and milk and mashed sweet potato with molasses, and made him a pallet of worn quilts by the fireplace.

  He would always remember the way Peggy’s house smelled—like fireplace ashes and fried bacon and cold biscuits; it was a smell that made him feel safe. Nor would he ever forget how the kerosene lamp on the kitchen table made shadows flicker and dance along the walls that night, and the way Peggy prayed, aloud and urgent, raising her hands heavenward and talking to God as if He were right there in the room.

  Here it was nearly Christmas, an’ he thought th’ good Lord had forgot, but, nossir, he’d been settin’ on th’ side of th’ bed this mornin’ when th’ idea started comin.’ Hit was like turnin’ on a spigot an’ gettin’ a little squirt or two, then, first thing you knowed, hit was gushin’ out.

  A jewelry tray! By jing, that was th’ ticket.

  Her brother, Willard, had sent ’er a brooch from France when he was in th’ war; she kep’ it in th’ dresser drawer. An’ Willard had give ’er a string of pearls another time, which she kep’ in a little whatnot in th’ kitchen. He, hisself, had give ’er earrings one time, which she’d laid up on the mantelpiece some years back, which was where they laid to this day. A jewelry tray would collect all that. Maybe he’d put a little dab of felt on th’ bottom.

  Boys, was he glad t’ git that notion over with!

  He pulled on his old robe and shuffled up the hall to the kitchen and looked out the window to the frozen grass, then went to the counter and lifted the lid on the cold pot.

  Yessir, hit was pinto bean weather, all right. He drained the soaking water off the beans and held the pot under the spigot and added fresh, then set the pot on the stove and turned on the burner. With a little dab of cornbread an’ some chopped onion, boys howdy, him an’ Rose would have a feast. . . .

  He was countin’ hisself a happy man, amen and hallelujah.

  Outfitted in running gear, Father Tim made the trek to Hope House with a shopping bag over his arm and Barnabas on the red leash. In recent months, he’d been allowed to leave Barnabas at the main-floor nurses’ station, instead of leashed to a post in the lobby.

  “For you, my friend,” he said to Ben Isaac Berman in Room Number Seven, the only domicile in Hope House with a CD player.

  “Bach!” said Ben Isaac, looking with sparkling eyes at his new CD. They embraced with affection. “Thank you, Father! When are you coming for a long visit? We must have our talk about Marcus Aurelius!”

  “Ah, yes,” said Father Tim. “Marcus Aurelius—the department-store magnate!”

  He liked to hear the handsome old man laugh.

  “Here’s a quote from the emperor himself,” said Father Tim, “and a fine one it is: ‘The first rule is to keep an untroubled spirit. The second is to look things in the face and know them for what they are.’ ”

  Ben Isaac considered this and nodded, approving. “I must write that down.”

  “I’ll see you the first week of January,” Father Tim promised. “Book it! And if I don’t see you again beforehand, Happy Hanukkah!”

  “Merry Christmas, Father!” Ben Isaac called after him. “What was that first rule again?”

  “Keep an untroubled spirit!”

  He moved along the hall to Miss Pattie’s room, where he found her sleeping. He prayed for her silently, asking God for a shower of blessings as she looked toward her ninetieth year.

  Though Louella’s door was open, there was no Louella.

  “Louella! Are you here?”

  Doris G
reen trundled by on her walker, with a pack of Camels and a lighter in the basket. “She’s workin’ today.”

  “Working?”

  “Baking biscuits. In the kitchen. Once a week. Four hours. Eight dollars an hour.”

  “Thank you, Doris.” A fount of information!

  He found Louella in the kitchen, wearing an apron and using a pint Mason jar to cut biscuits from a sheet of risen dough.

  “Louella!” He was dumbfounded, to say the least.

  She looked up and grinned broadly. “Hey, honey.”

  “What on earth are you doing?”

  “Earnin’ me some Christmas money.”

  “Well, I’ll say.”

  “Ever’body took a fit over my biscuits a while back, so I say I’ll bake once a week ’til Christmas, but lunch only an’ no breakfast, an’ they say, ‘Here’s a apron.’ Last time you come, I forgot t’ tell you!”

  “My goodness.” Would wonders never cease? “You’ll need someone to take you Christmas shopping!” She could go with him when he dashed to Wesley. . . .

  “No, honey, I done ordered online.”

  “Online? You’re online?”

  “Law, no, not me. Doris Green! She be hooked up all over Creation, she even talk to ’er grandson on a Navy boat in th’ ocean.”

  “Good gracious.” CyberMitford!

  “But this is th’ last of my workin’ days right here, you’re lookin’ at ’em. It messes with my soaps.”

  “Aha. Well. We’re looking forward to seeing you on Christmas Day; Scott will pick you up and I’ll bring you home. I left a little something in your room.”

  “Is it what I think it is?”

  “It is!”

  “Bright Cherry?”

  “The very same!”

  “I done gouged down in my ol’ tube ’til they ain’t a scrap left! I’m so pale I be lookin’ like white folks.”

  “You look like a million bucks after taxes,” he said, kissing her on the cheek.