A Christmas Revelation Read online

  Worm’s eyes widened. This sounded promising, but he couldn’t change focus yet. “What about the lady?” he asked. “What if it wasn’t her husband or her brothers what took her away?”

  “You listening? Christmas is more important’n anything. You wrap the presents up,” Squeaky continued, “in colored paper and ribbon, so they look nice.”

  “Who do you give them to?” Worm asked. “Does it have to be family?”

  “ ’Course it doesn’t!” Squeaky dismissed the idea with scorn. He was aware with a peculiar hurt that Worm was worried no family meant no Christmas either. “Some of the best ones are to friends. Or even to people you just like.” He made it up, stretching for ideas. “Or to someone you don’t know very well but would like to make happy. You don’t even have to put your name on it.” He saw Worm’s horror. “Usually you write who it’s for and who it’s from, but you can do it without saying who you are, just ‘A friend.’ ”

  Worm smiled slowly. Squeaky thought he knew what Worm was thinking, but some thoughts should be allowed to stay private.

  Squeaky hurried on, “And you decorate the place: the rooms and sometimes a bit outside, like a wreath on the door.”

  “What’s a wreath?” Worm asked.

  “It’s a circle woven of leaves and branches. About this big.” Squeaky held his hands up, about two feet apart. “And you put ribbons on it, red ones, red satin ones, and sometimes holly, with berries, red berries, sometimes tinsel, that’s strips of silver stuff. It shines in the light.”

  “And you put it on the door? Outside?”

  “Yes.”

  “I never saw one. Who’d have money to spare decorating a door?”

  “Well, you will this year! That’s what we’ve got to do. You and I.” That should take his mind off the woman in the street! And it would be good for the patients, if there were still any here at Christmas. Decorate the place. Why not? There was little else for lonely people to do in the gray days of mid-winter. They should make a big thing of it. Make a Christmas pudding. And a cake! Tie red ribbons around the place. He even knew somewhere they sold red candles. To hell with the budget. If rich people could enjoy Christmas, they could make themselves feel righteous by giving a little extra to the clinic funds, come the New Year.

  “And we’ll put out red candles,” he added. “And Christmas pudding.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Like spotted dick.” He knew Worm was familiar with the rich, light sponge pudding full of raisins. “Only ten times as good.”

  Worm looked at him with open disbelief. Nothing could be ten times as good as spotted dick.

  “You’ll see,” Squeaky said, hoping to heaven he could pull it off. Broken promises to a child were terrible, close to beyond forgiving, especially if they were about Christmas.

  “Are we going to do that?” Worm asked. His voice was full of doubt.

  “Didn’t I just say so?” Squeaky demanded.

  Worm took a deep breath, nearly spoke, then changed his mind.

  That was it. The decider. “Well, don’t just stand there!” Squeaky accused. “We must start. First, we must get the decorations. We need tinsel, lots of it, and we need ribbon and colored paper to wrap things up in. And red candles. White ones are ordinary, good for every day, but not for Christmas. And pinecones.”

  “What do we need pinecones for? What’s a pinecone?”

  “Don’t interrupt. It’s a thing that grows on a pine tree. I suppose we need a pine tree, too.” He glared at Worm for bringing up the subject. Now he was going to have to get a tree! And that was all Prince Albert’s fault, bringing German ideas into England, just because he had married the Queen! Poor man was dead, anyway. Sending people cards was probably a German idea, too.

  “Do you eat them?” Worm interrupted his train of thought again.

  “Eat what?”

  “Pinecones.”

  “No, you decorate with them, and they smell nice. Now, we have a lot to do! We need to make a list.” Squeaky considered ordering Worm to write it. He could write, after a fashion—that was Claudine’s doing, too—but it wasn’t always legible. Perhaps this wasn’t the time to push him. “I’ll do it,” he added. “You help me think of things. Go and fetch the chair and sit down.”

  Worm did as he was told and sat obediently, watching Squeaky all the time. This was a side of him Worm had never seen.

  Squeaky wondered what on earth he was doing. But it was too late to turn back now. Please to heaven Claudine would accept the idea and allow him to use all the money. And their donors would somehow replace it for the necessary items, like food, medicine, and firewood.

  “Why do we decorate things with ribbons?” Worm asked.

  The wretched child had an endless curiosity and seemed to imagine Squeaky knew the answer to everything.

  “Because they’re pretty,” he said tartly, writing RIBBONS down on the page, and then, on the next line, TINSEL.

  “Why red?” Worm asked.

  “Because it’s pretty!” Squeaky snapped. “It’s a happy color!” His glare defied Worm to argue.

  Worm nodded. “Why are we happy at Christmas? Is it just to make ourselves feel better, when everything’s freezing and there are no flowers and things?”

  “No! Of course not. It’s…” Squeaky had to struggle to give an answer that made sense to a child who had never had a home he could remember, or anyone who loved him in particular, and certainly no religious teaching. All his life’s experience would make the traditional stories seem ridiculous—and painful. Actually, that was pretty well what Squeaky had found. But looking at the hope in Worm’s eyes, he couldn’t say so. What was he expecting? Miracles!

  “A long time ago, hundreds and hundreds of years, even thousands,” he began, and it sounded hollow already. He started again. “A very long time ago, a special baby was born. He was supposed to save the world, and people, at least some people, knew that he was going to. All sorts of different things happened that had never happened before. There were lights in the sky, angels, some people said. And music. Angels sing, did you know that?”

  Worm shook his head.

  “Well, they do. And shepherds, who lived outside to look after their sheep, saw this and heard what they were singing…or anyway, they understood it. They knew this baby was born. Actually, he was born in a stable. You know what a stable is?”

  “ ’Course I do. It’s where horses live. They have them behind big houses, so they can keep their carriages for when they’re going out.”

  Clearly the idea of being born in a stable did not seem odd to Worm; in fact he could well have been born in one himself. It would have been better than a crowded and filthy slum.

  “They went to see the baby,” Squeaky went on quickly, scraping his memory for details of the Christmas story. “And there were Three Wise Men also, came from some place far away. They rode camels.”

  “What’s a camel?” Worm asked.

  “It’s a big animal you ride on. They don’t have them in England, and don’t interrupt! The Wise Men brought presents to the baby. That’s why we give presents to people now. They brought very precious things because they were rich, but it doesn’t matter what you bring, as long as you think the person will like it.”

  “Was there a horse in the stable?”

  “Of course!” Squeaky had no idea, but it seemed like a good thing. “And the camels, too. It was a big stable. All sorts of creatures knew that this baby was special, even though most people didn’t.”

  “How?”

  “How what?

  “How did they know?”

  “Because animals understand what God is saying a lot better than people do!” How in hell do I know? he thought. Worm seemed perfectly satisfied with that. Squeaky moved quickly to more modern celebrations, where he was on safer gro
und. “You’ve heard the bells at Christmas? Church bells, not just like any Sunday?”

  “I think so,” Worm agreed.

  “And you’ve seen the carol singers, and heard them?”

  “Yes.” This time he was certain.

  “Were they singing songs about the baby, and Christmas, the Wise Men, and all that?”

  “ ‘I Saw Three Ships’…” Worm said.

  “What? What have three ships got to do with it?”

  “They sing about three ships coming in,” Worm said patiently. “What does that mean?”

  “I’ve no idea. We’ll find out, if anyone knows. Are you finished interrupting me?”

  “Yes.” Worm’s eyes never moved their steady gaze. He hardly even breathed.

  Squeaky began to feel self-conscious. He became aware of just how little he knew about Christmas. It wasn’t only folklore, tradition, what people said and did because their parents had, because it made them feel good. “All these things have meaning,” he asserted. “But mostly we’ve forgotten what it is. It reminds us that he came for all of us without exception, so we should try to be more or less nice to everyone.”

  Worm looked skeptical.

  “I said try!” Squeaky told him stiffly. “And we are going to start with Miss Claudine, and then spread it out to everyone who is here at Christmastime. You hear me?”

  Worm smiled. “Yes. What are we going to do?”

  Squeaky had absolutely no idea. “We are going to have a special dinner. We are going to decorate with candles and ribbons…and…things. We are going to make certain no one is left out. No one at all. And we are going to sing carols and…I don’t know what. I haven’t decided yet.” Then he had a sudden idea. “Perhaps we’ll make a Nativity scene!”

  “What?” Worm was totally confused, but he looked happily expectant. He trusted Squeaky, and that was very unnerving.

  Squeaky struggled to remember exactly what went into a Nativity scene. There had been one at the church he remembered from his childhood. He could still see the mother and child quite clearly in his mind’s eye. And the donkey, and the two or three lambs. Were the people shepherds, or kings? Kings would be more fun! “It will be a scene at the manger, with the people who come to see the new baby, who know how important he really is,” he replied without hesitation.

  “Why is he important?” Worm asked immediately.

  “Because he’s going to do…something…so we could all be forgiven for what we do wrong, if we are sorry.” That sounded incomplete, but as close as Squeaky could get. He had a generally sour view of religion. In his opinion, it made people self-righteous, lacking in humor or kindness, and very prone to sit in critical judgment of just about everyone else. Of course, there were exceptions, but those people didn’t usually bring religion into it. They were simply nice, and the religion was incidental. It was part of who they were.

  Worm was staring at him, not yet satisfied.

  “He was so…gentle…he could understand everybody.” Squeaky reached frantically into his mind for an explanation he could believe. How could he expect Worm to believe it if he didn’t himself?

  “How could he do that?” Worm asked.

  Squeaky was not sure if Worm was curious, or if that was doubt in his eyes. “I told you, he was very special. When you get to like people, you listen patiently and try to understand. And when you really understand, you don’t always agree, but you like them, anyway.”

  Worm nodded slowly. Apparently, he accepted that. “What happened to him?” he asked.

  Squeaky swore silently to himself with several words he did not want Worm to hear, although having grown up on the dockside, he probably already had. Maybe he did not yet know what they meant. “That’s a whole ’nother story,” he said. “I’ll tell you that at Easter.” That was neat!

  “When’s Easter?”

  “Next year. Now be quiet! Christmas first. Now I’ve lost my place.”

  “We are going to make a…some kind of a scene, whatever that is,” Worm reminded him instantly.

  This time, Squeaky thought before he spoke. “It’s of the stable, and the baby, and the people who came to visit him.”

  “How did they know?”

  “I already said! Because there was an especially bright star in the sky. You could see it from anywhere.”

  “Anywhere in the world?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh. The world is round, like a ball, did you know that?”

  Of course he knew that. But he had not known that Worm did. “Yes. And it turns round and round, all the time,” he said. He was not about to be tested on astronomy by a nine-year-old! “But the Three…” Had he said Kings or Wise Men? “…Kings did not come from the other side of the world. They rode on camels.” At least they had in the pictures Squeaky could vaguely remember.

  “How do we get camels?” Worm asked.

  “We don’t! They left the camels outside!” Squeaky snapped. “We will have to ask the women to help us make the people. And the animals. That can be their job. We need to have everybody help, or it won’t be their Christmas, too.”

  “Who else is there?”

  “The baby, and his mother and father. Some shepherds. And the Three Kings.”

  “That’s good. Do the Kings wear special clothes?”

  “Of course. Everybody dresses up in their best for Christmas, whatever that is. If it’s your best, then it’s good enough.” He was going to settle that before it got any further. “But the ones that matter most are the baby and his mother.”

  “Is she beautiful?”

  Before Squeaky could answer, Worm continued, “I know what she looks like. She smiles and…and there’s light in her hair.” He blinked as if his eyes were full of tears but he was determined not to show them.

  So he had not forgotten the woman in the street. Damn! Squeaky would have to think of other Christmas stories to tell to take Worm’s mind off that woman! A ray of winter sunlight seemed to have ignited some dream in the child! “Among other things…” He scrambled to think of them. What stories had he heard as a child, or any other time, for that matter? The Three Kings had brought presents. What were they? “Gifts,” he said. “Wonderful gifts, with special meanings for his life.” Now he had to think of them. He seemed always to be digging himself further in.

  Worm sat on the edge of his chair, listening as Squeaky recited the adventures of the Three Kings. Sometimes he called them Wise Men, but he meant the same people. Sometimes he referred to them as Magi, but Squeaky didn’t know what that meant. Worm knew that, because when Squeaky didn’t know something but was making out he did, he had a habit of fidgeting with his left hand, curling and uncurling his fingers. He was making it up about the places the Three Kings visited on the way. But he was quite sure about the star, and about the gifts being important. He insisted they were things that told about the special boy’s life, and what it was going to be.

  Gold, because he was a King, too, but not of any country ’specially—of everywhere and nowhere. Frankincense, which had something to do with priests, and myrrh, which was something to do with death. It was all very strange and didn’t make a lot of sense, but Worm could tell that Squeaky believed it, so he didn’t want to upset him by asking. And Worm was quite sure Squeaky believed in the woman, the mother of the special baby, with the sun in her hair like a golden light shining, too. He wanted it to be true, and Squeaky believed in so little that Worm wouldn’t take that away from him. It would hurt, and Worm did not want to hurt him, so he listened to all the stories, no matter how unlikely they were, about Kings and shepherds and angels and all sorts of things.

  Eventually Claudine came and interrupted them to say that it was suppertime.

  “We’re planning Christmas,” Squeaky told her.

  Claudine was a tall woman, not pretty, but com
fortable to be with. Worm liked her voice. It was soft, and even when she was annoyed, which wasn’t very often, it still sounded nice. And she liked Worm. She always liked him, even when he was clumsy, or forgot things, or deliberately did something he was told not to. She would punish him, but she still liked him. It was about the most comfortable thing in the world that there was someone who always liked you.

  Now she looked surprised. “Planning what, exactly?” she asked.

  “A goose,” Squeaky replied, without hesitation. “Perhaps two. How many people are going to be here…about?”

  “About ten,” she answered. “Maybe twelve. And add a couple more if there are fights, or it’s very cold and we get frozen people. You’ll need two geese at least. I suppose you want me to cook them!” It was impossible from her expression to tell if she was going to agree or refuse. Or set some condition on it.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Burroughs,” Squeaky said graciously. “I knew you would help us. I told Worm you would.” That was a lie. He had never said anything at all. Actually, he had not even mentioned the goose—or two.

  Through supper, held in the kitchen like all their meals, Worm, Squeaky, Claudine, Ruby—who had been a maid here so long she thought of it as home; perhaps she didn’t have any other?—and Miss Bellflower, the current cook, all spoke about Christmas and what they would do.

  Claudine hesitated over the expense. Worm could see the doubt in her face when Squeaky talked about decorating with ribbons and bells and candles, and tinsel and even a tree. His voice grew in enthusiasm as he went on. He began by playing to his audience, but halfway through he was playing to his own imagination. Or was it memory? Watching him, Worm could not tell, and it would not only be rude to ask—or as Claudine said, impolite—it would be cruel. People needed to pretend sometimes. Worm knew that. Down on the dock at night, he had hugged an imaginary blanket around himself, and heard the crackling of flames in an imaginary fire.

  He watched the faces of everyone around the table and wondered if goose was really better than hot cottage pie, or if people just thought it was because they wanted to. Cake was another thing. That had to be special.