Behind Mr. Sturgis stood Miles Howland and Mary Perkins, who would be married in the spring but who had been lovers since last summer, although no one knew. He had first undone her clothes in the pine copse behind Parson’s Pond during a thunderstorm, and after this they had thought mostly of how, where, when next—moving, on the other hand, through a world lit by the intelligent and trusting faces of their parents, whom they loved. They took a picnic lunch to Bascom’s Island and didn’t put their clothing on the whole day long. Lovely, it was lovely. Was this sinful? Would they burn in Hell, suffer agues and strokes? Would he be killed by a bolt of lightning during a baseball game? Later that same Christmas Eve, he would serve on the altar at Holy Communion, wearing fresh white and scarlet and raking the dark church, as he appeared to pray, for the shape of her face. In the light of all the vows he had taken, that was heinous, but how could it be, since if his flesh had not informed his spirit he would never have known this sense of strength and lightness in his bones, this fullness of heart, this absolute belief in the glad tidings of Christmas, the star and the kings? If he walked her home from church in the storm her kind parents might ask him to spend the night and she might come to him. In his mind he heard the creaking of the stairs, saw the color of her instep, and he thought, in his innocence, how wonderful was his nature that he could at the same moment praise his Saviour and see the shape of his lady’s foot. Beside Mary stood Charlie Anderson, who had the gift of an unusually sweet tenor voice, and beside him were the Basset twins.
In the dark, mixed clothing they had put on for the storm, the carolers looked uncommonly forlorn, but the moment they began to sing they were transformed. The Negress looked like an angel, and dumpy Lucille lifted her head gracefully and seemed to cast off her misspent youth in the rainy streets around Carnegie Hall. This instantaneous transformation of the company was thrilling, and Mr. Applegate felt his faith renewed, felt that an infinity of unrealized possibilities lay ahead of them, a tremendous richness of peace, a renaissance without brigands, an ecstasy of light and color, a kingdom! Or was this gin? The carolers seemed absolved and purified as long as the music lasted, but when the final note was broken off they were just as suddenly themselves. Mr. Applegate thanked them, and they started for his front door. He drew old Mr. Sturgis aside and said tactfully, “I know you enjoy very good health, but don’t you think this snowstorm might be a little too severe for you to go out in? It said on the radio that there hasn’t been such a snowstorm in a hundred years.”
“Oh, no, thank you,” said Mr. Sturgis, who was deaf. “I had a bowl of crackers and milk before I came out.”
The carol singers left the rectory for the village green.
The music could be heard in the feed store, where Barry Freeman was closing up. Barry had graduated from Andover Academy, and during Christmas vacation of his senior year he had worn his new tuxedo to the Eastern Star Dance. There was general laughter as soon as he appeared. He approached one girl and then another, and when they all refused to dance with him he tried to cut in, but he was laughed off the floor. He stood against the wall for nearly half an hour before he put on his coat and walked home through the snow. His appearance in a tuxedo had not been forgotten. “My oldest daughter,” a woman might say, “was born two years after Barry Freeman wore his monkey suit to the Eastern Star Dance.” It was a turning point in his life. It may have accounted for the fact that he had never married and would go home on Christmas Eve to an empty house.
The music could be heard in Bryant’s General Store (“Rock Bottom Prices”), where old Lucy Markham was talking on the telephone. “Do you have Prince Albert in the can, Miss Markham?” a child’s voice asked.
“Yes, dear,” Miss Markham said.
“Now, you stop hectoring Miss Markham,” said Althea Sweeney, the telephone operator. “You’re not supposed to use the telephone for hectoring people on Christmas Eve.”
“It’s against the law,” said the child, “to interfere in private telephone conversations. I’m just asking Miss Markham if she has Prince Albert in the can.”
“Yes, dear,” said Miss Markham.
“Then let him out,” said the child, her voice breaking with laughter. Althea turned her attention to a more interesting conversation—an eighty-five-cent call to New Jersey, made from Prescott’s drugstore.
“It’s Dolores, Mama,” a strange voice said. “It’s Dolores. I’m in a place called St. Botolphs. . . . No, I’m not drunk, Mama. I’m not drunk. I just wanted to wish you a Merry Christmas, Mama. . . . I just wanted to wish you a Merry Christmas. And a Merry Christmas to Uncle Pete and Aunt Mildred. A Merry Christmas to all of them . . .” She was crying.
