woman wants to look her best when embarking on a new adven-mission.
As I zoomed around an evergreen, I gasped aloud, “Mercy me.” A cascading stream of emerald lights represented a waterfall. White lights outlined reindeer with front hooves lifted in a perpetual trot. Blue lights gleamed on a huge silver Christmas gift box with an iridescent red, blue, and green ribbon. A spotlight on the roof illuminated Santa’s sleigh, piled high with big boxes wrapped in gold and red and green foil paper. Second-floor balconies were peppermint bright with red-and-white-striped ribbons wrapped around the railings. Near the front porch, a golden light illuminated a creche with life-size wooden figures and real straw.
Long ago when Bobby Mac and I drove around Adelaide to show Rob and Dil the Christmas lights, strings of red bulbs outlined the roof and eaves of Pritchard House. We had thought the crimson bulbs glorious. But this magnificent display was beyond my experience. Faint strains rose in the frosty air. I suppose the music was somehow beamed from the house. I smiled and hummed along to “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.”
I wished suddenly that I could be with Rob and Dil, but Wiggins was very firm about the Precept prohibiting contact with family members. As he explained it, the living must not be preoccupied with the dead, but I wished them the merriest of Christmases from Mom and Dad. Dear Rob and Dil, it wouldn’t do any harm for me simply to glimpse them for a moment on this crisp night in December.
In an instant, I hovered over a pickup truck with the lights on and the tailgate down. Light glowed from the front porch of a comfortable old house. A sailboat trimmed with blue lights was on the front lawn.
I knew them at once. Carrying an awkwardly shaped bundle wrapped in a quilt, Rob was burly in a ski jacket but hatless. That boy never would cover his head. The sharp breeze stirred his thinning red hair now frosted with silver. Dil, always stylish, watched from a top step, clutching the lapels of her black-and-red plaid jacket.
“Don’t bump him, Rob. The right front leg’s pretty wobbly.”
Rob rested the bundle on its side in the bed of the pickup. “I’ll be careful. What would Christmas be without Rudolph? I’ll get him back to you in time for you to open gifts with your crew.”
He secured the quilt, banged the tailgate shut, turned toward the house. “Remember how exciting it was when Mom and Dad pulled in the sleigh on Christmas Eve?”
Dil’s silvery laughter rang out. “Dad was so loud. He always boomed. Oh Rob, they seem so near tonight.”
I blew them each a kiss and carried the warmth of seeing them with me when I returned to Pritchard House.
The decorated house and yard crowned a ridge. Rose shrubs divided steep steps that led up to a lawn and flagstone walk. Hannah Pritchard had been famed for her Archduke Charles shrubs. In summer, there were fragrant crimson blooms with pink centers which darkened to full crimson. Now the shrub was garlanded with pink, yellow, cherry, and orange bulbs in a triple strand.
I looked past the gleaming lights at the house. Wiggins had dispatched me because he was worried about a little boy, but so far my arrival had been nothing but sheer Christmas pleasure, air with a hint of the Canadian north, amazing lights that beckoned the spirit to smile, music more warming than my chinchilla coat, the creche with its promise of goodness evermore. Yet I felt uneasy. I had to find Keith. Was he inside the house?
Headlights from a passing car swept across the unlighted front porch. A woman bundled in a heavy jacket knelt beside a child.
At once I was beside them. I bent toward the little boy.
The woman’s whisper was low and hurried. “I’m going to ring the bell, Keith. When the door opens, hand this”—paper crackled—“to whoever comes. I can’t be with you.”
“Mutter?” His voice was uncertain, wavering.
The woman drew her breath in sharply. “Mutter can’t be here. She’s thinking about you, Keith. Remember that. Every day she is thinking about you. She loves you and wants you to be safe. Remember how she told you about your daddy, how brave he was. You’re his boy. You’ll be fine. Here, stand right in front of the door.” The woman lifted him up, placed the boy close to the screen. “I’ll ring the bell and then I have to move the car.”
She reached out, pressed the buzzer. From within came a faint peal. She pressed and the bell pealed again and again. For good measure, she lifted her arm and pounded. With a last look, sad yet hopeful, at Keith, she turned and hurried from the porch, running across the flagstones to the stairway. Flying steps clattered and she was lost in the shadows of the drive.
I almost swooped after her. Yet I couldn’t leave a little boy by himself, waiting for the door to open. What if no one came? He was so small and so alone.
A car motor sounded, an engine roared. Tires squealed as a car jackrabbited away.
I jerked toward the street in time to see taillights disappear. I’d lost all chance of finding the car and talking to the woman.
Wall sconces on either side of the door blazed, emphasizing the darkness beyond the Christmas display on the lawn.
Keith blinked in the sudden harsh light. He was perhaps four, no more than five, a sturdy little boy with tow hair and a narrow face and eyes dark as ebony. He took a step back, bewildered and frightened. A dingy plaid suitcase was propped against the wrought-iron railing.
I wanted to scoop him up, hold him in my arms. I called softly, “Keith, I’m here, honey. I’ll be with you.”
He looked up. His eyes widened. He gave a tentative smile.
I wasn’t here and yet he saw me. Children behold what adults rarely see. I smiled and bent to kiss the top of his head and was taken back a lifetime at the sweet scent of a little boy’s fresh hair. “Don’t worry. We’ll take your envelope inside where it’s warm. I’ll bet maybe we can get you some cookies.” What well-run home didn’t have Christmas cookies spattered with red and green sparkles? I ended in a whisper as the door opened.
Bubbly. The young woman at the door was as bright and fresh as just-poured champagne. Curly brown hair, wide hazel eyes in a rounded kind face, lips that were made for laughter. The pleasant look on her face was replaced by puzzlement as she looked out. Her gaze was straight. She didn’t see the small stiff figure standing near the screen. “Hello?” Her voice was pleasant.
Keith stood silent and afraid, still as a bent tree in a wintry landscape.
