Christmas for Joshua - A Novel (26 page)

“
Si! Si!
” Jose pointed at me. “
El presidente!
” He waved his hands as if including the whole place and added in English, “Señor Doctor is boss here. Everything!”

“Okay,” she said. “Got it. You’re the boss. Now, I have enough stuff to make this place light up the whole neighborhood. I need to check your breakers for sufficient load.”

“Come,” Jose said, “I show you.”

She rolled her hand in the air, and the three crew members sprang into action. They lowered two tall ladders from the roof, pulled down a ramp from the back of the truck, and began unloading.

“One thing,” I said, catching up with Pinky, “don’t put up any crosses.”

“How about a nativity scene made of fiber optic lights? It’s lovely.”

“No Christian religious symbols. But Santa stuff is okay.”

“We’ll put the reindeer and sleigh on the roof.” She pointed at the tree that protruded from the back of my car. “What about this one?”

“This one,” I said, “you can set up inside the Gathering Hall. The big one you have in the truck can go next to the main entrance. And make them glow with everything you have—except crosses.”

“
Jewish stars okay?” She laughed at my expression. “I’m dating a Jewish guy. He’s a biker, rides with a club called the Stars of Davidson.”

“
I read about them in the
Jewish News
.”

“
He started it.” She put her hands next to her mouth and yelled toward her crew, “Do the roof lights first! Triple color!”

Leaving them, I went into the synagogue. There was no one at the office. I sat at the computer and typed up song lyrics that had been composing themselves in the back of my mind for hours. Relieved to find enough paper in the printer, I ran a bunch of copies.

Around the building, in the back, the caterer’s unmarked van was backed up to the kitchen doors. I found her in the Gathering Hall, setting up the tables. She was a South African émigré, known in the valley for successfully balancing the strict demands of the rabbis who issued kosher certifications with the no-less arduous demands of her customers—mostly Scottsdale housewives who were determined to keep up with the Joneses. She could deliver a dairy spread with panache befitting a seven-course carnivorous meal. We had known each other for years—she had catered Debra’s Bat Mitzvah party as well as the memorial services for both of Rebecca’s parents.

I handed her the pile of printed lyrics and asked to have a folded copy placed under each plate. We chatted for a few more minutes, and I found an opportunity to mention casually the decoration project beginning outside. “I’m having a bunch of lights put up on the building. It’s a surprise, so please don’t mention it to Rebecca when she calls you.”

Back outside, as I passed by the caterer’s van, my Blackberry rattled, startling me. I pulled it out, but the bright sun made the screen unreadable. I walked over to the shade of an old olive tree, its veins intertwined, hardened as rocks, yet giving birth to new sprouts. Under the thick canopy, the text on the screen came out clearly. It was an e-mail from Rabbi Rachel to the whole congregation:

That’s how it ended:
Rabbi Rac
. I checked again for the origin of the e-mail. It had come from Rabbi Rachel’s address. She must have been eager to send it out. Her words were nothing short of an electronic attack on the board. How could she ignore what it had taken for me and a few others to keep the synagogue functioning—and pay her salary! And what was she proposing as a practical alternative? The congregation’s “
collective generosity
” had not stopped our decline so far, had it? True, some of our members were wealthy and generous to arts and culture institutions in Arizona, but not to the synagogue. Only weeks earlier I had shared with her a
Commentary
magazine
piece about the discrepancy between how American Jews are exceedingly philanthropic in support of academic and civic institutions but give very little to Jewish causes. It was true nationwide, and it was true here.

It occurred to me that, because Judy’s earlier e-mail clearly attributed Jonathan’s gift to my efforts, the rabbi’s e-mail could be construed as a personal attack as well.

Peering at my Blackberry, I read again the last sentence of her e-mail:
“With faith in our hearts and souls, we can continue to flourish without selling out for the proverbial thirty pieces of silver.
” Was her reference to this particular sum, which Judas Iscariot had purportedly accepted for betraying Jesus, merely coincidental? Or was she hinting, ever so subtly, at my non-Jewishness?

I scanned the text again, finding another suspect sentence:
“As I told the board of trustees last night, accepting a bag of money from a donor is tempting, but the sacrifice of our core values would be sinful.”
Wasn’t Judas Iscariot accused of accepting the thirty pieces of silver in a money bag?

My Blackberry vibrated suddenly, jolting me out of my intense contemplation of this disaster. In a flash of rage, I threw it away. The Blackberry hit the trunk of the olive tree and fell to the rocks in several pieces.

“
Damn!
”

The world started spinning faster than I’d seen it spin before. I bent over, my hands on my knees, my eyes shut, and breathed deeply. Staying in this folded position, I slowly shuffled to the caterer’s van, determined not to collapse. Through the open back I found a bag of ice, tore the plastic, and scooped out a few ice cubes, which I pressed to my face and forehead. I continued to breathe deliberately, saturating my brain with oxygen, fighting off that ominous sensation of an approaching loss of consciousness.

Hark the Herald Angels Sing

I recovered well enough to go to the restroom, rinse my face and wet my hair. Feeling better, I checked on Pinky and her crew. They were on the roof, rolling out lines of electrical cords while Jose trimmed back the overgrown oleanders along the wall to provide better access for their ladders.

Satisfied that all was proceeding well, I walked down the street, past the Montessori preschool, to the church. I had never stepped into this church, which, like our building, was quite modest. The sign above said:
The Holy Name of Mary Catholic Church.

Heavy doors led me into a dark vestibule. I heard faint voices singing somewhere in the building. The cool air carried a tangy aroma. The Saltillo tiles were uneven, lain with wide concrete grout. A statue of Christ, slightly taller than me, stood over a circle of fluttering candles, a book pressed to his chest. His kind eyes followed me as I walked over to another set of doors. I almost crossed myself, an old reflex that apparently wasn’t completely gone.

When I entered the main sanctuary, the boys’ choir was practicing under the guidance of a thin woman with big glasses who used a pencil to direct them. I leaned against a column to listen, but she cut off the singing with a slash of her pencil and berated them, “Not good! Dry as the Salt River! Where are your feelings?”

She fiddled with an old-fashioned CD player to restart the recording of the melancholic hymn. The boys started singing again, still showing little enthusiasm. I could see that some of them skipped many of the Latin words. Our old church services had been conducted in English, but I had taken Latin in high school and college in preparation for medicine, and it came back to me as the boys sang. They were practicing in order to lead their parents and relatives during the Midnight Mass. I translated in my mind and quietly chanted the English words of the hymn:

“
Father,

Who makes this holy night aglow,

With the magnificence of Jesus Christ,

Whom we accept as our Lord, the truest light,

Convey us to eternal delight,

In Heaven’s kingdom,

Where He lives with you and the Holy Spirit,

A God, forever, and ever.
”

She made them repeat it three more times, then inserted another CD into the old machine. A familiar tune came from the speakers, and the choir began to sing, “
Hark, the herald angels sing, Glory to the newborn king!
”

I joined them with quiet humming in the back of the church. It was just like the old days. But when they reached “
Pleased as man with man to dwell
,” the accompanying music gave a sharp screech and died. The woman’s pencil dropped, and she pounded on top of the CD player, trying to revive it.

A few of the boys kept singing, “
Jesus, our Emmanuel, Hark, the herald angels sing.
” Others started laughing. I hurried up the aisle to the front, where an elderly organ stood by the side wall. I dropped into the seat and began playing, just as the last few voices completed the verse and sang the chorus, “
Glory to the newborn King.
”

I played catch for a few notes, sorely out of practice, but within a line or two, I caught up. At the end of the song, I returned to the beginning. By now, there was a perfect flow of synchrony between my fingers and the choir, which now sounded fuller, many voices joining back in the singing.

Not bothering to look at the woman, I played, and they sang, “
Hark! The herald angels sing…
” Their pronunciation matched with my tempo. I could tell that all of them were engaged now, intrigued by the stranger who had suddenly showed up to play for them, rewarding me with the heartfelt vocal effort that had eluded their pencil-wielding conductor.

During the third verse, their voices surged, shouting the word “
Hail!
” and continued, “
the heav’n-born Prince of Peace!
” I glanced over my shoulder and saw that all the boys’ eyes were on me, all of them smiling as they shouted, “
Hail! The Son of Righteousness!
”

It made me shiver as I realized that these boys, whom I had never met before, were actually cheering me on at the tops of their voices, giving their own interpretation to the old lyrics. My fingers kept hitting the keys ever harder, the old organ reverberating through the sanctuary, the choir roaring with every ounce of air their lungs could expel, until the last line, which they practically screamed: “
Glory to the newborn king!
”

In the silence that followed, I heard clapping. My eyes searched the pews and found a man in a black robe. He stood in the rear and clapped, and soon the woman joined him, then the boys, row after row, until all hands were clapping. I made a theatrical bow and went to the front, where I shook hands with many of the boys and complimented them on their singing.

“
I’m Father Donne,” the priest said. “I’ve never heard our choir sing like this. God has blessed you with divine talent.”

“Hardly.” I shook his hand, which was bony but warm. “Christian Dinwall. I used to play in our church, back in New York. It was a long time ago.”

“Even more inspiring, then.” He ushered me into his office and closed the door. “To play like this, one needs superb hand-eye coordination and a sensitive soul. And you managed to connect so well with our easily distracted boys.”

“I don’t know about the soul, but my hands get lots of practice. I’m a surgeon.”

“Oh.” He fiddled with the cross that hung from his neck. “I hope you’re not here about one of my parishioners?”

“Nothing of the kind. In fact, I’m here as president of the synagogue down the road.”

The look of puzzlement on his face was almost comical.

“I converted many years ago. My wife is Jewish.”

“Ah.”

I could see that he wasn’t pleased. Church authorities used to burn people like me at the stake. “It’s an interesting coincidence,” I said, “that the music for
Hark the Herald Angels Sing
was composed by a born Jew, grandson of the great Jewish rabbi and philosopher Moses Mendelssohn. The composer, Felix Mendelssohn, went the opposite way from me, converting from Judaism to Christianity.”