The Moffat Museum (9 page)

Then Jane looked at Joey. He did not have a happy glow, and he didn't have the petal idea to cheer him up. As she and Joey were leaving the church, Rufus spinning fast as a marble around and around the spiral stairs to join them, she said, "You see, Joey? When the minister asks, 'Who giveth Sylvie away in holy matrimony?' all you have to do is say, 'I do!' Don't say, 'Me.' Say, 'I do,' loudly so everybody hears. Now, Joey, does that sound hard? No," she answered for him. "Easy as pie!"

But Joey remained gloomy. Not that he had minded the rehearsal; it sounded very pretty. Besides, Joey always did what he had to do, go for a bushel of coal in zero weather, anything. Now, help get his sister married? All right, he'd do that. But far more than saying "I do," the thought of the long pants he didn't own bothered him. What other awful idea like wearing Ray Abbot's too-tight black pants would someone come up with next?

Mama had the answer to that. When they got home, she was waiting for them on the front stoop. "Come on, Joey. While you were at the church, I went over to Mrs. Crowley's store. There's just time to get there before she closes. You, Joey, my big son, you are going to have a brand-new suit with long trousers. I'm buying it for you. Instead of money, I told Mrs. Crowley I would alter anything her customers wanted. I'll do it all and charge her nothing until she thinks I've fixed enough ... shortening, lengthening, whatever ... to pay for the suit."

So Mama and Joey hurried off to Crowley's Department Store.

Jane and Rufus stood on the front porch and watched them go. Rufus seemed dejected. He said, "Joey and me always do things together. Now he's off to buy long pants." He paused. "And I'm the only one not in the wedding."

"Well, Rufus," said Jane, "you can wear
your
sailor suit, be fine for the wedding. So both Joey and you
will
be wearing long pants.
And,
" she said, "you're wrong when you say you are the only one of us
not
being in the wedding. Smell! Draw in a deep breath. What do you smell?"

"Roses," said Rufus. "Roses."

"Right," said Jane. "Come on in!"

She led the way to the cellar door and opened it. My, how cool! Rufus immediately examined his waxworks face. "Hey!" he said. "What are all these big bags doing here beside my Madame Tussaud face?"

"I stored them there," said Jane. "Listen! You know what these bags are filled with? Petals of roses! I've been gathering them all day. All up and down the street. Feel in one bag. Fresh still? Don't squeeze them. Smell them! Still smell wonderful? Well, we ... I mean
you...
are going to strew them on the bride. This wedding is going to be a rose-petal wedding!"

"Me!" Rufus laughed. "Me? I'm in Sylvie's wedding, too?"

"Yes. But don't tell anybody. It's a surprise. You, up in the balcony, strewing petals on Sylvie, the bride. Oh, I hope lots of them will land in the aisle and make a carpet of petals for her and for everybody."

"Strewing petals! I'm a good shot at miggles, but petals have never been in my field. They'll blow themselves here or there. Even a breeze might blow them out the front door."

"It doesn't matter where they fall. Look at all the bags we have! Some are bound to fall on Sylvie. Aim for her and aim for the aisle where she will walk. I'll be walking right behind her. Then will come Joey with Mama on his arm. Strew lots on Mama if you can. Well now, isn't this a good idea? Having a rose-petal wedding for Sylvie?"

"Yeah," said Rufus. "It's okay. The whole idea is okay. Circa thousands, MMMMM, of petals," he murmured. "But how are we going to get all these petals to the church before twelve o'clock tomorrow? I think this wedding should be postponed. Have it in the fall. Have bright red and golden leaves shower down on Sylvie instead of rose petals."

"Can't postpone it," said Jane. "This wedding has been rehearsed, so it has to go on, come what, come may."

"I should have been in the rehearsal, scattered a few petals to get the gist of it," said Rufus.

"Oh, my goodness, no!" said Jane. "Rose petals showering down on Sylvie is going to be a surprise! Everything else is as it always is in a wedding except—Nancy Stokes told me this—that sometimes there is a page. She asked me whether or not you were going to be the page?"

"Page!" exclaimed Rufus.

"Yes. The page is usually a little boy who holds up the bride's long veil so she won't trip on it and fall down like I did that time I was a firefly. Instead of holding up Sylvie's veil, all you have to do is shower rose petals from above."

"But I'm a born page," Rufus objected. "They shoulda had me be the page!"

"I wish they had, too," said Jane. "Then all of us would be walking down the aisle. But I heard Sylvie ask Mr. Abbot, 'Ray, couldn't Rufus be my page?' He said, 'No, Sylvie, dear. We must keep this wedding simple. Flower girl? Yes. I agreed to that. But page? No.' Rufus, remember he
is
twice as old as Sylvie, so whatever he says...
that
has to be!"

"It's Sylvie's wedding," said Rufus. "And if Sylvie wants me to be her page," he added indignantly, "I'll be her 'simple' page. I know how to be a page, simple or not. Sylvie is used to having me be her page, not only in plays like
Cinderella,
but at home, too. At home 1 am her private page. So why not at her wedding?"

"Uh-hum-m," said Jane. "You're right. But who would shower the petals if you were her page?"

Rufus did not listen. "Who," he demanded, "use' to go to the library with her books so they would not be overdue and she would have to pay two cents?"

He went on. "Who use' to run to the store with her penny of the day and buy her two-for-a-penny peppermints, chocolate covered? Me! Not you, Jane. Not Joey!
Me!
"

"You, Rufus, you," agreed Jane.

"In the library, I even picked out books for her. The library lady helped me. Sylvie doesn't like the kind of books me and Joey like ... pirates, cowboys, and the Altsheler books. She likes histerical books."

"Historical," corrected Jane.

"And bring them back to her ... the books and the peppermints ... while she would be lying in the hammock looking up at the sky," said Rufus. He paused. Then he gulped. "Who's goin' to get her books and her peppermints now?"

After a pause, Jane said, "Maybe Ray Abbot will. But you, Rufus, you will be the most important person in the wedding. You up in the balcony will be a different kind of page, a petal-showerer page. Never, ever, in any story I ever read, have I heard of that special kind of page."

"Right," said Rufus. He began to laugh. "Where'd you get this idea?" he asked.

"Yesterday when Sylvie came walking up the path, a breeze fluttered some of Mrs. Price's rose petals on her. That's when I thought it up."

Rufus laughed again. "They're plenty of ordinary pages, those who hold up veils, but never before a petal-showerer in a high place casting handfuls over the railing and aiming for the bride."

They were silent for a while. Then Jane said, "You know what? I think we should take the bags of petals over to the church right now. The cellar of the church might be even cooler than ours and be like Greenland's icy mountains. Then tonight we can go to sleep in peace knowing the petals are safe and sound in the church, all ready for the showering."

Rufus thought this was a good idea. "I know just where to store them. And, Jane, they don't call the cellar of a church a cellar. They call it an undercroft. There are shelves, deep, deep shelves, right inside a narrow door to the left of the heavy big front doors. They are spooky shelves..."

"Just right for storing rose petals," said Jane.

Rufus got his express wagon from its garage behind the raspberry bushes. It wobbled a little, but it worked. They piled it high with the bags of petals, and off they went.

Jane ran from one side to the other to keep the bags from tumbling off. Rufus was cautious and circumnavigated the rough places in some sidewalks. It was quite a maneuver to cross a street, but they managed.

Now they were at the church. The big doors were unlocked, as always. No one was inside the church. They opened the door to the left. This narrow door led not only to the undercroft, but also to a narrow stairway, spiraling around and around upward to the balcony, and even farther up, to the ropes the sexton pulled each Sunday morning and on wedding days to make the bells peal out loud and clear.

Sam Doody often rang the bells, for the narrow, winding stairs were hard for the elderly sexton to climb.

They left the narrow door slightly ajar so that they could see something in the semidarkness. Ah! Now they could see the deep, deep shelves that seemed to be in a secret recess in the granite wall. On one side of the bottom shelf there were a few clay flowerpots. They had wilted geranium leaves and stalks in them.

"Oh, look at this!" said Jane. "There's a sign on this shelf: RESERVED FOR LADIES OF THE ALTAR GUILD."

"Means nothing," said Rufus cheerfully, "or there would be more than pots with dead geraniums in them."

"Right," said Jane happily. So they made many trips to the wagon and brought in bag after bag of rose petals. They placed them neatly on the shelf.

"Let's go," said Rufus. "But I wish I could take one bagful of these wedding petals up to the balcony and practice a little strewing ... a rehearsal."

There was no time for Jane to say anything. At that moment they heard the heavy outer doors of the church open, and sunlight streamed in. Then came the merry sound of many ladies laughing. Jane quickly closed the narrow door. Now she and Rufus were in total darkness.

"Ts!" Jane whispered. "Maybe these are the ladies of the Altar Guild with something for those shelves marked RESERVED."

"I'll run up the stairs to the belfry, pull the ropes, and set the church bells pealing. That'll scare them, and they will run away!" said Rufus.

"No!" whispered Jane. "Behave yourself! This is the church." They crouched down under the wide shelf and waited tensely.

Ah-h, thank goodness! The ladies went into the church and did not even come near the little door. Jane opened it a crack. The ladies had begun to practice hymns. Even the organist had come. This must be a rehearsal for the Sunday service or ... maybe ... for Sylvie's wedding?

Anyway, petals, Jane, and Rufus were safe for a time. But what if another group of merry, laughing ladies arrived ... the real ladies for whom that wide shelf was reserved?

Jane said, "Rufus, we have to change our plan. We have to put the bags of petals up under your pew in the balcony right now while they're all singing their heads off down there. Hear Miss Beale? We'll take the petals up to the balcony quietly, quietly, and tuck them away under the front pew. It's almost as cool inside the church as down here anyway."

"Besides, we'll have too much to do tomorrow morning, getting into our church clothes, to transport these circa MMMMM petals up to where they have to be for my showering," observed Rufus.

Jane stayed below on guard. She put bag after bag into Rufus's arms, and he sped up the spiraling stairs to the balcony and tucked them under the front pew. With one last bag in his arms and one in Jane's, they both went up to see how things looked.

Fine. The bags were tucked neatly under Rufus's pew from one end to the other. They left one space in the middle empty for Rufus's legs and feet, which were going to have a lot to do, feeling around for the next bag to shower down. "Like manna from heaven," said Jane.

Jane and Rufus sat down in the empty middle space to rest for a while, and Rufus did some practicing with his legs and feet, feeling around for bag number one. "I should have a helper," he said. "No, two helpers ... one on each side of me to shove the next bag along. How can I stretch from one end of the pew to the other, fishing for the next bag? My legs aren't long enough. Maybe I should bring a fishing rod?"

Jane laughed. "Oh, no! You'll manage. You'll be all alone up here. Nobody likes to sit in the balcony. You'll be dropping petals down below there."

"Like manna from heaven," said Rufus. "But I thought manna was to eat."