The Gift of Hope Read online

  “Maybe you could sort of hint I’d like to be an angel.”

  “We’ve already had this conversation, honey. Miss Hope is in charge of the pageant. Whatever part she gives you, I’m sure you’ll do your very best.”

  “Oh, okay,” she said in a voice that made him wonder how difficult she would be in her teens. Thankfully, he didn’t need to worry for a few more years.

  Hope saw the minister and his daughter standing in the corridor outside the basement commons and nodded in their direction. She was loaded down with costumes she’d pulled from a big closet at the back of the room. Her intention was to spread them out on tables and assign parts according to sizes, but she could already see it wouldn’t be easy. For one thing, the oft-used garments had a distinctively musty smell. Everything that could be laundered should be. One plan was to let each child take home his or her costume, but as a librarian, she knew things weren’t always returned promptly. She was tempted to wash and iron them all herself, but when on earth would she have time?

  “If those angel costumes are laundered one more time, they’ll most likely fall apart,” Granny Doe said, sitting at a table with her leg propped up on a chair.

  Hope had tried to persuade her to stay home, but her grandmother insisted on coming to the church.

  “I want Harriet Llewellyn to know I’m not letting a little fracture interfere with Christmas,” she’d insisted.

  Getting her grandmother safely down the front porch steps at home on crutches had been nerve-racking, and at church she’d ended up going down the stairs on her bottom.

  “This crown needs more glitter,” Harriet said, bringing a handful of costume pieces to the table. She was a self-appointed member of the pageant committee since she’d written the script more than twenty years ago.

  This was Hope’s first year in charge, and she planned to make some changes. For one thing, she wanted the little children, the angels, to sing instead of having to memorize stilted lines only vaguely related to the Biblical version. She hadn’t consulted with Harriet, relying instead on mothers of the participants for help.

  “This lovely blue robe is for the Virgin Mary,” Harriet said. “My granddaughter Emily, Ernestine’s little sister, always plays that part.”

  Harriet was an intimidating figure, nearly six foot tall with short silver hair and a slender figure. She wore expensive tailored suits, almost always in shades of blue. Although she served on many church committees, she was better known for giving advice than for actually doing work.

  Hope looked with dismay at the blue velvet robe designated for the part of Mary. Emily Llewellyn had grown dramatically in the last year, almost as tall as Hope and not nearly as slender as her grandmother. If she could get into the robe at all, it would barely reach her knees. Much as Hope didn’t want conflict with Harriet, she would have to be firm about casting the children according to the size of the costumes.

  She sighed with relief when Noah and Anna came into the commons area. Harriet hurried over and began a long dialogue with the minister. Anna moved away and came toward Hope.

  “Good to see you, Anna,” Hope said with a welcoming smile.

  She loved all her Sunday school students, but she was especially drawn to Anna, knowing from experience how hard it was to grow up without a mother. Added to that, the young girl had had to move to a strange town and start all over.

  “I’m so glad you’re here, Anna,” Hope said. “If you don’t mind, you can help me sort costumes and lay them out on tables. Our casting call is tomorrow afternoon. I’ll need to pass out the robes to be laundered then, but first I have to take inventory of what we have.”

  She’d decided to take a chance on sending the angel and shepherd costumes home because there seemed to be more than needed, but she’d do the wise men and Holy Family herself. The Baby Jesus figure needed a good bath and new swaddling clothes, perhaps something one of her volunteer mothers would do.

  “They look awfully short,” Anna said, holding up one of the white cotton gowns.

  “The youngest children are always angels.” Hope saw the disappointment on her face. “I’d like to have a choir of older children as angels, but I’m afraid the congregation would be disappointed if the little ones don’t have their wings.”

  She picked up a pair of glittering cardboard wings, thankful she wouldn’t have to make new ones because they’d all been redone last year. Before she could go back to the closet to get the shepherd’s costumes, Harriet hurried toward her.

  “I’m so concerned about your leg,” she said, stopping first to hover over Granny Doe where she sat. “Fortunately you have your lovely granddaughter to help with the decorating. Everyone will understand if you let her carry the responsibility, but, of course, you’ll still have input. I told Reverend Langdon the congregation wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  Noah came toward them, frowning slightly when he heard the last few words.

  “I’m not sure it’s fair to put the pageant and the decorating on Hope,” he said. “There must be many other talented people in the congregation.”

  Anna gave him a puzzled look, perhaps surprised by her father’s comment.

  “Oh, Hope is a marvel,” Harriet said. “I’m sure she’ll do just fine, and, of course, she’ll have lots of help. Trimming the Christmas tree is an important event in the life of the church.”

  Hope’s eyes met Noah’s, and he seemed to be giving her permission to refuse. He shook his head slightly, but when she looked at Granny Doe, she didn’t have the heart to say no.

  “Of course, I’ll help, but my grandmother is always in charge of decorations.”

  “I have plans made, and we always have lots of help,” Granny Doe said, sounding a bit surprised because she’d been sure Harriet would want the job for herself.

  “Of course you do!” Harriet said with a smile that pulled her thin lips into something like a grimace. “I do have one suggestion, though.”

  Hope held her breath, expecting the worst. She was afraid the older woman would suggest floating a plastic Jesus over the altar or lighting the exterior with purple lights.

  “My granddaughter, Ernestine, loves baking, and she makes such lovely things. I think she’d be willing to make all the cookies for our traditional Christmas Eve reception after the midnight service. I’ll bring it up at the church council meeting if you don’t mind, Reverend Langdon.”

  “If she’s willing, that would be very nice,” he said.

  Hope noticed Harriet didn’t call the minister by his first name, which was a bit surprising. She’d been chair of the search committee and was sometimes a bit patronizing.

  “Is there anything I can do to help?” Noah asked when Harriet had hurried away for an ‘important’ appointment.

  “She gets her nails done on Saturday morning,” Granny Doe muttered under her breath.

  Hope ignored the comment and smiled at the minister. “There is one thing. Would you help my grandmother get to the car when we’re ready to leave? I’m so afraid she’ll fall trying to get up the stairs on crutches.”

  “I’ll be happy to, but you’ve hit on something I’m going to bring up at the next council meeting. We’re really not up to code on handicap access, although it’s not a problem getting to the sanctuary through the front door. I’d like to look into a chair lift so our older members can participate in activities in the common room.”

  “That’s a wonderful idea,” Granny Doe said. “I know several people who have to miss church suppers and such because it’s too hard for them to get up and down stairs.”

  “Let me know when you’re ready to leave,” Noah said. “I’ll be in my office going over tomorrow’s sermon.”

  “I’ll stay here and help,” Anna said.

  Even with the help expected to come for the casting session tomorrow, Hope felt a bit overwhelmed by what she’d taken on. She hoped to add fresh touches to the pageant, but she had to avoid making it too complicated

  At the end of he
r work session, she loaded the trunk of her car with costumes she wanted to take care of herself and asked Anna to tell her father they were ready to leave.

  While Noah helped her grandmother up the stairs, Hope went to bring the car as close as possible to the door.

  “Thank you so much,” she said when Noah had settled Granny Doe and her crutches into the car.

  “If there’s anything else I can do, please feel free to ask.” He smiled at Granny Doe, and for a moment Hope was transfixed. When the mask of sadness fell from his face, he was a beautiful person.

  She couldn’t allow herself to think that way. He was still a man in mourning, and only heartache could come from forgetting that fact. She’d spent too many years with a father who pretended to be happy for her sake.

  When she was alone in the car with Granny Doe, Hope firmly put the minister out of her thoughts and questioned Harriet’s surprise insistence she be in charge of decorating.

  “Why would she do a thing like that?” Hope asked. “How can I possibly do a good job with decorating and the pageant?”

  “You’ll have lots of help, but I think I know her reasoning. She wants to keep you so busy you won’t have time to think about Noah, let alone do anything to attract him.”

  “She doesn’t have any reason to think I would!”

  “Maybe not, but Harriet has been trying to find a husband for her granddaughter, Ernestine, for years. Noah is handsome and personable, not to mention a widower. Men like him don’t come along very often, especially not in Blairton.”

  “But she’s so highhanded! Does Ernestine want to bake cookies for the whole congregation? Does she even know her grandmother has volunteered her?”

  “Baking is one of the few things Ernestine does well, not that she isn’t a sweet girl.”

  “I still don’t see how overloading me with activities will give Ernestine a chance with Noah. People aren’t pawns you can move around to suit your own purposes.” Hope didn’t know when she’d felt so frustrated. “You know how important the Lord is to me. I’m happy to do whatever I can for the church, but I’ve never heard anything so silly. No, not silly, degrading. Poor Ernestine! I wonder whether she knows her grandmother is matchmaking.”

  “At least Harriet didn’t try to take over the decorating,” Granny Doe said in a mild voice. “Don’t worry. I have lots of friends who will help.”

  “Noah needs help more than I do. The poor man doesn’t know what Harriet is up to. Does every church have someone like her?”

  “She means well and supports the activities of the church,” Granny Doe said. “She just gets carried away when she gets an idea. Look on the good side. We’ll have a wonderful Christmas. It’s the season of peace and love. Anything can happen.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Hope worked late Saturday evening to launder, iron, and repair the costumes for the Holy family. She couldn’t assign parts unless she knew the robes would fit.

  Granny Doe had been right about the condition of the angel costumes. She would give the parents of the angels a choice of laundering and repairing them or making new on their own. Since they were made of inexpensive white cotton, it wouldn’t be a hardship to any of the families. Even an old sheet would suffice.

  Before she left for the casting call Sunday afternoon, she checked the clipboard where she kept a list of all the things she had to do, happy to cross off one item.

  Granny Doe had decided to stay home all day to rest her aches and pains from overdoing the day before. Getting around on crutches might look easy, but the older woman was using muscles she’d forgotten she had.

  “Can I get you anything before I leave?” Hope asked after settling her grandmother on the living room couch.

  “No, I’ll just do a little reading and maybe nap a bit. I wonder whether Reverend Langdon—Noah—will be there for your meeting. It’s hard to remember to call a minister by his first name.”

  “There’s no reason why he should be there,” Hope said, trying to conceal her irritation at her grandmother’s determination to put her on the minister’s radar. “Even if he is, I’ll have more than thirty children to cast and assign costumes.”

  “Well, good luck, dear,” Granny Doe said, feigning indifference.

  Hope got to the church a good half hour before the scheduled time, wondering if the unseasonably warm weather would last much longer. She appreciated not having to shovel the driveway or scrape her car windows, but Christmas Eve without a shimmering white blanket of snow to mask the drabness of winter seemed wrong. She had fond memories of singing carols with her high school friends while big fluffy flakes turned the town into a wonderland on Christmas Eve.

  Many of those friends were married now, and others had moved away in search of better opportunities. Although she loved her job and her grandmother, she sometimes felt lonely for the close relationships of the past.

  Her mood brightened when Stacy Van Horn and her five-year-old daughter, Daisy, a curly haired little redhead who was practically a replica of her mother at that age, were the first to arrive at the church.

  “Remember when we were shepherds in the pageant?” Stacy asked. “I still remember the boy who had to wear his mother’s bathrobe because he lost his costume. What was his name?”

  “Gordon, Gordon Groton. Now that you remind me, I still have a few reservations about sending costumes home with the kids. What do you think?”

  “Leave it up to the mothers. I’ll take a dozen or so home with me just to be safe. Diane Hughes won’t mind laundering a load too. Maybe she can be in charge of the sheep’s’ fuzzy little capes.” She picked up a boldly striped green and brown robe and wrinkled her nose. “I don’t remember them smelling musty last year,” Stacy said.

  “It’s probably because the church had a water problem in the utility area of the basement last fall.”

  They didn’t have long to chat before several other mothers, including Diane, arrived with small children in tow. Hope had a chart, and she wrote in each child’s name as he or she was assigned a role and a costume. Hope got so involved in the casting, she scarcely noticed when Anna arrived and stood patiently waiting for her part.

  “I don’t want to be a shepherd,” one of the older grade-school children protested. “Girls didn’t take care of sheep in the Bible.”

  “No,” Hope agreed, “but our sheep are preschoolers who need to be watched. I know fifth-graders can be trusted not to lose one.”

  “I guess,” the critical girl agreed.

  Hope was in the midst of handing out speaking parts to a few older children who would act as narrators and read from the Bible when her day took a turn for the worse. Harriet walked in with her granddaughter and made a beeline for the table where Hope was standing.

  “I’m so glad Mary wears a blue robe. It’s Emily’s best color,” Harriet said, nudging her granddaughter closer.

  Hope had thought long and hard about a kind way to tell the girl she was too big to play Mary. Not only was the costume much too small, she would tower over Keith, the boy she’d selected to be Joseph.

  “You’ve done a really good job playing Mary for several years,” Hope began, trying to be as tactful as possible. “Don’t you think it would be nice to give someone else a turn? I thought maybe it would be fair to let Anna be Mary since it’s her first Christmas here.”

  “My grandma said I could be Mary,” Emily insisted, her apple cheeks turning a bright rosy pink as she began to cry.

  Hope knew the easy way would be to give in, but it really did seem unfair to let the same girl play the part year after year.

  “I was a shepherd when I was your age. It’s a really important part because you’ll have to make sure our little sheep don’t get scared or wonder off.”

  “Boys are shepherds!” Emily protested in a high whine.

  “Oh, dear,” Stacy said beside her, sympathetic but as helpless as Hope to stop the flow of tears.

  Harriet shushed her granddaughter to no avail, then turned to
Hope with a stern face. “You’ve hurt her feelings. There’s no reason why Emily can’t be Mary. It’s only a children’s pageant.”

  “We talked about the costume.…”

  “I’m sure the hem can be let out. I’d do it myself, but sewing isn’t my thing. Maybe Emily’s mother…”

  “I’m sorry, but Anna will play Mary this year,” Hope said, trying to sound firm but kind.”

  “I really don’t mind if she does it,” Anna said in a soft voice.

  “She doesn’t care!” Emily howled, wiping away a tear streaking down her face.

  “Reverend Langdon, don’t you think it’s cruel to take away a part Emily has played for several years?” Harriet asked.

  Hope looked up in surprise because she hadn’t realized the minister was in the room. She didn’t want to look like a tyrant in his eyes, although she didn’t know why his good opinion suddenly seemed so important.

  “The costume was made for a smaller child,” she explained, speaking to him and trying to ignore the storm of protest from Harriet and her granddaughter.

  “Emily, I remember the children’s choir singing during the service a few week ago. You did a splendid job. I suggest you sing the solo in the Christmas pageant. You can wear your prettiest dress and perform in front of the whole congregation. Is that something you could do?”

  Emily rubbed both cheeks with the backs of her hands and frowned while she considered the offer.

  “There isn’t a solo in the pageant,” Hope whispered to the minister, completely taken aback by his suggestion. Even though she didn’t know him well, he had earned a reputation for not interfering in the work of church committees.

  “There is now,” he said in a firm voice.

  Emily looked at her frowning grandmother, but Harriet seemed to have lost her fight. She nodded approval, and the disappointed girl somewhat belligerently agreed. The room was quiet as the pair stalked off, even the smallest children picking up that something wasn’t quite right.