A Lot Like Christmas: Stories

  We also have an assortment of Christmas Carol cookbooks, Advent calendars, jigsaw puzzles, and an audiotape on which Captain Picard of the American television series Star Trek: The Next Generation takes all the parts.

  All of these are, of course, adaptations, shortened and altered and otherwise bowdlerized. No one reads the original, though we carry it, in paperback. In the two years I’ve worked here, we’ve only sold a single copy, and that to myself. I bought it last year to read to my daughter, Gemma, when I had her for Christmas, but then I did not have time to do so. My ex-wife, Margaret, came to pick her up early for a pantomime she and Robert were taking her to, and we only got as far as Marley’s ghost.

  Gemma knows the story, though, in spite of never having read it, and the names of all the characters, as does everyone. They are so well-known, in fact, that at the beginning of the season this year Harridge’s management had suggested the staff dress in costume as Scrooge and Tiny Tim, to increase profits and “provide a seasonal atmosphere.”

  There was a general outcry at this, and the idea had been dropped. But on the morning of the twenty-second when I arrived at work, there was a figure in a floor-dragging black robe and a hood standing by the order desk with Mr. Voskins, who was smiling smugly.

  “Good morning, Mr. Grey,” Mr. Voskins said to me. “This is your new assistant,” and I half expected him to say, “Mr. Black,” but instead he said pleasedly, “the Spirit of Christmas Future.”

  It is actually Christmas Yet to Come, but Mr. Voskins has not read the original, either.

  “How do you do?” I said, wondering if Mr. Voskins was going to demand that I wear a costume as well, and why he had hired someone just now. The books department had been shorthanded all of December.

  “Mr. Grey will explain things to you,” Mr. Voskins said to the spirit. “Harridge’s has been able to arrange for an author autographing,” he said to me, which explained this hiring three days before Christmas. No doubt the book being autographed was yet another version of A Christmas Carol. “We will be holding it the day after tomorrow.”

  “On Christmas Eve?” I said. “At what time? I’d arranged to leave early on Christmas Eve.”

  “It will depend on the author’s schedule,” Mr. Voskins said. “He’s an extremely busy man.”

  “My daughter’s spending the evening with me,” I explained. “It’s the only time I’ll have her.” They would be at Robert’s parents’ in Surrey for the rest of Christmas week.

  “I’m discussing the details with the author this morning,” he said. “Oh, and your wife telephoned. She wants you to ring her back.”

  “Ex-wife,” I corrected him, but he had already hurried off, leaving me with my new assistant.

  “I’m Mr. Grey,” I said, extending my hand.

  The spirit silently extended a skinny hand for me to shake, and I remembered that the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come was mute, communicating solely by pointing.

  “Have you worked in a books department before?” I asked.

  He shook his hooded head. I hoped he didn’t plan to stay in character while waiting on the customers, or perhaps that was the idea, and he was here for “seasonal atmosphere” only.

  “What am I supposed to call you?” I said.

  He extended a bony finger and pointed at the Wild West Christmas Carol, on the cover of which a black-hatted spirit stood, pointing at a tombstone with Scrooge’s name on it.

  “Spirit? Christmas? Yet to Come?” I said, thinking that an “atmospheric” assistant was worse than none at all.

  But I was wrong. He proved to be very efficient, learning the cash register and the credit-card procedure with ease, and waiting on customers promptly. They seemed delighted when he extended his bony finger from his black sleeve and pointed at the books they’d asked for. By ten o’clock I felt confident enough to leave him in charge of the department while I went to the employee lounge to telephone Margaret.

  The line was engaged. I intended to ring her up again at a quarter past, but we had a surge of shoppers, and although Christmas Yet to Come was extremely helpful, I couldn’t get away again till nearly eleven. When I dialed Margaret’s flat, there was no answer.

  I was almost glad. I wanted to know the time of the autographing before I spoke to her. We had already had two fights over the “visitation schedule,” as Margaret calls it. I was originally to have had Gemma on Boxing Day as well as Christmas Eve, but Robert’s parents had invited them up to Surrey for the entire week. We had compromised by my having Gemma on Christmas Eve and part of Christmas Day. Then last week Margaret had rung up to say Robert’s parents especially wanted them there for church on Christmas morning as it was a family tradition that Robert read the Scripture. “You can have her all Christmas Eve day,” Margaret had said.

  “I have to work.”

  “You could insist on having the day off,” she’d said, letting her voice die away.

  It is a trick she has of leaving a sentence unfinished but her meaning perfectly clear. She used it to excellent account during the divorce, claiming she had not said any of the things I accused her of, as in fact she had not, and though I only see her now when she brings Gemma, I still understand her perfectly.

  “You could insist on having the day off,” she meant now, “if you really cared about Gemma.” And there is no answer to that, no way to make her understand that Christmas Eve is not a day a shopclerk can insist on taking off, to explain to her that it is different from being an accountant. No way to explain why I gave up being an accountant.

  And no way to explain to her that I might need to change the schedule because of an autographing. I decided to wait to try again till I had spoken to Mr. Voskins.

  He did not come back till after noon. “The autographing will take place from eleven to one,” he said, handing us a stack of red-and-green flyers. “Hand these out to the customers,” he said.

  I read the top flyer, relieved that the autographing wouldn’t cause a problem with Gemma. “A Special Signing of Sir Spencer Siddon’s latest book,” it read. “Making Money Hand Over Fist.”

  “It’s on the bestseller list,” Mr. Voskins said happily. “We were very lucky to get him. His secretary will be here at half past one to discuss the arrangements.”

  “We’ll need more staff,” I said. “The two of us can’t possibly run an autographing and wait on customers at the same time.”

  “I’ll try to hire someone,” he said vaguely. “We’ll discuss everything when Sir Spencer’s secretary arrives.”

  “Shall I go to lunch now, then?” I said, “and let Mr….” I pointed at the spirit, “go second so I’ll be back in time for the meeting?”

  “No,” he said. “I want you both here. Go now.” He waved vaguely in our direction.

  “Which?”

  “Both of you. I’ll get someone from the housewares department to cover your department. Be back by 1:00.”

  When our replacement came, I told the spirit, “You can go to lunch,” stuck A Christmas Carol, which I’d been reading on my lunch and tea breaks, in my coat pocket, and went to telephone Margaret. The line was engaged again.

  When I came out of the lounge, the spirit was standing there, waiting for me, and I realized he wouldn’t know where to go for lunch. Since Harridge’s had closed its employee dining room to increase profits, employees had half an hour to get to, partake of, and return from lunch. “I know of a place that’s quick,” I told him.

  He nodded, and I led off through the crowded aisles, hoping he would keep up. I need not have had any fear—he kept pace with me easily, in spite of not saying, as I did, “Sorry,” to dozens of shoppers blocking the way. By the time we’d reached the south door, he was even with me, and, before I could turn toward Cavendish Square, he’d moved ahead, his arm extended and his long, bony finger pointing toward Regent Street.

  All the luncheon places in Regent Street are expensive and invariably crammed with shoppers resting their feet, and are a good ten min
utes’ walk away. We would have just enough time to walk there, not get waited on, and return empty-handed.

  “I usually go to Wilson’s,” I said, “it’s closer,” but he continued to point commandingly and we had no time for arguing, either. I followed him down the street, down a lane I hadn’t known was there, and into a dismal-looking lunch counter called Mama Montoni’s.

  It wasn’t crowded, at any rate, and the small tables looked comparatively clean, though the made sandwiches on top of the counter looked several days old.

  At one of the tables was an enormous man with a full brown beard, and I saw why the spirit had brought me here. The man was dressed as the Spirit of Christmas Present, in a green robe edged with white fur, and a crown of holly.

  “Come in! Come in!” he said, even though we were already in, and my companion glided over to him.

  The enormous man shook his head and said, “No, he can’t make it for lunch today,” as if Christmas Yet to Come had spoken.

  I wondered who the “he” they referred to was. The Spirit of Christmas Past, perhaps?

  “Neither of us got anything, I’m afraid,” the enormous man said to Yet to Come, sounding discouraged. “Most of the bank executives are on holiday. But the teller said the Adelphi is holding pantomime auditions this afternoon.”

  I wondered if the pantomime was A Christmas Carol, or if they had previously been in a production and were now trying to find employment that fit the costumes. It was a good costume. The holly crown had the requisite icicles, and the green robe was belted with a rusted scabbard, just as in the original. His chest was not bare, though, and neither were his feet. He had compromised with the weather by wearing sandals with thick socks and had fastened the open robe across his massive chest with a large green button.

  I was still standing just inside the door. My companion turned and pointed at me, and the enormous man boomed out, “Come in! and know me better, man!” and beckoned me to the table.

  I was going to say that I needed to order first, but the old woman behind the counter—Mama Montoni?—had disappeared into the back. I went over to the table. “How do you do?” I said. “I’m Edwin Grey.”

  “Delighted to meet you,” the enormous man said heartily. “Sit down, sit down. My friend tells me you work together.”

  “Yes.” I sat down. “At Harridge’s.”

  “He tells me you are hiring additional staff in your department. Is that right?”

  “Possibly,” I said, wondering how Sir Spencer Siddon would feel at being confronted with half the characters from A Christmas Carol. Would he think he was meant to be Scrooge? “It would be only temporary, though. Just the three days till Christmas.”

  “Till Christmas,” he said, and the old woman emerged from the back with a fistful of silverware and two plates of congealed-looking spaghetti.

  “I’ll have what they’re having,” I said, “and a paper cup of tea to take with me.”

  The old woman, who was clearly related to Yet to Come, didn’t answer or even acknowledge that I’d spoken to her, but she disappeared into the back again.

  “I didn’t know this café was here,” I said, so he wouldn’t bring up the topic of job openings again.

  “Excellent choice of book,” he said, pointing at my Christmas Carol, which was protruding from my coat pocket.

  “I should imagine it’s your favorite,” I said, laying it on the table, smiling.

  He shook his shaggy brown head. “I prefer Mr. Dickens’s Little Dorrit, so patient and cheerful in her imprisonment, and Trollope’s Barchester Towers.”

  “Do you read a good deal?” I asked. It’s rare to find anyone who reads the older authors, let alone Trollope.

  He nodded. “I find it helps to pass the time,” he said. “Especially at this time of year, ‘When dark December glooms the day / And takes our autumn joys away / When short and scant the sunbeam throws / Upon the weary waste of snows / A cold and profitless regard…’ ‘Marmion.’ Sir Walter Scott.”

  “Introduction to the fifth canto,” I said, and he beamed at me.

  “You are a reader, too?” he said eagerly.

  “I find books a great comfort,” I said, and he nodded.

  “Tell me what you think of A Christmas Carol,” he said.

  “I think it has lasted all these years because people want to believe it could happen,” I said.

  “But you don’t believe it?” he said. “You don’t believe a man might hear the truth and be changed by it?”

  “I think Scrooge seems quite easily reformed,” I said, “compared with the Scrooges I have known.”

  Mama Montoni emerged from the back again, glaring, and slapped down a plate of lukewarm spaghetti and a crockery cup half full of tea.

  “So you have read ‘Marmion’?” the Spirit of Christmas Present said. “Tell me, what did you think of the tale of Sir David Lindesay?” and we launched into an eager discussion that lasted far too long. I would be late getting back for the meeting with Scrooge’s secretary.

  I stood up, and my assistant did, too. “We must be getting back,” I said, pulling on my coat. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Mr….?”

  He extended his huge hand. “I am the Spirit of Christmas Present.”

  I laughed. “Then you’re missing your third. Where’s Christmas Past?”

  “In America,” he said quite seriously, “where he has been much corrupted by nostalgia and commercial interests.”

  He saw me looking skeptically at his socks and sandals. “You do not see us at our best,” he said. “I fear we have fallen on hard times.”

  Apparently. “I should think these would be good times, with any number of Scrooges you could reform.”

  “And so there are,” he said, “but they are praised and much rewarded for their greed, and much admired. And”—he looked sternly at me—“they do not believe in spirits. They lay their visions to Freud and hormonal imbalance, and their therapists tell them they should feel no guilt, and advise them to focus further on themselves.”

  “Yes, well,” I said, “I must be getting back.” I pointed at my assistant, not knowing whether Present would expect me to address him as the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come. “You can stay and talk to your friend if you wish,” and made my escape, glad that at least I hadn’t suggested he come speak to Mr. Voskins about being taken on, and wondering what Mr. Voskins would do when he found out he had hired a lunatic.

  Mr. Voskins wasn’t on the floor, and neither was the secretary. I looked at my watch, expecting it to be well past one, but it was only a quarter till. I rang up Margaret. The line was engaged.

  My assistant was there when I got back, waiting on a customer, but there was still no sign of Mr. Voskins. He finally came up at two to tell us the secretary had phoned to change the schedule.

  “Of the autographing?” I said anxiously.

  “No, of the meeting with us. His secretary won’t be here till half past.”

  I took advantage of the delay to try Margaret again. And got Gemma.

  “Mummy’s downstairs talking to the doorman about our being gone,” she told me.

  “Do you know what she wanted to speak to me about?” I asked her.

  “No…o,” she said, thinking, and added, with a child’s irrelevance, “I went to the dentist. She’ll be back up in a minute.”

  “I’ll talk to you in the meantime, then,” I said. “What shall we have to eat for Christmas Eve?”

  “Figs,” she said promptly.

  “Figs?”

  “Yes, and frosted cakes. Like the little princess and Ermengarde and Becky had at the feast. Well, actually, they didn’t have it. Horrid Miss Minchin found out and took it all away from them. And red-currant wine. Only I suppose you won’t let me have wine. But red-currant drink or red-currant juice. Red-currant something.”

  “And figs,” I said distastefully.

  “Yes, and a red shawl for a tablecloth. I want it just like in the book.”

  “What
book?” I said, teasing.

  “A Little Princess.”

  “Which one is that?”

  “You know. The one where the little princess is rich and then she loses her father and Miss Minchin makes her live in the garret and be a servant and the Indian gentleman feels sorry for her and sends her things. You know. It’s my favorite book.”

  I do know, of course. It has been her favorite for two years now, displacing both Anne of Green Gables and Little Women in her affections. “It’s because we’re just alike,” she’d told me when I asked her why she liked it so much.

  “You both live in a garret,” I’d said.

  “No. But we’re both tall for our age, and we both have black hair.”

  “Of course,” I said now. “I forgot. What do you want for Christmas?”

  “Not a doll. I’m too old for dolls,” she said promptly, and then hesitated. “The little princess’s father always gave her books for Christmas.”

  “Did he?”

  Mr. Voskins appeared at my elbow, looking agitated. “I’ll be right there,” I said, cupping my hand over the mouthpiece.

  “It’s nearly half past,” he said.

  “I’ll be right there.” I promised Gemma I’d purchase figs and red-currant something, and told her to tell her mother I’d phoned, and went to meet the secretary, wondering if he’d look like Bob Cratchit. That would make the cast complete, except for the Spirit of Christmas Past, of course, who was in America.

  The secretary wasn’t there yet. At a quarter to three, Mr. Voskins informed us that the secretary had phoned to change the meeting time to four. I used the extra time to purchase Gemma’s present, a copy of A Little Princess. She owns a paperback, which she has read a dozen times, but this was a reproduction of the original, with a dark blue cloth cover and colored plates. Gemma looked at it longingly every time she came to see me, and had given all sorts of not-very-veiled hints, like her “The little princess’s father bought her books,” just now.