The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate

I thought he was joking but you could never be sure. We worked side by side for a few peaceful hours until Viola rang the bell. I was grateful for those hours. I had been missing him.

CHAPTER 25

CHRISTMAS EVE

I would almost as soon believe with the old and ignorant cosmogonists, that fossil shells had never lived, but had been created in stone so as to mock the shells now living on the sea-shore.

I CHERISHED THE INFREQUENT hours I had with Granddaddy. As Christmas loomed on the horizon, our paltry time together shrank even further. I worked in the kitchen at Viola’s elbow, which I think she found more aggravating than usual, as she had to cook and teach me at the same time.

J.B. quizzed me. “Callie, how long until Christmas?”

“Look, J.B.” I held up my hand. “See my fingers?”

“Yes.”

“Well, this finger is for today, and this one is for tomorrow, and this one is for the day after that, which is Christmas. You see?”

“Yes.”

“Do you understand now?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

“But, Callie, how long until Christmas?”

Question for the Notebook: When does the young human organism get a grasp of time? The five-o’clock possum living in the wall understands time, so why doesn’t J.B.? He’s driving me batty.

I looked at this last sentence. Granddaddy had taught me that a scientific log was a citadel of the facts and that opinion didn’t enter into it. I erased my comment, relieved that I’d only written it in pencil.

Father and Alberto came through the door with a stunted pine they had found in the oak scrub (evergreens did not do well in our part of the world). J.B. went into a positive frenzy. “Look, look, Callie, it’s our Christmas treeeeeee! It must be Christmas!”

We spent the afternoon making decorations from colored paper and clamping tiny candles in tiny holders to the branches. Harry made a star out of shiny silver cardboard and placed it on top of the tree with no need of a ladder, it was that puny. As a finishing touch, we arranged cotton bolls on the boughs to look like snow, something we had all heard about but never seen.

The world of Methodist Fentress was divided into those families who opened their presents on Christmas Eve and those who opened them on Christmas Day. Fortunately we were Christmas Eve-ers. According to our minister, Mr. Cornelius Barker, presents were a pointless, expensive, pagan diversion. Yes, well, good luck explaining that to seven children. My mother had no success with it, and neither did the Reverend Barker, although to give him credit, he didn’t try all that hard. He came to dinner once a month, and as far as I could tell, he was the one guest Granddaddy looked forward to. They addressed each other as Walter and Cornelius, which scandalized Mother, and they baited each other in genial discussions of Genesis versus the Fossil Record. Mother scored the coup of having the Reverend come to our house for supper following the Christmas Eve services.

We spent a large part of Christmas Eve day making sure that everyone was well scrubbed—no small undertaking, as it meant heating a huge amount of water. Then we assembled in the front hall for inspection. For once, no one was sent back to the washroom for more work on his neck or her nails.

The night was clear and cold, and we bundled up in our thickest coats and scarves. Harry penned up the dogs so that they wouldn’t troop along after us, and then we set off, all except for Granddaddy, who stayed behind to tend the fire in the parlor and enjoy some peace and quiet. Alberto and San-Juanna took the wagon to Our Virgin of Guadalupe in Martindale. Viola went off to her own service at All God’s Children. I would have liked to have gone with her, but that would never have been allowed. I had walked past her church before and heard music spilling from the falling-down clapboard building; the spirited singing and proclamations of joy emerging from it beat the other churches all hollow, to my mind.

We set off with lanterns and sang carols on the way. I held J.B.’s hand and pointed out various constellations to him.

“Look, J.B., there’s Canis Major and Canis Minor. That means the big dog and the little dog.”

J.B. looked concerned. “There’s no dogs in the sky, Callie.”

“They aren’t dogs, they’re stars. Some people a long time ago thought they looked like dogs.”

“They don’t look like Ajax. They don’t look like Matilda. I think you’re fibbing. Mama says you’re not supposed to fib.”

I myself had trouble making a dog or a bull or a lion out of the distant pinpoints of light. How had the ancients come up with such cockeyed fancies?