"So I've been asking myself," she interrupted, "how you live, and where you live. I've seen you on street-corners a few times, too. Maybe that's all you do--play your viola--I know well enough it's not just a 'fiddle'. So, where are you living now?" She hung her wrist limply.

"Are you on the street?"

"I'm presently lodging at the Charleston."

"Hew!" she exclaimed, waving her fingers. "That place? n.o.body of any worth lives at the Charleston. It's full of winos and wh.o.r.es."

"It's inexpensive," Jurgen replied. "The decor leaves much to be desired. But I'm afraid that I'll have to be moving along to even cheaper lodgings by the new year."

"That bad?"

Jurgen nodded. He could probably hold out for another month or two, but by then, he would have to close his new bank account.

"Well," she continued, "the Charleston is bad enough. I just won't stand for one of my friends hanging his hat in a place like that, or worse. Do you need a place to stay?"

He knew she was sincere, but the situation felt uncomfortably close to charity. His grandmother had always warned against even seeming to be in need of charity--let alone actually needing help. "Really, Mabel, I couldn't presume to burden you with..."

"Now, stop it Jurgen," she said with a shake of her head. She scooted her hips forward, cupping both hands around her bourbon carefully as if she were settling in for a serious talk. "Business here has never been better--and I think you've had a lot to do with that. You bring a new sound, and people are paying to hear it, and drink a few, and they're eating food, too... My friend Dotty, just the other day said to me..."

Mabel pressed her hand to her breast and forced her voice to a higher pitch, "Mabel, honey, I hear deyz a strange waat boy down at Calcutta--plays jazz on de fiddle."

Jurgen laughed at her feigned accent.

Mabel let her voice drop to its normal pitch. "Are you looking for regular work?"

"Nothing seems to be available in my line."

"Listen. First thing, we have to get you out of the Charleston. Now, my brother's got an extra room--and he's already said he'll put you up, cause I've asked him--any friend of his sister is always welcome. So that leaves work."

"I really could not allow you to do that..."

"Well, hear me out, first, before you say that," she answered. "I'm not half finished."

Jurgen put up a hand to acquiesce. "I'll hear you out."

"My old friend Dotty," she began. "We went to school together you understand--when we were children, anyway. Now, Dotty works for Miss Edna. And Miss Edna thinks the world of her because she's so neat and organized. Miss Edna herself is a flighty thing--she can hardly paint her own lips with both hands."

Jurgen laughed, then bent forward and cupped his gla.s.s the way Mabel cupped hers, rolling it between his palms. Mabel had such a way of expressing herself.

"Now Edna's lover-boy is a man named Lamonte. I don't know what he sees in Edna--to look at her you wouldn't think she can do anything right." She winked. "Miss Edna's got something softer than brains; and it's not in her head."

Only the first part of what she said really caught his attention.

"You're speaking of Laurence Lamonte, the conductor?" He took a quick sip of bourbon and rolled the gla.s.s again between his palms, wondering where she was leading; almost seeing it.

"That's the man," Mabel replied with a firm nod of her head. "With a little help from Edna--getting Lamonte in to hear you play--you'll have something decent in no time." She sipped her bourbon slowly, regarding him. "It won't be difficult."

"Why not?"

"Oh," she replied, moving closer with narrowed eyes. "I know his secret--Dotty told me. Our Mr. Lamonte enjoys slipping off discretely on occasion to hear some... jazz..." Putting both palms on the table, she whispered. "The way I sometimes slip off to sing... Schubert."

Jurgen laughed and sat back in his chair. "Schubert." He did not feel particularly surprised; she probably sang all of Schubert's lieder beautifully. She sat regarding him with a half-smile, and appeared to be finished with her speech. He thoughtfully tapped on his gla.s.s a few times, mulling over the proposal, gazing at his fingers. Finally, he looked up to meet her eyes. "You know just what to say."

Mabel smiled and reached out to pat his hand. "Be here tomorrow," she replied, "with your luggage, and I'll take you to meet my brother."

She raised her gla.s.s, and met his in the middle of the table with the lightest of taps.

He sipped. "I couldn't have asked for a nicer Christmas."

"I could say the same about you." She sipped once, then slapped her gla.s.s down and stood up, adjusting her sequined gown around her hips, then leaned over confidently. "I'll soon have you joining my secret musical soirees, too." She pointed at the table. "Now, don't forget your five dollars. Let's go make some Christmas music." Jurgen slipped the bill into his shirt pocket, then followed her out the door and into the spotlights.

On Christmas Day at eleven, Jurgen checked out of the Charleston Residence Hotel. Packing took only a few minutes, as he had little in the way of possessions. When he finished packing, he switched off the light and set his valise and viola case down outside the door. Leaving the door open, he went back into the room and, holding a hand kerchief in his palm, stood on the chair to carefully unscrew the hot bulb from its socket. He closed the door behind him, then crouched in the hallway and put the Hungarian lightbulb into his valise, carefully wrapped inside his silk shirt.

CHRISTMAS CONCERT

It was several nights before Christmas, and all along the freeway, cars were lined up like a vast herd of red-nosed reindeer being led off to slaughter. I glanced away from the sight and reached out to snap off the radio. I'd had far too much of the Messiah since Thanksgiving.

You'd think a respectable cla.s.sical station could think of something more original to saturate the airwaves with. But I knew that even if I changed the station, I'd get White Christmas, or Blue Christmas, or Dixie Christmas, or some other form of musical blasphemy. Traffic moved along sluggishly, inching up a long, curving hill. It was raining heavily--one of those sudden tropical storms, only it was happening in a refrigerator. I had the windshield wipers on full, but still I could hardly see the vehicle in front of me.

Along with every other irate father, uncle, brother, and son who was late for some engagement or another, I was in the fast lane. I had gotten caught in a last-minute sales meeting, and I was going to be late for my daughter's concert if the idiot in front of me didn't hurry up. The offending car was a Jeep, jacked up on all fours with tires big enough to dwarf a road-grader, and had struts and shock absorbers and what-not sticking out all over the undercarriage--a real useful piece of machinery for navigating the treacherous Silicon Valley freeways: when you see a car you don't like, you just roll right over it. The Jeep had one of those typical California vanity plates, held in place by a bra.s.s frame which, had I been able to read it in the dark, would have said "My other truck is a Mack." The driver was pumping on his brakes continually, no doubt keeping time to some Country Christmas. .h.i.t Cla.s.sic. Lounging on top of this pinnacle of western automotive engineering was a Christmas tree, lashed with a couple pieces of thin twine--probably on its way to a living room hung with paintings of nudes on black velvet, and soon to be littered with tacky country decorations and strings of popcorn. The tree listed to one side, bobbing over the edge of the Jeep's roof in time with the blinking brake lights. The driver's girlfriend was smooching up to him in the front seat--I could see her outline through the back window, practically sitting in his lap... maybe she _was_ in his lap. I started thinking they probably deserved to lose the whole tree. They'd have a real nice surprise when they got home without it.

I reached over to turn on the radio again, thinking the hourly excerpt from the Messiah might be over by then. I should have brought a tape from home, but I'd barely had time to change my suit. Just when my eyes were averted for an instant, the Christmas-tree bedecked vehicle in front of me decided to drop its load. I felt my car go b.u.mp, b.u.mp, and slammed on my brakes before I even looked up. The car behind me skidded and swerved to one side, then leaned on his horn as if he'd run into an iceberg. I just hit the emergency lights and leaned on my own horn. The guy in front, perhaps hearing the tooting chorus behind him, stopped just down the road, and like an idiot, put his Jeep into reverse and came hurtling back toward me. He skidded to a stop and put on his emergency lights.

What kind of jerk ties down a Christmas tree so loosely that it flops off in the middle of a freeway? We were only doing twenty miles an hour--in the rain, no less. I thought I would have to get out and check the extent of the damage, and I wasn't happy about slogging in the rain with my dress shoes on. Hallelujah, the jerk stopped, anyway, so I could at least get the name of his insurance company--I'd already memorized his personal license number (which doesn't bear repeating--I'd always thought the DMV had standards of decency).

I hopped out, trying to pull up the collar of my overcoat even though it wouldn't quite cover my head, and started walking forward to have a few choice words with Mister Country Jamboree in the over-endowed automobile. Of course, CJ (as I then dubbed the driver) bounded out of the Jeep and headed my way, tucking in his shirt as he walked. One look at him, and I almost turned around and left--CJ could have been Paul Bunyan's twin brother. He had the shirt to prove it, too: red and black lumberjack style checks, with the top three b.u.t.tons undone, and chest hair that was thicker than my beard. He also wore cowboy boots and wide red suspenders.

"Holy moley, mister!" he yelled with a tone of real concern. "You alright?"

I was about to lay into him when his gum-chewing girlfriend appeared from behind, tucking herself into his armpit. "Oh!" she squealed, "Ah'm so sorry! Looks like our tree smashed up your brand new car!"

My car wasn't exactly brand new, but I looked around to where she pointed. Sure enough, the front grill was bent in and one headlight had gone out, the gla.s.s completely smashed. The tree itself was nestled cozily under the car, nuzzling up against the oil pan.

The look of childish helplessness on both their faces--and frankly what I considered might be a moderate dose of dull wittedness--somehow got to me just then, and I couldn't quite bring myself to swear at them.

Besides, the fastest thing to do would be to shrug it off with a happy face, extract their battered shrubbery from beneath my car, and be on my way. I decided that silliness would carry the day. "Merry Christmas!" I called, throwing out my arms. "Sorry about your tree!"

Both of them lit up in grins.

"Look--he ain't even mad," the guy said to his girlfriend.

She batted her lashes in astonishment. "We're awfully sorry about this," she chimed, wagging her head.

It only took a minute to get the tree out from under the car. All the while, I was thinking of how to explain it to the patrolman who would undoubtedly appear in a moment: it's just another roadkill, officer, nothing to be alarmed about; I'm sure it happens all the time, what with all these trees swooping down on unsuspecting holiday merrymakers.

The tree was pretty battered up around the lower branches, but it really could have sufficed to cheer someone's holiday--if one cut off a couple feet from the bottom and turned the bad side toward the wall so it couldn't be seen. You only decorate half the tree anyway, right? I started trying to explain this to my countrified acquaintances, but they would have none of it.