A Lot Like Christmas

by Connie Willis

  “Where’s Dr. Morthman?”

  “Next door,” he said, squirting essence of funnel cake. “He’s meeting with the rest of the commission.”

  I winced and went next door. “We need to look at the floor coverings in the mall,” Dr. Short was saying. “The Altairi may well have been responding to the difference between wood and stone.”

  “And we need to take air samples,” Dr. Jarvis said. “They may have been responding to something poisonous to them in our atmosphere.”

  “Something poisonous?” Reverend Thresher said. “Something blasphemous, you mean! Angels in filthy underwear! The Altairi obviously refused to go any farther into that den of iniquity, and they sat down in protest. Even aliens know sin when they see it.”

  “I don’t agree, Dr. Jarvis,” Dr. Short said, ignoring Reverend Thresher. “Why would the air in the mall have a different composition from the air in a museum or a sports arena? We’re looking for variables here. What about sounds? Could they be a factor?”

  “Yes,” I said. “The Altairi were—”

  “Did you get the surveillance tapes, Miss Yates?” Dr. Morthman cut in. “Go through and cue them up to the point just before the Altairi sat down. I want to see what they were looking at.”

  “It wasn’t what they were looking at,” I said. “It was—”

  “And call the mall and get samples of their floor coverings,” he said. “You were saying, Dr. Short?”

  I left the surveillance tapes and the lists of shoppers on Dr. Morthman’s desk, and then went to the audio lab, found a CD player, and listened to the songs: “Here Comes Santa Claus,” “White Christmas,” “Joy to the World”—

  Here it was. “ ‘While shepherds watched their flocks by night, all seated on the ground, the angel of the Lord came down, and glory shone around.’ ” Could the Altairi have thought the song was talking about the descent of their spaceship? Or were they responding to something else entirely, and the timing was simply coincidental?

  There was only one way to find out. I went back to the main lab, where Dr. Wakamura was sticking lighted candles under the Altairi’s noses. “Good grief, what is that?” I asked, wrinkling my nose.

  “Bayberry magnolia,” he said.

  “It’s awful.”

  “You should smell sandalwood violet,” he said. “They were right next to Candle in the Wind when they sat down. They may have been responding to a scent from the store.”

  “Any response?” I said, thinking their expressions, for once, looked entirely appropriate.

  “No, not even to spruce watermelon, which smelled very alien. Did Dr. Morthman find any clues on the security tapes?” he asked hopefully.

  “He hasn’t looked at them yet,” I said. “When you’re done here, I’ll be glad to escort the Altairi back to their ship.”

  “Would you?” he said gratefully. “I’d really appreciate it. They look exactly like my mother-in-law. Can you take them now?”

  “Yes,” I said, and went over to the Altairi and motioned them to follow me, hoping they wouldn’t veer off and go back to their ship since it was nearly nine o’clock. They didn’t. They followed me down the hall and into the audio lab. “I just want to try something,” I said, and played them “While Shepherds Watched.”

  “ ‘While shepherds watched their flocks,’ ” the choir sang. I watched the Altairi’s unchanging faces. Mr. Ledbetter was wrong, I thought. They must have been responding to something else. They’re not even listening. “ ‘…by night, all seated…’ ”

  The Altairi sat down.

  I’ve got to call Mr. Ledbetter, I thought. I switched off the CD and punched in the number he’d written on my hand. “Hi, this is Calvin Ledbetter,” his recorded voice said. “Sorry I can’t come to the phone right now,” and I remembered too late that he’d said he had a rehearsal. “If you’re calling about a rehearsal, the schedule is as follows: Thursday, Mile-High Women’s Chorus, eight P.M., Montview Methodist; Friday, chancel choir, eleven A.M., Trinity Episcopal; Denver Symphony, three P.M.—” It was obvious he wasn’t home. And that he was far too busy to worry about the Altairi.

  I hung up and looked over at them. They were still sitting down, and it occurred to me that playing them the song might have been a bad idea, since I had no idea what had made them stand back up. It hadn’t been the Muzak because it had been turned off, and if the stimulus had been something in the mall, we could be here all night. After a few minutes, though, they stood up, doing that odd pulled-string thing, and glared at me. “ ‘While shepherds watched their flocks by night,’ ” I said to them, “ ‘all seated on the ground.’ ”

  They continued to stand.

  “ ‘Seated on the ground,’ ” I repeated. “Seated. Sit!” No response at all.

  I played the song again. They sat down right on cue. Which still didn’t prove they were doing what the words told them to do. They could be responding to the mere sound of singing. The mall had been noisy when they first walked in. “While Shepherds Watched” might have been the first song they’d been able to hear, and they’d sit down whenever they heard singing. I waited till they stood up again and then played the two preceding tracks. They didn’t respond to Bing Crosby singing “White Christmas” or to Julie Andrews singing “Joy to the World.” (Or to the breaks between songs.) There wasn’t even any indication they were aware anyone was singing.

  “ ‘While shepherds watched their flocks by-y night…’ ” the choir began. I tried to stay still and keep my face impassive, in case they were responding to nonverbal cues I was giving them. “ ‘…ah-all seated—’ ”

  They sat down at exactly the same place, so it was definitely those particular words. Or the voices singing them. Or the particular configuration of notes. Or the rhythm. Or the frequencies of the notes.

  Whatever it was, I couldn’t figure it out tonight. It was nearly ten o’clock. I needed to get the Altairi back to their spaceship. I waited for them to stand up and then led them, glaring, out to their ship, and went back to my apartment.

  The message light on my answering machine was flashing. It was probably Dr. Morthman, wanting me to go back to the mall and take air samples. I hit play. “Hi, this is Mr. Ledbetter,” the choir director’s voice said. “From the mall, remember? I need to talk to you about something.” He gave me his cell phone number and repeated his home phone, “In case it washed off. I should be home by eleven. Till then, whatever you do, don’t let your alien guys listen to any more Christmas carols.”

  There was no answer at either of the numbers. He turns his cell phone off during rehearsals, I thought. I looked at my watch. It was ten-fifteen. I grabbed the yellow pages, looked up the address of Montview Methodist, and took off for the church, detouring past the Altairi’s ship to make sure it was still there and hadn’t begun sprouting guns from its ports or flashing ominous lights. It hadn’t. It was its usual Sphinx-like self, which reassured me. A little.

  It took me twenty minutes to reach the church. I hope rehearsal isn’t over and I’ve missed him, I thought, but there were lots of cars in the parking lot, and light still shone through the stained-glass windows. The front doors, however, were locked.

  I went around to the side door. It was unlocked, and I could hear singing from somewhere inside. I followed the sound down a darkened hall.

  The song abruptly stopped, in the middle of a word. I waited a minute, listening, and when it didn’t start up again, began trying doors. The first three were locked, but the fourth opened onto the sanctuary. The women’s choir was up at the very front, facing Mr. Ledbetter, whose back was to me. “Top of page ten,” he was saying.

  Thank goodness he’s still here, I thought, slipping in the back.

  “From ‘O hear the angel voices,’ ” he said, nodded to the organist, and raised his baton.

  “Wait, where do we take a breath?” one of the women asked. “After ‘voices’?”

  “No, after ‘divine,’ ” he sa
id, consulting the music in front of him on the music stand, “and then at the bottom of page thirteen.”

  Another woman said, “Can you play the alto line for us? From ‘Fall on your knees’?”

  This was obviously going to take a while, and I couldn’t afford to wait. I started up the aisle toward them, and the entire choir looked up from their music and glared at me.

  Mr. Ledbetter turned around, and his face lit up. He turned to the women again, said, “I’ll be right back,” and sprinted down the aisle to me. “Meg,” he said, reaching me. “Hi. What—?”

  “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I got your message, and—”

  “You’re not interrupting. Really. We were almost done anyway.”

  “What did you mean, don’t play them any more Christmas carols? I didn’t get your message till after I’d played them some of the other songs from the mall—”

  “And what happened?”

  “Nothing, but on your message you said—”

  “Which songs?”

  “ ‘Joy to the World’ and—”

  “All four verses?”

  “No, only two. That’s all that were on the CD. The first one and the one about ‘wonders of his love.’ ”

  “One and four,” he said, staring past me, his lips moving rapidly as if he were running through the lyrics. “Those should be okay—”

  “What do you mean? Why did you leave that message?”

  “Because if the Altairi were responding literally to the words in ‘While Shepherds Watched,’ Christmas carols are full of dangerous—”

  “Dangerous—?”

  “Yes. Look at ‘We Three Kings of Orient Are.’ You didn’t play them that, did you?”

  “No, just ‘Joy to the World’ and ‘White Christmas.’ ”

  “Mr. Ledbetter,” one of the women called from the front of the church. “How long are you going to be?”

  “I’ll be right there,” he said. He turned back to me. “How much of ‘While Shepherds Watched’ did you play them?”

  “Just the part up to ‘all seated on the ground.’ ”

  “Not the other verses?”

  “No. What—?”

  “Mr. Ledbetter,” the same woman said impatiently, “some of us have to leave.”

  “I’ll be right there,” he called to her, and to me, “Give me five minutes,” and sprinted back up the aisle.

  I sat down in a back pew, picked up a hymnal, and tried to find “We Three Kings.” That was easier said than done. The hymns were numbered, but they didn’t seem to be in any particular order. I turned to the back, looking for an index.

  “But we still haven’t gone over ‘Saviour of the Heathen, Come,’ ” a young, pretty redhead said.

  “We’ll go over it Saturday night,” Mr. Ledbetter said.

  The index didn’t tell me where “We Three Kings” was, either. It had rows of numbers—5.6.6.5. and 8.8.7.D.—with a column of strange words below them—Laban, Hursley, Olive’s Brow, Arizona—like some sort of code. Could the Altairi be responding to some sort of cipher embedded in the carol like in The Da Vinci Code? I hoped not.

  “When are we supposed to be there?” the women were asking.

  “Seven,” Mr. Ledbetter said.

  “But that won’t give us enough time to run over ‘Saviour of the Heathen, Come,’ will it?”

  “And what about ‘Santa Claus Is Coming to Town’?” the redhead asked. “We don’t have the second soprano part at all.”

  I abandoned the index and began looking through the hymns. If I couldn’t figure out a simple hymnal, how could I hope to figure out a completely alien race’s communications? If they were trying to communicate. They might have been sitting down to listen to the music, like you’d stop to look at a flower. Or maybe their feet just hurt.

  “What kind of shoes are we supposed to wear?” the choir was asking.

  “Comfortable,” Mr. Ledbetter said. “You’re going to be on your feet a long time.”

  I continued to search through the hymnal. Here was “What Child Is This?” I had to be on the right track. “Bring a Torch, Jeanette, Isabella.” It had to be here somewhere. “On Christmas Night, All People Sing—”

  They were finally gathering up their things and leaving. “See you Saturday,” he said, herding them out the door, all except for the pretty redhead, who buttonholed him at the door to say, “I was wondering if you could stay and go over the second soprano part with me again. It’ll only take a few minutes.”

  “I can’t tonight,” he said. She turned and glared at me, and I knew exactly what that glare meant.

  “Remind me and we’ll run through it Saturday night,” he said, shut the door on her, and sat down next to me. “Sorry, big performance Saturday. Now, about the aliens. Where were we?”

  “ ‘We Three Kings.’ You said the words were dangerous.”

  “Oh, right.” He took the hymnal from me, flipped expertly to the right page, pointed. “Verse four. ‘Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying’—I assume you don’t want the Altairi locking themselves in a stone-cold tomb.”

  “No,” I said fervently. “You said ‘Joy to the World’ was bad, too. What does it have in it?”

  “ ‘Sorrow, sins, thorns infesting the ground.’ ”

  “You think they’re doing whatever the hymns tell them? That they’re treating them like orders to be followed?”

  “I don’t know, but if they are, there are all kinds of things in Christmas carols you don’t want them doing: running around on rooftops, bringing torches, killing babies—”

  “Killing babies?” I said. “What carol is that in?”

  “ ‘The Coventry Carol,’ ” he said, flipping to another page. “The verse about Herod. See?” He pointed to the words. “ ‘Charged he hath this day…all children young to slay.’ ”

  “Oh, my gosh, that carol was one of the ones from the mall. It was on the CD,” I said. “I’m so glad I came to see you.”

  “So am I,” he said, and grinned at me.

  “You asked me how much of ‘While Shepherds Watched’ I’d played them,” I said. “Is there child-slaying in that, too?”

  “No, but verse two has got ‘fear’ and ‘mighty dread’ in it, and ‘seized their troubled minds.’ ”

  “I definitely don’t want the Altairi to do that,” I said, “but now I don’t know what to do. We’ve been trying to establish communications with the Altairi for nine months, and that song was the first thing they’ve ever responded to. If I can’t play them Christmas carols—”

  “I didn’t say that. We just need to make sure the ones you play them don’t have any murder and mayhem in them. You said you had a CD of the music they were playing in the mall?”

  “Yes. That’s what I played them.”

  “Mr. Ledbetter?” a voice said tentatively, and a balding man in a clerical collar leaned in the door. “How much longer will you be? I need to lock up.”

  “Oh, sorry, Reverend McIntyre,” he said, and stood up. “We’ll get out of your way.”

  He ran up the aisle, grabbed his music, and came back. “You’ll be at the aches, right?” he said to Reverend McIntyre.

  The aches? You must have misunderstood what he said, I thought.

  “I’m not sure,” Reverend McIntyre said. “My handle’s pretty rusty.”

  Handle? What were they talking about?

  “Especially the ‘Hallelujah Chorus.’ It’s been years since I last sang it.”

  Oh, Handel, not handle.

  “I’m rehearsing it with Trinity Episcopal’s choir at eleven tomorrow if you want to come and run through it with us.”

  “I just may do that.”

  “Great,” Mr. Ledbetter said. “Good night.” He led me out of the sanctuary. “Where’s your car parked?”

  “Out in front.”

  “Good. Mine, too.” He opened the side door. “You can follow me to my apartment.”

  I had a sudden blinding vision of
Aunt Judith glaring disapprovingly at me and saying, “A nice young lady never goes to a gentleman’s apartment alone.”

  “You did say you brought the music from the mall with you, didn’t you?” he asked.

  Which is what you get for jumping to conclusions, I thought, following him to his apartment and wondering if he was going out with the redheaded second soprano.

  “On the way over I was thinking about all this,” he said when we got to his apartment building, “and I think the first thing we need to do is figure out exactly which element or elements of ‘all seated on the ground’ they’re responding to, the notes—I know you said they’d been exposed to music before, but it could be this particular configuration of notes—or words.”

  I told him about reciting the lyrics to them.

  “Okay, then, the next thing we do is see if it’s the accompaniment,” he said, unlocking the door. “Or the tempo. Or the key.”

  “The key?” I said, looking down at the keys in his hand.

  “Yeah, have you ever seen Jumpin’ Jack Flash?”

  “No.”

  “Great movie. Whoopi Goldberg. In it, the key to the spy’s code is the key. Literally. B flat. ‘While Shepherds Watched’ is in the key of C, but ‘Joy to the World’ is in D. That may be why they didn’t respond to it. Or they may only respond to the sound of certain instruments. What Beethoven did they listen to?”

  “The Ninth Symphony.”

  He frowned. “Then that’s unlikely, but there might be a guitar or a marimba or something in the ‘While Shepherds Watched’ accompaniment. We’ll see. Come on in,” he said, opening the door and immediately vanishing into the bedroom. “There’s soda in the fridge,” he called back out to me. “Go ahead and sit down.”

  That was easier said than done. The couch, chair, and coffee table were all covered with CDs, music, and clothes. “Sorry,” he said, coming back in with a laptop. He set it down on top of a stack of books and moved a pile of laundry from the chair so I could sit down. “December’s a bad month. And this year, in addition to my usual five thousand concerts and church services and cantata performances, I’m directing aches.”

  Then I hadn’t misheard him before. “Aches?” I said.