A Pearl of Great Price
By Wain
December 23, 1979
"Well, I’ll be damned." Hugh Fitzcairn
gave the newspaper a shake and folded it into quarters before pushing it across
the table. "Look at this, Mac."
Duncan MacLeod put down his coffee and inspected
the obituary Fitzcairn pointed out to him. "Charles Davenport, junior,
industrialist and one of the richest men in America . . . " he mumbled,
" . . . survived by a sister and his mother . . . services in scheduled
for early next week."
"Do you remember the Davenports?"
Fitzcairn asked.
"Steel, oil, railroads. New York, nineteen
twenty something, " MacLeod said between sips of coffee.
Fitzcairn waved for the waitress and fumbled for
his coat.
"Where are you going, Fitz?" MacLeod
asked.
"Shopping."
December 23, 1922
MacLeod and Fitzcairn stood at the open doorway of
the magnificent Upper East Side home. MacLeod nodded and headed toward the bar.
Fitzcairn decided to take care of more pressing matters first, the most
pressing matter of all being the two beautiful women standing next to a bowl of
steaming punch.
"Wassail," Fitzcairn supplied.
"It’s called wassail, ladies."
The shorter of the two women picked up a ladle and
poked at the pair of clove-studded oranges that floated in the hot punch, which
bobbed and spun, releasing a spicy fragrance into the air.
The woman stood armed for battle—ladle in hand,
warm smile on her face, a fierce desire in her eyes, and Fitzcairn knew that
the war was lost in that very moment; she had vanquished his heart. He gave a
long and appreciative look at her, his eyes stopping at the level of her own
heart, and muttered a silent damnation at the hideous fashion dictates of the
day. Were it not for flapper dresses and chests bound to look like a boy, she
would be bobbing in as enticing way as the oranges in the punch. Fitzcairn
conjured his most charming and seductive smile and extended an empty crystal
punch cup. The two women’s giggles were nearly drowned in the music from the
five-piece band.
"I don’t suppose you’d know how to make
it?" the shorter woman asked.
Fitzcairn hooked his left thumb in his vest pocket
and leaned forward with a twinkle in his eye. "First, you must catch a
pair of wassails."
He poked one of the floating oranges. Both women
exploded in laughter.
"Round up a hundred of them, pen them, and
then open the gate. The last two out are the sleekest, fattest, most flavorful
ones. Twist off their heads and tails and pop them into the punchbowl with . .
. " Here he paused and sniffed with a clinical, bemused look on his face .
. . "a fifth of the finest apple brandy your hostess has been able to
procure despite the dreary strictures imposed by Prohibition."
All three collapsed into fits of laughter, drawing
the attention of MacLeod, who crossed the room with a teacup of whisky. He
stood between the two women and gave each a kiss on the cheek. Then he placed
his arm loosely on the waist of the taller woman. Fitzcairn gave a little sigh
of relief.
"Ladies, may I present my friend Hugh
Fitzcairn?" MacLeod said. "Miss Daphne Throckmorton." He
indicated the blonde woman at his side. Fitzcairn murmured greetings over her
outstretched hand and then turned anxiously to her companion.
MacLeod barely suppressed a smile. "And Mrs.
Charles Davenport," he said, happily emphasizing her marital status.
Mrs. Davenport put down the ladle and extended her
hand. Fitzcairn bowed deeply to bring his lips to her fingers. "I am
eternally at your mercy, Mrs. Davenport," he said. "Would you care to
dance?" MacLeod’s mouth fell open.
"Call me Pearl. I’d love to." She smiled
at Daphne and started toward the dance floor. Fitzcairn took his eyes from the
hypnotic shimmy of the fringe stretched across her dress long enough to watch
MacLeod’s crestfallen face.
"I am in your debt, laddie," he said.
"Fitz, she’s married."
Fitzcairn waited, eyebrows raised expectantly, to
see if his frieind would explain what the lady’s marital status had to do with
anything, and concluded that MacLeod’s exasperated roll of the eyes was a wish
for good luck in his pursuit of Mrs. Davenport’s affections.
He danced with Pearl through several lively
numbers, both skilled enough—and daring enough with their high kicks—to have
cleared a small space in the center of a crowd of appreciative onlookers.
"And how was it again that you removed the
heads from wassails?" Pearl asked at the start of a slower dance.
"As cruel as it sounds, it’s best to nibble
them off," he said, closing in on her neck for as close a demonstration as
he dared in public. "The slower, the better."
She shivered. "What exquisite torture! And
the wassail tails?"
"That, dear lady, is best reserved for a more
private venue."
Pearl excused herself after the dance was over to
find Daphne, and Fitzcairn strolled over to the punchbowl, where he found
MacLeod. They followed Pearl and Daphne’s exit from the room with admiring
gazes.
"Why do women always say they’re going to
powder their noses?" MacLeod asked.
"I suspect it’s because they don’t want to
admit they’re talking about us." Fitzcairn peered into MacLeod’s teacup.
"It’s a damned good thing William Wallace is already gone; seeing whisky
served like that would have struck him dead in his tracks."
MacLeod swirled the liquid in the teacup. "I
imagine that our hostess think it looks less illegal this way."
Fitzcairn bounced on the balls of his feet and
searched every corner of the room with his eyes. "Have you by any chance
seen Mr. Davenport?"
MacLeod gave him a smug, unreadable smile and,
despite repeated prompting, refused to answer until fine beads of perspiration
broke out on Fitzcairn’s forehead.
"He’s out of town for the week," MacLeod
said finally.
Fitzcairn beamed. "Really? The man must be a
very great fool indeed to leave such a beautiful creature as Pearl unattended
and lonely during the holidays."
"It’s a business trip, and Daphne says that
the beautiful Mrs. Davenport insisted that he go. She has very expensive
tastes, Fitz."
The musicians began to play a Christmas carol.
Fitzcairn hummed along, stopping only long enough to say to MacLeod, "What
say you offer them a ride home, Mac, and maybe I can arrange for old Fitzie
Claus to pop down Pearl’s chimney tomorrow night and give her a special
gift?"
"You’re a worry, Fitz."
Fitz turned a winning smile on his friend and
sang, "Let nothing you dismay . . . "
"You’re incorrigible, Fitz."
"That’s part of my charm, laddie,"
Fitzcairn said.
"She’s got very expensive taste, and you’re
broke," Duncan reminded him.
"The true spirit of Christmas isn’t measure
in material gifts."
MacLeod snorted. "She likes jewelry,
Fitzcairn, Big, gaudy jewelry."
Daphne and Pearl returned to the room and crossed
the dance floor. The jet beads that looped Pearl’s neck and draped nearly to
her hips bounced rhythmically as she walked.
Fitzcairn sighed, "Come on, Mac. Have a heart
and offer them a ride. You can’t tell me you haven’t considered if God wouldn’t
rest ye merry, too, if you let Daphne unwrap a present or two under your tree?"
December 23, 1979
There was only a half an hour left until the mall
closed, and Fitz was lost in a sea of desperate, rushing last-minute shoppers.
He passed a greeting card shop with its window done up for Valentine’s Day and
made his way to a jewelry store. He looked from case to case to case before
leaving the shop without making a purchase.
Santa was looking none too jolly; nor were the
frustrated parents of tired children who still queued up at an hour that must
have been past their bedtime.
Fitzcairn stopped in front of display of the North
Pole and directed a question to a flocked, animated reindeer. "It was so
much easier before all of this crass commercialism, don’t you think,
bucko?"
December 23, 1922
Fitzcairn had long since decided that his good
friend Duncan MacLeod was soft on new-fangled contraptions and ideas, and the
1921 Packard was no exception. Still, as new-fangled contraptions went, the car
was a fairly inoffensive one, and the benefits reaped on that single ride with
Pearl Davenport more than made up for the noise and gasoline fumes.
The back seat was cozy, with a wide seat and
lovely glass vases hanging above the windows. MacLeod or perhaps Daphne had
taken the trouble of filling them with holly and mistletoe. Fitzcairn snagged a
sprig of mistletoe and dangled it over Pearl time and time again, to the
grudging amusement of MacLeod and Daphne, who occupied the front seat.
Pearl wondered out loud why she and Fitzcairn had
never met before. He buried his answer in a roundabout story of travels in
Great Britain and the Continent. The plain fact of the matter was that he
hadn’t a snowball’s chance of being invited into Pearl’s social circles without
MacLeod’s introduction. But he had a borrowed tuxedo, several lifetimes worth
of clever stories, and centuries of experience with the fairer sex, and that
was all he needed with Mrs. Davenport, whom he was tickling and calling
"Pearl-my-girl" within ten minutes’ time.
The back seat of the Packard was a smashingly
successful place to arrange an illicit assignation. It was so successful that
before the night was through, Hugh Fitzcairn had decided that as soon as he was
solvent again—a situation that will likely entail smug tutelage from that
blasted Scothe thought—he was going to buy himself his very own new-fangled
horseless carriage.
December 23, 1979
Fitzcairn made his fifth and final empty-handed
loop around the mall, then protested out loud and cursed under his breath when
the security guard shepherded him outside and locked the door.
"If my friend Mr. Dickens had met you, you
unfeeling clod," Fitzcairn threatened through the mall door, "you’d
have had the chance to appear in a novel, but I doubt you’d would have had such
a happy ending as old Ebeneezer did!"
Fitzcairn had liked Christmas a great deal more
before malls and catalogues. A song, a poem, a lovely feat of derring-do had
all been enough of a gift in other times. He shoved his hands in his pockets
and headed for the only store that was still open—a corner gas station and
minimart.
December 26, 1929
MacLeod cracked open the hotel room door and
demanded,"Where have you been sleeping for the last two nights?"
"On the davenport." Fitzcairn winked.
"What happened to your shirt?" MacLeod
asked.
Fitzcairn rubbed at the bloody stains on his cuff
and collar. "Let me in, and I’ll tell you."
MacLeod swung open the door and gestured toward
the couch of his hotel room.
Fitzcairn sat with a sigh."There’s a good
lad."
"One of us?" MacLeod asked.
"Worse," Fitzcairn said. "I met Mr.
Charles Davenport rather unexpectedly, and he gave a whole new meaning to
‘Boxing Day’. It seems he concluded his business a day earlier than we
anticipated."
MacLeod winced and clapped Fitzcairn on the knee.
"For a minute, I was afraid you were going to tell me that Pearl didn’t
like your Christmas present."
Fitzcairn smiled. "She adored my
present."
"Daphne said that Pearl likes jewels, and
you’re so broke right now that the only ones you’ve got are the family
jewels."
Fitzcairn drew himself up with dignity. "I
wrapped them up in a silk ribbon. Presentation is all, MacLeod."
"Please stop, Fitz."
"But first, MacLeod, I visited every candy
and pastry shop in New York until I found what I needed. I made up a small
plate of Venus’s Nipples and Lady’s Navels, and I demonstrated how to eat
them."
MacLeod rubbed his hand over his forehead and
pleaded in a weak voice, "Do stop now, Fitz."
"I found a curiosity called a ‘Whoopie Pie’
with which I, quite naturally, dear boy, supplied a demonstration. Then,"
Fitzcairn added triumphantly, "we shared some Turkish Delight."
MacLeod winced as if he were in pain. Fitzcairn
smiled, eyes half closed.
He sat up abruptly then, and his eyes popped open.
"And then . . . well, then Mr. Davenport returned home early."
"Why don’t you get changed?" MacLeod
suggested. "I’ll drive you to the train station."
Fitzcairn rubbed his cheekbone. "Well,
laddie, the thing is that I’ve decided to stay in New York for a while.
Davenport’s off to Texas tomorrow, and I can’t have my girl Pearl all alone for
the New Year or her birthday, now can I?"
December 23, 1979
A fluorescent tube near the cash register buzzed
and flickered, lending a disorienting feel to the greenish light in the
minimart. Fitzcairn was the lone customer at this late hour, but he knew that
he needed a present for tomorrow, Christmas Eve. After having spent nearly
forty-five minutes trawling the aisles in the hopes that inspiration would
strike him, he was beginning to get nervous looks from the cashier.
He had given up and was on his way out when
inspiration finally struck. He made his purchase, wished the tired and
slack-jawed cashier a merry Christmas, and headed out into the cold.
Fitzcairn tossed and turned throughout the night,
dreaming of his on-again, off-again relationship with his girl Pearl. He had
kept the loneliness away from her—and she from him, when he dare to admit it to
himself—for the better part of three years, until the day that her first child
was born and filled her days and nights.
Shortly after nine o’clock on Christmas Eve
morning, Fitzcairn rolled out of bed and headed for the shower. He sighed even
now, so many years later. Pearl had been better off with Davenport after all;
he had given her the life and the children that she wanted but Fitzcairn
couldn’t provide. But he could still do this one thing for her, and he couldn’t
bear to see her lonely.
He snatched up Pearl’s Christmas present and
headed for the nursing home he had seen listed in her son’s obituary. Directed
by the staff, Fitzcairn walked to the end of a long corridor to her room.
Inside the room was a silver-haired woman with
Pearl Davenport’s unmistakable eyes; she was surrounded by a man and woman in
their thirties, and a uniformed nurse holding a plastic bag of medications and
a checklist.
"Charles, darling, come and sign this,"
Pearl called, and the young man bent over the nurses’ clipboard and scribbled
something.
Pearl looked up again, squinted, and squealed,
"Fitzie? Do come in!" She held our her hands in greeting, and the
nurse took the opportunity to slip a blood pressure cuff over one of Pearl’s
arms.
Fitzcairn waved his package. The young man crossed
the room and extended his hand. "Robert Davenport," he said and then
gestured to the woman next to the nurse, "and my wife, Linda."
"Hugh Fitzcairn." He shook hands with
Robert."She called you Charles."
Robert lowered his voice, "Well, Grandmama is
reliving her youth again. She thinks I’m my grandfather."
Fitzcairn inclined his head slightly. "My
condolences on the death of your father."
Pearl helped push off the blood pressure cuff and
gestured for Fitzcairn to join her. He bent down close to her and whispered,
"It’s good to see you, Pearl-my-girl."
Pearl giggled and eyed the wrapped package.
Fitzcairn presented it to her with a flourish, and she tore open the paper. She
smiled and read the label.
"Hershey’s kisses," she said, dropping
her voice. "Do they come with a demonstration, Fitzie?"
"Of course they do." Fitzcairn winked,
then bent to kiss the fragile, papery skin of her cheeks.
Robert stepped forward, a small suitcase in his
hand. His wife, Linda, was already out the door, and the nurse had moved behind
Pearl’s wheelchair and was unlocking the brakes.
Robert said, "I’m sorry to intrude, but we
have to go now if we’re going to beat traffic across the bridge. Do join us for
Christmas Eve dinner tonight, Hugh."
"I couldn’t possibly intrude," Fitzcairn
protested.
Pearl snatched his shirt, dragged him to her ear,
and whispered, "Especially not if Charles is going to be there. We don’t
want a repeat of Boxing Day."
"I’ll stop by for New Year’s and then the
next week for your birthday," Fitzcairn promised.
Pearl looked at him, serious for a moment, "You
know, you should come on your birthday, too. It’s not good to be alone,
Fitz." The seriousness disappeared as Pearl was wheeled out of her room.
"Do give Daphne and Duncan a call for
me," Pearl said.
Fitzcairn followed Pearl and her family nearly to
the exit, stopping at a pay phone and waving goodbye with the receiver. He
dropped in a dime and made arrangements to spend the evening with MacLeod.
When Fitzcairn left the nursing home, Pearl and
her family were driving out of the parking lot. He pulled his pipe from a
pocket and lit it, singing to himself as he went, "Tidings of comfort and
joy, comfort and joy. Oh, tidings of comfort and joy."