The Happy Hour Choir Read Online Free PDF

she does.”
    I blushed and studied the hole in the carpet to the side of the desk leg.
    â€œI don’t doubt her talent. There are . . . other considerations.”
    Ginger didn’t get mad often. Even worse, she didn’t scream and cuss like normal people even when she did. No, she got dangerously calm. “Beulah, you go on out there and turn on the lights. Warm up a little. We’ll be out in a minute.”
    I jumped up and leaped out the door. To this day, I have no idea what Ginger told Luke to make him change his mind. All I know is he wasn’t so interested in the Equal Opportunity Act when the two of them came into the sanctuary to hear me play.
    She stood beside him, gripping his arm a little too hard. “Pick a number, Reverend.”
    â€œThis really isn’t necessary at this point,” he said, shaking his head as though still puzzling out how she’d talked him into it.
    â€œBeulah, play two-forty-five. Play it straight.”
    I opened a familiar and worn brown hymnal to “Whispering Hope.” Not one of these songs was difficult because Ginger taught me to play them when I was only a girl; playing it without embellishment was going to be the hard part. Technically, I put each note in the right place at the right time, but there wasn’t a lot of heart and not even a whisper of hope.
    â€œYou taught her how to play using the Cokesbury Hymnal, didn’t you?” He marveled. Now he knew how an infidel like me had known about a golden oldie like “Dwelling in Beulah Land.”
    â€œBut that’s not all,” she said to him before turning back to me. “How about some Bach?”
    I launched into the opening of the Toccata and Fugue in D Minor. The solemn, menacing notes rang hollow in the little sanctuary, but my eyes cut to the organ to my right. That could liven things up, and I’d always wanted to learn to play the organ.
    â€œBeulah, one-twenty-seven.” A flush of revelation ran cold then hot on my cheeks: Ginger Belmont had been grooming me for this moment from the day we met.
    I shook off the epiphany and played another hymn with the same cold precision I had used to play the classics.
    â€œJazz ’er up,” she commanded.
    My shoulders relaxed, and I leaned toward the piano as our trip to “Higher Ground” took on a winding Dixieland route.
    â€œThat’s lovely,” Luke said calmly. “Now, could you please play number eighty-nine from the blue hymnal?”
    The blue hymnal? The last time I’d been at church, those bad boys had done nothing more than gather dust.
    Luke cleared his throat. “There’s a stack on top of the piano.”
    I took one of the books in question, sucking in a deep breath. I could sight-read music—no problem there—but just the thought of something unexpected gave me another chill. I flipped to Luke’s request and scanned the hymn, reading all the way to the bottom. Beethoven?
    My fingers started slowly, fumbling only once before I recognized the melody as having come from Beethoven’s Ninth. By the second verse I was confident enough to add my own syncopation and ornamentation.
    â€œThat’s enough.” Luke’s firm voice echoed through the sanctuary. “I would prefer you play all songs exactly as written.”
    â€œPlay it straight, Beulah.” Ginger spoke so softly, I almost didn’t hear her. Still, I sat up tall and played as though the Mormon Tabernacle Choir planned to join in at any minute.
    â€œThank you,” Luke said with something that sounded oddly like victory. “I’ll get you the bulletin for this Sunday, but I’m afraid you can’t jazz it up. You may be talented, but that’s not why you’re here. I don’t want people to get confused and lose their place while they’re trying to sing.”
    I slumped the minute he disappeared. No jazz? I could think of no worse punishment than