"Miz Gram, you done been learning me to play the harmonica for three months now."

"Not learn boy, I am teaching you to play and you are learning. Don't they teach grammar in school any more?" the old woman was all smiles as she sat by the old pot bellied stove and warmed her aching bones. "Seems that with age every cold snap makes my old bones ache more and more. Surely do wish I could move to some place where it is warm in the winter." The old woman pull the bottle of wine out of the old brown worn and patched wool coat sweater she wore, took a drag, wiped her mouth and put it back in the pocket.

"Momma says you must be one good teacher, to teach a punkin head like me to play the harmonica." The boy was all grins, for since it was winter and there would be no more fishing till springtime, he had to find something to occupy his time. "Pa says maybe I can play at church one Sunday afore long."

"Really?" The old woman felt good, for the boy did have a natural talent just like her dead son did." And she was glad she had gone ahead, given the boy the harmonica and was teaching him to play. It took her back over many long forgotten memories of raising her kids. Yes that really did bring back fond memories for with eleven kids, many a night they sat around the old stove and played music. It seemed that each one of her children had an ear for music.

"How bout this one Miz Gram," as the boy started to play the theme song from Doctor Zhivago, Lara's theme.

"I swear boy, you are something else, shucks I remember reading that book and it was a good one, but that music is something special to me." The old lady took her own harmonica and began to play along with the boy, and to anyone walking down the muddy road out sided her house, you could hear some sweet harmonica harmony escaping the walls of the old frame shack in which she lived.

After they were done, the old lady made the boy a cup of cocoa and gave him a chocolate-oatmeal-applesauce cookie she had just made that morning. "Sure do like these cookies Miz Gram, you are one swell cook, but could I save this one and instead of eating it, take it to Grandpa Elmer for he is feeling poorly?"

"Sure son, you do that, for that would be a nice thing to do and I am sure Grandpa Elmer would enjoy that cookie, specially if he dunked it in his coffee." The boy's thoughts and actions were just too good to be true, Oh to be young naïve and see the world through those rose colored glasses. "But boy we got to get serious now, cause if you are going to play at the church house we had better get you to learning some of the old standard songs."

"Sure Miz Gram, sure, how about the Old Rugged Cross?" And with that he started in and played it to as near perfection as one could ever hope for.

"Well what about . . . .?" and before the old lady could finish the sentence the boy spoke.

"How about In The Sweet By and By," and he started off. The old lady smiled for it was a good thing she had gotten out an old church hymnal and refreshed her memory on the old standards for the boy's repertoire was growing every day.

Sunday afternoon just after dinner time, the old lady was trying to figure out how she could get some more insulation for the house cause she did seem to get cold might easy these days, when the boy knocked on the back door. She could tell it was the boy for he had a special knock. But heck doesn't everyone have a special knock, if you stop and think of it and do a little thinking? "Come in boy, come on in," She yelled as she cut open the great big cardboard box she had found out behind the motorcycle shop this morning.

"Miz Gram, Miz Gram, guess what, guess what?" The boy's eyes were all bugged out and there was a smile on his face from ear to ear.

"Tell me boy, tell me, what!" The old lady knew cause it was the time the boy got home from church on Sunday.

"Reverend Pickles asked Ma and Pa if I could play two songs next Sunday at the special service."

"And are you?"

"Yessum, I am, if you come to church to hear me," the boy said without any hesitation. "I said I would if Miz Gram would come, cause she learned, I mean has taught me."

The old lady's face dropped and a sad look came over her face. "Can't go boy, can't go, haven't been to church or worshiped the lord since he took my twins twenty-five years ago."

The boy's face too, did drop and the corners of his mouth which had been pointed nearly straight up in a smile were now pointing down. "But you have to Miz Gram, cause you wanted me to play, and I want to play, you just have to."

Tears came to the old lady's eyes as she remembered the Sundays of her life, she and her family had spent in that old church, praising the lord and a singing loud. Then she remembered the death of her twins Caleb and Sarah on a church picnic, when the Reverend Armburger had gone off to the bushes with Miss Sappersly and the twins had fallen in the lake and drowned. And she did blame the lord for taking or allowing that stupid man to take her twins. "Don't rightly see how I can boy, but we had better get to practicing for I want you at your best."

"But I don't want to play unless I can play for you Miz Gram, no siree bob, I don't. After about a half hour discussion the old lady said she would come and stand outside, and the boy said he would play and practice all week. The boy was not done yet, but he knew in his heart he could get the old lady to come.

Every day after school the boy raced to the old lady's house and they practiced till five thirty, and each day, the boy would tell the old lady, "If you come and are sitting there, I know I can play better, cause I will be a watching you and your eyes and if I start to go wrong, your eyes will tell me and I will hear your voice say, boy, just a little slower, or boy, hold those notes a little longer."

And each day the old lady would reply, "boy, this is your time to show off and to perform, that church don't need nobody , no sinner like me in there." But Friday morning the old lady dug into a trunk in the corner of her storeroom and took out a dress, her church meeting dress she used to wear. She tried it on, then did a little altering and then she found her big black hat, and her old high-heeled shoes and a pair of hose. "Maybe, well maybe, but I had better at least look decent for the boy. Saturday the boy was over and she made him practice with a blindfold on and the radio playing that clank, clank music so the disturbances would not take away from his concentration.

Just before the boy left he handed an envelope, "My ma said to give you this," as he hugged the old lady and scampered off home. The old lady opened the envelope and inside was a single sheet of notebook paper written on in ink. It said, "Mrs. Gram, my husband and I do appreciate all you have done for Joe. Since you became his friend and music teacher his grades in school have improved and his behavior has become exceptional for a boy his age. My husband and I will pick you up at ten to ten tomorrow, then after church we would be honored if you would eat Sunday dinner with us. Signed, Mrs. Licksum."

The old lady smiled for it had been a long time since she had been invited anywhere or even talked to for that matter. She took two long slugs from her wine bottle and then put the kettle on cause she needed a good bath. She didn't sleep to well, thinking, but she smiled every time she thought of the boy playing, playing just like her dead son.

Joe's dad knocked on the door and escorted the old lady to the family car, heck it was only a half-mile to church, but it was a cold Sunday morning. He let the family out in front of the church then parked around back. The old lady had not met the boy's mother, but she did seem nice in her own way, not one of those village busy bodies.

The boy took the old lady's arm and his mom and dad led them to a pew on the right side of the old clapboard church about half way down, the boy and the old lady went to the side as far as they could go. "It is alright Miz Gram," the boy spoke quietly as he could feel the old lady's pulse rapidly beating.

"My husband likes to sit on the aisle, but you and Joe sit there if you like," the boy's mom whispered, as everyone looked at the old lady, the old smoking wino, who none except the older folk had ever seen in church.

When the congregation broken into the first hymn, the old lady began to relax, and slowly a broad smile came to her face as she felt her little friend next to her.

Finally the reverend Pickles announced a special entertainment in honor of the this day would be two harmonica solos by Joseph Licksum, and the little boy squeezed the old lady's hand, smiled at his ma and pa and walked up front and after he had all the attention began to play.

The old lady heard the notes and began to relax as the boy began to play the Old Rugged Cross. She closed her eyes and just seemed to float, she had this feeling of relaxation and a lightness that she had never felt before; as if a burden had been lifted from her always-burdened shoulders.

After the first song, the boy started the second one, Nearer My God to Thee and as he was about half way through the song, a whitish vapor seemed to come through the little stained glass window behind the pulpit.

As the vapor slowly appeared and formed the sound of the harmonica seemed to be joined by a hundred muted and smooth playing trumpets, and fifty harps as this strange aura seemed to exude throughout the congregation. The whitish vapor seemed to drift over the old lady, Miz Gram and then the strangest and the most eerie thing happened. Two winged seraphs appeared, in their grand robes of white and their white wings giving a gold glint as they seemed to reach down for the old lady. As they did she appeared to be holding a sparkling gold harmonica, which she began to play. And as she began to play the seraphs guided her up and then over the boy who was playing below. Momentarily you could hear them in a duet of perfect harmony.

As the last few notes of the song were reached, the old lady and the two winged seraphs seemed to float through the small stained glass window. The little boy appeared to sense something special and spectacular was happening so he raised one hand and every person in the congregation, young and old, male and female, sick and hardy, began to lightly hum along with the boy and his hidden accompanists played the complete song over. When he finished, the birds outside began to sing and everyone in the church turned and hugged the person next to them.

Everyone that is except for the old lady; her body did not move, but sat still with an angelic smile on her face. She had been brought back into the fold and that mysterious vapor and the two winged seraphs were escorts to take the old lady to meet Saint Peter and in a very short time she was playing a harmonica duet with her lost son and then twins. The old lady was at peace with her family and although a lot of people looked down on her, Saint Peter realized the good in her heart and her love for her fellow man.