Walter Briggs, the old piano tuner in the bow tie, set his tool bag down beside my mothers 1923 Steinway, wished her a happy Mothers Day, and then turned to Stephanie and said, You came into my shop in March, with a photograph of this piano. You asked me what it would sell for.
Stephanie had taken my mothers three thousand five hundred dollar piano repair fund, the money to fix three dead keys on the Steinway that belonged to Mamas own mother. She said it was for her daughters cheerleading camp. But that was not the whole of it.
Stephanie had been planning to sell the piano out from under my mother. She had taken a photograph of it to Walters shop to find out what a 1923 Steinway upright would bring, while telling Mama she was only borrowing a little money for a few weeks.
She said Mama is eighty-two, her hands shake, she can barely play anymore, so why put money into a piano nobody listens to. Mama played that church for sixty-one years. I listen to her every day of my life.
Walter had tuned pianos in Savannah for fifty years. He remembered Stephanie and her photograph and her question about resale, and when I called him, he knew exactly what had been going on. He came to Mothers Day brunch to say it out loud.
Faced with the tuner who heard her ask what it would sell for, Stephanie gave the money back, and gave up any notion of selling Mamas mothers piano.
Walter stayed that afternoon and restored all three dead keys right there, and tuned the whole instrument, and would only take his normal fee. Then he asked Mama to play.
She sat down at the Steinway her mother left her, and with hands that do shake, just a little, she played the hymn she has played at First Methodist for sixty-one years. The whole room went quiet. Nobody listens to that piano, Stephanie said. We all listened. We will be listening for as long as Mama can reach the keys.