An Elm Creek Quilts Sampler (30 page)

Or the first sight of each other might rekindle all of those smoldering resentments until any hope of reconciliation burned to ashes.

Sarah wished she could figure out what to do. If only she had more time.

By the middle of the next week, Sarah had finished the Hands All Around block and another block, the Ohio Star. Then she had only one block left to piece.

The next day, Mrs. Compson held the book open to the page so that Sarah could see the picture. “Here it is,” the older woman said. “It’s not the most difficult block, but it’s a good one for using up scraps, so I saved it for last.”

Sarah carried the book to the table and studied the diagram. The block resembled the Log Cabin pattern, but instead of only one center square, there were seven arranged in a diagonal row across the block. The strips of fabric on one side of the row were dark, and the strips on the other side were light. She looked to the title for the block’s name. “Chimneys and Cornerstones,” she read aloud, and smiled. “It’s a Log Cabin variation, and its name also alludes to houses. That’s appropriate, don’t you think?”

Mrs. Compson was fingering her glasses and staring into space.

“Mrs. Compson?”

“Hmm? Oh, yes, the name is quite fitting.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong. I just remembered something I hadn’t thought about in a long time.” Mrs. Compson sighed and eased herself onto the sofa. “My great-aunt made a Chimneys and Cornerstones quilt for my cousin when she left Elm Creek Manor as a young bride. She and her husband were moving to California, and we didn’t know when—or if—we would see them again. It wasn’t like today, when you can hop on a plane any time you like.”

I was a very young child then. This happened before my mother passed away, before Richard was born, even before my first quilt lesson.

I admired my cousin Elizabeth very much. She was the eldest of the cousins, and I wanted to be just like her when I grew up. How confused and sad I was when she told me that she would be going away. I didn’t understand why anyone would want to live anywhere but Elm Creek Manor.

“Why do you want to go away when home is right here?” I asked her.

“You’ll understand someday, little Sylvia,” she told me. She smiled and hugged me, but there were tears in her eyes. “Someday you’ll fall in love, and you’ll know that home is wherever he is.”

That didn’t make any sense to me. I pictured Elm Creek Manor sprouting wings and flying along after my cousin and her husband, settling back down to earth wherever they stopped. “Home is here,” I insisted. “It will always be here.”

She laughed then and hugged me harder. “Yes, Sylvia, you’re right.”

I was happy to see her laugh and thought that meant she wouldn’t be leaving. But the wedding preparations continued, and I knew my dear cousin was going away.

Claudia helped the grown-ups as best she could, but I resented anyone who did anything to hasten my cousin’s departure. I hid my aunt’s scissors so that she couldn’t work on the wedding gown; I took the keys to Elizabeth’s trunk and flung them into Elm Creek so that she couldn’t pack her things. I earned myself a spanking when I told her fiancé that I hated him and that he should go away.

“If you aren’t going to help, then just keep out of the way and stay out of trouble,” my father warned me.

I pouted and sulked, but no one paid me any attention. Eventually I pouted and sulked my way into the west parlor, where my great-aunt sat quilting. She was my grandfather’s sister, the daughter of Hans and Anneke, and the oldest member of the family.

I stood in the doorway watching as she worked, my lower lip thrust out, my eyes full of angry tears.

My great-aunt looked up and hid a smile. “So, there’s the little troublemaker herself.”

I looked at the floor and said nothing.

“Come here, Sylvia.”

In those days, when a grown-up called you, you went. She pulled me up onto her lap and spread the quilt over us. We sat there, not speaking, as she sewed. I watched as she took a long strip of fabric and sewed it to the edge of the quilt. The softness of her lap and the way she hummed as she worked comforted me.

Finally my curiosity got the better of me. “What are you doing?” I asked.

“I’m sewing the binding onto your cousin’s quilt. See here? This long strip of fabric will cover the raw edges so the batting doesn’t fall out.”

Raw edges?
I thought. I didn’t know quilts had to be cooked. Not wanting to reveal my ignorance, I asked a different question. “Is this her wedding quilt?”

“No. This is an extra quilt, one to remember her old great-aunt by. A young wife can never have too many quilts, even in California.” She pushed her needle into her pincushion for safekeeping, then spread the quilt wide so that I could see the pattern.

“Pretty,” I said, tracing the strips with my finger.

“It’s called Chimneys and Cornerstones,” she told me. “Whenever she looks at it, she’ll remember our home and all the people in it. We Bergstroms have been blessed to have a home filled with love, filled with love from the chimneys to the cornerstone. This quilt will help her take a little of that love with her.”

I nodded to show her I understood.

“Each of these red squares is a fire burning in the fireplace to warm her after a weary journey home.”

I took in all the red squares on the quilt. “There’s too many. We don’t have so many fireplaces.”

She laughed. “I know. It’s just a fancy. Elizabeth will understand.”

I nodded. Elizabeth was older than I and understood a great many things.

“There’s more to the story. Do you see how one half of the block is dark fabric, and the other is light? The dark half represents the sorrows in a life, and the light colors represent the joys.”

I thought about that. “Then why don’t you give her a quilt with all light fabric?”

“Well, I could, but then she wouldn’t be able to see the pattern. The design only appears if you have both dark and light fabric.”

“But I don’t want Elizabeth to have any sorrows.”

“I don’t either, love, but sorrows come to us all. But don’t worry. Remember these?” She touched several red squares in a row and smiled. “As long as these home fires keep burning, Elizabeth will always have more joys than sorrows.”

I studied the pattern. “The red squares are keeping the sorrow part away from the light part.”

“That’s exactly right,” my great-aunt exclaimed. “What a bright little girl you are.”

Pleased, I snuggled up to her. “I still don’t like the sorrow part.”

“None of us do. Let’s hope that Elizabeth finds all the joy she deserves, and only enough sorrow to nurture an empathetic heart.”

“What’s emp—empa—”

“Empathetic. You’ll understand when you’re older.”

“When I’m old like Claudia?”

She laughed and hugged me. “Yes. Perhaps as soon as that.”

Mrs. Compson fell silent, and her gaze traveled around the room. “That’s how I feel about Elm Creek Manor,” she said. “I love every inch of it, from the chimneys to the cornerstone. I always have. How could I have stayed away so long? Why did I let my pride keep me away from everyone and everything I loved? When I think of how much time I’ve wasted, it breaks my heart.”

Sarah took Mrs. Compson’s hand. “Don’t give up hope.”

“Hope? Hmph. If I had any hope left, it died with Claudia.”

“Don’t say that. You know that isn’t true. If you had no hope, you wouldn’t have asked me to find a way to bring Elm Creek Manor back to life.”

“I think I know when I’m feeling hopeful and when I’m not, young lady.” But the pain in her eyes eased.

Sarah squeezed her hand. “I’m glad this block is in my quilt.”

“I’m glad, too.”

By the end of the week Sarah finished the Chimneys and Cornerstones block, and then all twelve blocks were finished.

On Monday Sarah prepared the blocks for assembly into the quilt top.

“Don’t slide the iron around like that. Just press,” Mrs. Compson cautioned as Sarah ironed the seams flat. “If you distort the blocks they won’t fit together.”

As Sarah handed her the neatly pressed blocks, Mrs. Compson measured them with a clear acrylic ruler exactly twelve and a half inches square. Each of Sarah’s twelve blocks was within a sixteenth of an inch of the intended size.

“Fine accuracy, especially considering this is your first quilt,” Mrs. Compson praised her. “You’ll be a master quilter yet.”

Sarah smiled. “I have a good teacher.”

“You flatterer,” Mrs. Compson scoffed. But she smiled, too.

To Sarah’s surprise, Mrs. Compson announced that their next step was to clean the ballroom floor. “Or at least part of it,” she added. She took a battered vacuum cleaner from the hall closet and gave it to Sarah, while she carried the twelve sampler blocks.

Mrs. Compson had mentioned once before that the ballroom took up almost the entire first floor of the south wing, but Sarah still took in a breath as she looked around the room. A carpeted border roughly twenty feet wide encircled the broad parquet dance floor, which still seemed smooth and glossy beneath a thin coating of dust. Above, a chandelier hung beneath a ceiling covered with a swirling vinelike pattern made from molded plaster. At the far end of the room was a raised dais where musicians or honored guests could be seated. In the far corner, a large object—a table, maybe, with chairs on all sides—rested beneath a dusty sheet. Rectangular windows topped by semicircular curves, narrow in proportion to their height, lined the south, east, and west walls.

Mrs. Compson moved from window to window pulling back curtains, but the drizzle outside permitted little light to enter. She went to a panel in the far corner, flicked a switch, and gave the chandeliers a challenging look. The lights came on, wavered, and then shone steadily, casting shadows and sparkling reflections to the floor below.

After Sarah vacuumed a small portion of the carpet, she and Mrs. Compson arranged the blocks on the floor in three rows of four, then stood back and studied them.

“I think I want the Schoolhouse block in the middle instead,” Sarah said, bending over to switch two of the blocks. “And the Lancaster Rose next to it. Since it’s more complicated I want to show it off.”

Mrs. Compson chuckled. “Spoken like a true quilter. Then you can place the two blocks with curved piecing opposite each other, here and here. And since you have three star blocks, and another that resembles a star, you can put them in the corners like this …”

They spent half an hour arranging and rearranging the blocks until Sarah was satisfied with their appearance. In the upper-left-hand corner she placed the Ohio Star block, with the Bachelor’s Puzzle, Double Nine Patch, and LeMoyne Star blocks completing the row. The middle row held the Posies Round the Square, Little Red Schoolhouse, Lancaster Rose, and Hands All Around blocks. The Sawtooth Star, Chimneys and Cornerstones, Contrary Wife, and Sister’s Choice blocks made up the bottom row.

“I don’t think this is going to be big enough for a queen-size bed,” Sarah said.

“Don’t worry. We’re a long way from binding it yet.”

“If I make any more blocks, I’ll never finish the quilt in time.”

“Oh, we’ll contrive something.”

“Like what? You mean the setting? That should make it bigger, but not by much.”

“Not the setting. You just let me worry about that,” Mrs. Compson said, and Sarah couldn’t persuade her to say anything more.

They left the blocks in place and returned to the west sitting room, where Mrs. Compson showed Sarah how to make a Garden Maze setting. They began by making three templates: a small square, an even smaller triangle, and a narrow rectangle that tapered off to a point on both ends. To save time, Mrs. Compson traced the pieces—the tapered strips from the cream fabric and the other two shapes from the darkest blue—while Sarah cut them out. Sarah simply used her ruler rather than making a template for the narrow, dark blue pieces Mrs. Compson called block border strips.

Sarah sewed the hypotenuse of each small triangle to a tapered edge of the longer strips; when four triangles were attached, pieced sashing strips fourteen inches in length were formed. Meanwhile, Mrs. Compson sewed the dark block border strips around the edges of each block. They worked for the rest of the afternoon, and when it was time for Sarah to leave, Mrs. Compson told her to go ahead and leave everything where it was.