The Aloha Quilt (25 page)

The remaining seventeen aspiring Aloha Quilt Camp teachers varied widely in their
experience and accomplishments. A few had won ribbons in regional quilt shows and
had taught a few introductory courses at their local quilt shops and quilt guilds.
Others had had their work displayed at international judged and juried quilt conventions
and had led workshops in advanced techniques. There was a clear distinction between
those two groups, but most of the applicants fell somewhere in the middle. One quilter
had never had her work accepted at
a quilt show of national renown, but she was such a popular, engaging speaker that
she spent as much time on the road as at home, traveling from one quilt guild to another,
teaching and selling her self-published patterns. Another applicant had quilted less
than five years and taught less than one, but her stunningly beautiful and innovative
creations had appeared in several quilt magazines and her star was clearly on the
rise. Yet another quilter had won Best of Show at the American Quilter’s Society show
in Paducah the previous year, had developed her own system for simplifying complex
block construction, and had a book contract pending, but she taught only her own technique,
no other subjects. That wasn’t to say she couldn’t teach other courses, and she lived
on the Big Island, which suggested she was serious about the job and would have no
problem relocating, but on the other hand—

Overwhelmed, Bonnie pushed herself away from the table and walked out the back gate
and down to the beach to clear her head. Weighing one candidate against another when
not all factors were equal seemed an impossible task. What was more important: teaching
experience or artistic accomplishment? Winning personality or technical skill? Number
of published patterns or prizes won? The hiring process had seemed much easier back
at Elm Creek Manor, where she and her friends had discussed the different candidates,
making suggestions and pointing out issues that the others hadn’t seen, achieving
consensus, and choosing five finalists to invite for interviews. While it was tempting
to interview everyone except for those who clearly weren’t qualified, Bonnie knew
that wasn’t a practical solution, if only because Claire couldn’t afford the travel
expenses.

The cooling breezes off the ocean soothed her troubled thoughts, and after basking
in the sunshine a while, Bonnie
returned to the inn with renewed determination—and what she hoped was an acceptable
compromise. Claire had asked her to rank the applicants from best to worst, but since
that had proven to be next to impossible, she instead divided them into five groups:
most qualified, least qualified, and three groups in the middle, each comprised of
quilters who were either strong artists, teachers, or designers but had weaknesses
in another category.

The applications sorted, Bonnie carried everything inside to the office, where Claire
quickly put the computer to sleep and joined her on the sofa. Bonnie arranged the
five stacks on the coffee table and sat back while Claire perused the résumés, preparing
herself for questions about how she had ranked the applicants.

Claire frowned thoughtfully as she paged through the first pile. “They seem like nice
people, but not quite what we’re looking for,” she eventually said, setting aside
the three applicants who had never taught.

“I hate rejecting people,” Bonnie confessed. “It pains me to imagine some nice quilter
in California or Iowa opening her mailbox, hoping for an invitation to come for an
interview and learning instead that we aren’t interested. No one wants to be told
that they aren’t good enough.”

“Some people’s ambitions are out of line with reality,” said Claire, dismissing the
first group with a wave of her hand and picking up the second stack, applications
from quilters who were exceptional teachers but lacked in other areas. “We said we
wanted experienced teachers. If they’ve never taught before, what are they thinking,
applying for these jobs?”

“Maybe they hoped we would be flexible. You can’t blame people for dreaming big.”

“Yes I can, if it wastes my time.”

Bonnie studied her, unsure if she was joking. “That’s a little harsh, don’t you think?”

“Not really. If they gave our ad more than a cursory reading, they should have known
better than to think we’re seeking entry-level candidates.”

Bonnie sighed. “Maybe. I don’t know. Maybe we should have been more specific.”

“ ‘Experienced quilt teachers wanted,’ ” said Claire airily, quoting their ad from
memory. “Since unlike me, you don’t resent these ladies for taking up your valuable
time, I think you’re the right person to compose their rejection letters.”

“No, you do it. You’re the heartless one.”

“Which is exactly why you’re best for the job. I’m liable to tell them exactly what
I think and offend them, whereas you’ll be so diplomatic that they’ll not only agree
that we made the right choice, they’ll want to come to Aloha Quilt Camp as students
instead.”

Bonnie knew Claire was vastly overstating her writing skills, but she agreed and took
a seat at the computer. She finished the first draft of a rejection letter—which she
knew was much too long, much too apologetic, and much in need of revision—while Claire
finished reading the rest of the applications. “Our ad seems to have paid off,” Claire
later remarked. “I’m ready to invite a few of these applicants for an interview right
now, although we should wait to see who else applies.”

Bonnie joined her on the couch. “Who’s impressed you the most so far?” One glance
told her that Claire had kept the very well qualified candidates together just as
Bonnie had grouped them, but she had shifted around some of the candidates in the
middle three groups. “What did you think about Shelley Stevens, the quilter from Michigan?
Doesn’t she sound wonderful? I love how she enhances her quilts with embroidery.”

“Oh, absolutely. Her work is gorgeous.” Claire took Shelley’s application and those
of the other two well-qualified candidates and placed them on the reject pile with
the quilters who had no teaching experience. “Maybe she’d be willing to come as a
guest lecturer after we’re more established.”

“Guest lecturer? But—” Bonnie looked from Claire to the reject pile and back, utterly
bewildered. “She wants to be on our permanent faculty.”

“That’s what she says, but she’s unbelievably overqualified. We could never afford
to pay her what she deserves, and even if we could, we could never keep her for long.”

Bonnie snatched up Shelley’s application and paged through it. “How do you know? She
doesn’t say a word about salary requirements.”

“Someone with her experience and status in the quilting world can name her salary.”

“Maybe so, but let’s at least let her name it before we reject her.”

“And go to the trouble and expense of bringing her out here for an interview just
to find out she was only angling for a pay increase at her current job?” Claire shook
her head in regret, took Shelley’s application from Bonnie, and returned it to the
reject pile. “We can’t afford that. We need to concentrate on recruiting people we
could actually hire, not get ourselves tangled up in negotiating for a superstar.”

“So we’ll ask her during her phone interviews,” said Bonnie, exasperation increasing
exponentially. “We should at least talk to her. These women applied for the teaching
position as described in our ad. Let’s assume they want the job and not second-guess
their motivations. We agreed to interview our top ten candidates by phone, right?
What difference would it make if we expanded that to fifteen?”

“I understand what you’re saying, but we have limited time. We have to spend it on
the most likely prospects.”

Bonnie clasped a hand to her brow. “No, we should aim for the best and compromise
if we have to.”

“You’re too idealistic.”

“You’re too defeatist!”

“No, I’m realistic.”

“Do we want the best faculty or not?”

“We want the best faculty we can afford.”

Bonnie took her top three candidates’ applications from the reject pile. “We can ask
them their salary requirements during their phone interviews. If they’re out of our
price range, we can thank them and move on, otherwise we can invite them for a second
interview here.”

“Bonnie—” Claire hesitated, then shook her head. “All right. Fine. All I ask is that
you wait a week to see what other applications come in before you call, and that you
help me choose a backup top ten, excluding your superstars.”

Bonnie agreed, though she suspected Claire had asked for the delay to give her time
to make Bonnie see reason. In Bonnie’s opinion, Claire was the unreasonable one. How
could she dismiss something as too expensive before checking the price tag? And really,
how much time would a few additional phone interviews take? Didn’t it make good business
sense to invest that negligible amount of time and effort into getting all the facts
before rejecting the three most impressive applicants?

But who was Bonnie to lecture Claire about good business? Claire ran a successful
quilt shop as well as an inn, whereas Bonnie’s quilt shop had gone down in spectacular
defeat. Her only other business venture, Elm Creek Quilts, thrived because it was
a collaborative effort with several other skilled, capable women. Maybe she should
ignore her instincts and
follow Claire’s lead. Maybe part of her past failures had come from setting her sights
too high.

Conflicted, she watched as Claire sorted through the applications a second time, reading
résumés, admiring photos of quilts, checking for lists of references. Bonnie was on
the verge of telling Claire that she should go ahead and interview whomever she preferred,
because after all, Claire would have to work with the new hires long after Bonnie
departed. Then, just as she was about to concede, a new resolve took hold. Maybe Claire
was right, but maybe not, and if Bonnie didn’t contact Shelley and the other two most
promising applicants, she would never know. If their salary demands were indeed too
high as Claire predicted, Bonnie would admit her mistake and learn from it. She would
rather blunder that way than act on assumptions that could be entirely wrong.

“So who do you like for our backup top ten?” Bonnie asked, returning her favorite
three candidates’ applications to their place on the coffee table. “Do we prefer great
teachers over great artists, or the other way around?”

“We’re hiring two teachers, so if we can’t find both in the same person, we’ll look
for one of each,” said Claire, smiling with her familiar friendliness as if the disagreement
had never occurred. “We need to strike a balance.”

On that, Bonnie couldn’t agree more.

It took them another hour to agree upon ten finalists to call for phone interviews,
pending any new applications that might arrive in the mail that week. Privately Bonnie
composed her own top ten, including her favorites, whom she intended to call the minute
the waiting period she had promised Claire expired.

The next day another two applications arrived, including one that expanded their top
ten to a top eleven, since Claire and Bonnie could not agree on whom to displace.
Later that same day Bonnie’s new cell phone number took effect.

She was on the lanai, taking a break from work to sew on her Pineapple Patch quilt
when Darren Taylor called. He had investigated Craig’s threats and had spoken at length
with Sylvia. “Craig can’t touch Elm Creek Manor,” Darren assured her. “Sylvia owns
the house, the grounds, and almost all of the personal property within the manor.
None of that was ever identified as an asset of Elm Creek Quilts. Some items purchased
since the founding of the business—computers and such—do clearly belong to Elm Creek
Quilts rather than Sylvia, but the house and the estate are hers and hers alone.”

“Are you sure?” Bonnie wanted to believe him, wanted to be sure that Craig had no
power over Elm Creek Quilts and never would. “About two years after we founded Elm
Creek Quilts, Sylvia divided up the business among the founding members and Matt,
our caretaker. I was sure she had included the manor, the orchard, and the entire
estate in that.”

“Sylvia told me that she divided the business entity Elm Creek Quilts into shares,”
Darren explained. “She kept a twenty percent stake for herself, gave twenty percent
to Sarah McClure, and gave the remaining Elm Creek Quilters ten percent each. During
this restructuring, Sylvia did give away two parcels of land: a lot near Waterford
College that she donated to the city for the creation of a skateboard park, and the
apple orchard, which she gave to Matt McClure. Everything else remains hers.”

“I know Sylvia said something about the manor,” Bonnie persisted. “It’s been a few
years, but I know she made some
provision for her family estate. She’d had a health scare and she wanted to get her
affairs in order.”

“You’re probably thinking of the changes she made to her will,” Darren replied. “Upon
her death, Sylvia’s twenty percent of the business, the manor, the grounds, and all
her personal property will go to Sarah McClure. I spoke with Sarah, and she intends
to continue Sylvia’s current arrangement and lease the manor to Elm Creek Quilts for
a dollar a year.”