The New Year's Quilt (Elm Creek Quilts Novels) (5 page)

“A heart,” Henry’s mother announced, beaming at her future daughter-in-law. “Elizabeth has found true love.”

As Elizabeth’s face glowed from happiness in the firelight, Sylvia boiled over with impatience. “That’s not a heart,” she declared. “A heart has a pointed tip. That looks like…like a piece of fruit, that’s all.”

Elizabeth gazed into the bowl, her smile slowly fading. Then she looked up and gave Sylvia a wistful smile. “I suppose you’re right.” She turned away to gaze into the bowl. “The question is, what sort of fruit, and what does it mean?”

“It looks like an apricot to me,” said Great-Aunt Lucinda. “See the slightly elongated shape, and the indentation along the edge? That part could be the stem—”

“It’s a heart,” said Henry’s mother, but less convincingly.

“Maybe it’s an orange,” said Henry, making his way to the fireside. He offered Elizabeth his hand and helped her to her feet. “An orange ripening on a tree in a grove on a ranch in sunny southern California.”

“It’s an apple,” Sylvia shot back. “It looks exactly like one of the apples we picked from our own trees last autumn.”

“Whatever variety of fruit it may be,” Sylvia’s mother broke in gently, “I think we can all agree on the meaning. For Elizabeth, the year ahead is certain to be sweet and good and flavorful.”

All of the adults chimed in their agreement, but Sylvia scowled, pretending not to notice her mother’s warning look. The shape was an apple and it meant that Elizabeth ought to stay close to Elm Creek Manor, where she could enjoy the harvest year after year.

Only a few lead shavings remained when Sylvia’s mother came forward to try her hand. A few guests who had wandered away from the game returned to the fireside to see what the future held for their beloved hostess. Sylvia saw neighbors exchange glances and overheard their whispers, and her heart swelled with pride. Everyone loved Mama, and everyone wanted her to receive the best fortune of the evening. Sylvia hoped that the lead would take the shape of a cow, which represented healing, and she resolved to call the lump of lead a cow if it even remotely resembled any four-legged animal. If Elizabeth and Henry’s mother could interpret the figures liberally to suit themselves, so could she.

Sylvia’s mother hesitated before dribbling the melted lead into the bowl of water. A hush fell over the room. Sylvia’s mother bent over the bowl, then sat back on her heels and took a deep, shuddering breath. Sylvia inched closer to see, and her stomach suddenly knotted in cold, sickening dread.

The metal had hardened in the shape of a cross. There could be no mistaking it. And crosses signified death.

Someone broke the silence with a low moan, but was quickly hushed. Sylvia’s mother looked around at the faces of her friends and family and forced a smile. “Perhaps I should have followed Grandma’s example after all,” she said, her voice trembling.

“It’s just a foolish game,” said Great-Aunt Lucinda. “It’s not real.”

“What’s wrong?” said Henry. “That looks like a sign of good fortune to me.”

Sylvia balled her hands into fists and glared at him. “Don’t you know what crosses mean?” He was so stupid, so stupid!

“That’s not a cross.” Henry bent over the bowl to scrutinize the figure within, and then straightened, shaking his head. “That second line’s too thin and not straight enough. Anyone can see that’s a threaded needle. That has to be a good sign for a family full of quilters.”

“Of course. I see it now,” said Great-Aunt Lucinda quickly. “Perhaps it means you’re going to make many quilts this year, Eleanor.”

“Or perhaps the meaning is more symbolic,” said Elizabeth. “Needles are useful and necessary, just as you are to all of us. Needles can make a home warmer and more beautiful. Needles are used for…for mending.”

Henry put his arm around Elizabeth’s shoulders, but his eyes were on Sylvia’s mother. “Looks like you’ll be doing some mending in the year ahead, Mrs. Bergstrom.”

An inflection he gave the word suggested healing rather than darning socks or repairing little girls’ torn hems. Sylvia’s mother trembled with another deep breath, but then she offered Henry a warm, grateful smile. “Of course. I see it now.” She reached out a hand, and Henry and Elizabeth helped her to her feet. “I do hope this doesn’t mean I have to rush off to my sewing basket until after the party.”

A ripple of laughter went through the crowd, but Sylvia caught the undercurrent of sadness. Her mother must have heard it, too, for she turned a brilliant smile on her loved ones and gestured to the musicians to strike up another tune. As the first merry notes sounded, Sylvia’s father was at Mama’s side, inviting her to dance.

Sylvia no longer felt like dancing. She wished that she had come up with the new interpretation of the symbol her mother had seen in the water, wished that she had been the one to protect her mother from the bleak foretelling, the one to bask in the warmth of her mother’s grateful smile. And yet she felt oddly grateful to Henry for speaking up when she and everyone else had been paralyzed with foreboding. As much as she disliked him, she was glad he had been there.

Now, if only he would go home.

Sylvia curled up in an armchair and watched the couples circle the dance floor like snowflakes in a storm—her mother resting her cheek on her father’s chest, Elizabeth gazing lovingly up at Henry. They danced on, not knowing what the year ahead held in store, but determined to face the best of times and the worst of times together.

Sylvia’s mother did not die in the year to come, but her weak heart did not mend itself as they all prayed it miraculously would. She had always been the peacemaker of the family, so perhaps the mending the symbol foretold was the gentling of arguments and the soothing of hurt feelings within the family circle. Or perhaps the lead shape had carried a simpler, more literal meaning, for Sylvia’s mother, like all the women of the family, sewed furiously that winter, making quilts, a trousseau, and a beautiful wedding gown for Elizabeth.

For Sylvia’s beloved cousin did not come to her senses as Sylvia hoped, but married Henry and left Elm Creek Manor for a ranch in southern California. Whether Elizabeth had indeed found her true love, or only oranges and apricots, Sylvia never knew, for as the years passed, letters from Triumph Ranch appeared in their mailbox less frequently until they finally stopped coming.

Sylvia’s mother saw four more New Years come and go, until she finally succumbed to death quietly at home, with her loved ones around her. Doctors had been predicting her death since childhood, but no amount of time would have been enough to prepare themselves for life without her. On that dark day, they thought only of their loss, and no one remembered the lead cross she had seen in the water.

If Claudia remembered the dire prediction she had received that New Year’s Eve, she never spoke of it. As a pretty and popular young woman, she enjoyed the admiration of all the young men of the Elm Creek Valley and seemed, for a time, to have escaped the unhappy fate the lead figure in the water had foretold. Her disappointment in love came many years later, after the war, after her marriage to the man whose cowardice led to the deaths of Sylvia’s husband and their younger brother. This was the great betrayal that had compelled Sylvia to abandon the family home, the breach no apology could heal.

As for the eyeglasses Sylvia had seen in the bowl of water, she did indeed achieve a ripe old age. Whether she had attained wisdom as well—that was another thing altogether. She certainly had not attained it in time to reconcile with Claudia before her death. Whenever Sylvia reflected back upon that New Year’s Eve, she could not help but wonder whether the hatchet had warned not only of Claudia’s unhappy marriage but also of the severing of ties between two sisters.

If ever Sylvia needed wisdom, she needed it now. She sighed and ran a hand over the quilt top, pausing to study the changes she had made to three of the Mother’s Favorite blocks. For one, she had substituted a Hatchet block to remind her of the fortune Claudia had cast that long-ago winter night. A True Lover’s Knot in the center of another block called to mind her parents, who had loved each other like no other man and woman Sylvia had ever known. Another block boasted an Orange Peel pattern, which Sylvia had sewn as a tribute to Elizabeth and Henry. She hoped they had been blessed with true love and all the sweetness life had to offer. How she wished she had not been so selfish, so jealous of their blossoming affection. If only she had understood that in loving Henry, Elizabeth had not depleted her heart’s store of love. There had always been enough left over for her favorite little cousin. Had Sylvia not tried to keep Elizabeth’s love all for herself, perhaps Elizabeth would have stayed in touch with the family. Perhaps Sylvia would know what had become of her, and why her letters from Triumph Ranch had stopped coming.

Sylvia and Andrew drove on, leaving the rolling, forested hills of Pennsylvania behind them. Sylvia had always considered herself a reasonable person, sensible and not given to superstitious flights of fancy, and yet she could not help wondering if Henry had a hand in her current predicament. She could not miss the similarities between his situation and that which she now faced, and she suspected he would be amused, if he were still alive, to witness her current predicament. Now, at long last, she understood how he had felt, how Elizabeth had felt, when confronted with Sylvia’s foolish objections to their wedding. Now, too late for it to do any good, she understood how it must have pained Elizabeth that Sylvia had withheld her blessing.

On that New Year’s Eve so long ago, a more reasonable child might have chosen to mend her ways and make a new start with Henry, as befitting the New Year. Not Sylvia. A few days into the New Year, she resumed her silly pranks with renewed determination to prevent the wedding. She hid Aunt Millie’s scissors so that she could not work on the wedding gown, but Aunt Millie simply borrowed Great-Aunt Lucinda’s. She stole the keys to Elizabeth’s red steamer trunk and flung them into Elm Creek so that her cousin could not pack her belongings. She refused to try on her flower girl dress no matter how the aunts wheedled and coaxed, until they were forced to make a pattern from the frock she had worn on Christmas. She even came right out and told Henry that she and everyone else in the family hated him, but Henry did not believe her, and he did not go away until he took Elizabeth with him to California.

Just as Andrew’s children misjudged Sylvia, so had she misjudged Henry. She had seen him through the filter of a young girl’s jealousy and had never considered that he might cherish Elizabeth and bring her joy. On that New Year’s Eve, when he had turned foreboding into hope by imagining another future for her mother, Sylvia had been offered a glimpse of the man he truly was, a man of kindness, reassurance, and generosity of spirit. If only she’d had the sense to be grateful that her beloved cousin had found such a partner.

Could she hope for more from Andrew’s children than she had been willing to give? If Andrew’s children never accepted their marriage, wasn’t it precisely what she deserved, a just punishment for her own selfishness so long ago?

Perhaps. She could not deny it. But Andrew had done nothing wrong. He deserved better even if Sylvia did not.

Two days in New York awaited them, two days to savor the Christmas season in the city, alight with anticipation of the New Year. Sylvia intended to enjoy their honeymoon, but she would also make time to complete her quilt before they continued east to Amy’s home in Hartford, Connecticut.

She would find out soon if Amy possessed the insight that had eluded Sylvia as a child.

S
ylvia continued to sew down the binding as she and Andrew drove across New Jersey, but she put the quilt away as they approached the Lincoln Tunnel. Soon they had arrived in Manhattan, where a light flurry of snow whirled down upon the minivan from a clear blue sky. Sylvia clasped her hands in her lap in girlish delight as they drove through Midtown, passed Central Park, and turned onto East 62nd Street on the Upper East Side. She had not been to the city in many years, and it seemed new and familiar all at the same time. She considered it a stroke of good fortune that they found a parking spot not far from their bed and breakfast inn, a five-story brownstone called the 1863 House. One of the proprietors was a regular guest at Elm Creek Quilt Camp, and every year she urged Sylvia and Andrew to come stay with them anytime they were in New York. “It’s the least I can do to repay your hospitality,” she said. “Your classes inspire me, and Elm Creek Manor restores my soul. Where would I be without you?”

Adele, who had retired from a successful career on Wall Street in her mid-forties to pursue quilting and other artistic interests, was given to such dramatic statements, so Sylvia was at first not convinced that she was meant to take the offer seriously. But when Adele repeated the invitation in a Christmas card Sylvia received just after she and Andrew had decided to move up their wedding date, she finally accepted.

Since the newlyweds had set their Christmas Eve wedding date only a week ahead of time, they did not expect Adele and her husband, Julius, to have a room available on such short notice. Andrew even suggested they stay in a large chain hotel rather than impose on their generosity, but Sylvia had faith in Adele and suggested they at least inquire. A bed and breakfast in one of the finest neighborhoods in the city would be much more charming than an impersonal hotel room, and Sylvia couldn’t bear to pass up the opportunity to see firsthand the historic inn she had caught glimpses of in the amusing stories Adele had shared at quilt camp.

In a stroke of good fortune, although the 1863 House was usually fully booked through the Christmas season, a last-minute cancellation had freed up what Adele promised was one of their most charming rooms. “Don’t overbook yourself during your stay,” Adele warned. “I promised the staff of the City Quilter I’d bring you by if you ever came to town.” Sylvia rarely turned down an invitation to browse through fabric bolts and admire ingenious new quilting gadgets, so she happily agreed to leave plenty of time to visit Manhattan’s best quilt shop.

Adele was off at the market when they arrived, but Julius welcomed them and showed them to the Garden Room on the first floor. The former drawing room boasted a twelve-foot ceiling and a large, south-facing bow window with lace curtains that made the most of the winter sunlight. French doors led to a private terrace garden, dusted with late December snow, and a mahogany wardrobe stood beside a marble fireplace with an elegantly carved wooden mantel. Along the near wall, a striking, multicolored scrap quilt adorned a grand four-poster bed. Sylvia quickly set her suitcase down and went to examine it. “This isn’t one of Adele’s creations,” she remarked, noting the antique fabric prints and colors. The block design resembled the Thousand Pyramids pattern, with four corner triangles composed of thirty-six smaller triangles separated by rectangular sashing arranged around a small, cheddar-yellow Sawtooth Star.

“It’s one of Adele’s favorite discoveries,” Julius confirmed. “She insisted we bring it out for you to use in honor of your wedding. Adele said she could think of no one who would appreciate it more.”

Delighted, Sylvia ran her hand over the bright, scrappy top. Adele had indeed discovered a treasure. The fabrics indicated that it dated from the latter third of the eighteenth century, but its excellent condition belied its age. Someone must have cherished this quilt, for it had been given the gentlest of care.

“I imagine this quilt has quite a story to tell,” she murmured, thinking of the unknown quiltmaker who had spent months, perhaps years, sewing the tiny triangles together by hand.

“I’ll bet this house does, too,” said Andrew admiringly, resting his hand on the carved mantelpiece.

“The quilt’s provenance is somewhat uncertain, as it is for so many antiques,” said Julius. “But Adele and I would be glad to tell you what we know about the house over dinner tonight, unless you have other plans?”

They had tickets for a popular Broadway musical that one of Andrew’s old buddies from his army days had managed to get for them. (“His daughter has connections,” Andrew had explained when Sylvia marveled at their good fortune. “She’s going with a fellow who works in the ticket office.”) An early dinner with their proprietors would suit them perfectly. They arranged to meet later that afternoon, and Julius returned to his work while Sylvia and Andrew unpacked.

With a few hours to spare before dinner, Sylvia and Andrew decided to stroll along the Museum Mile to stretch their legs after the long drive, enjoy the sights and sounds of the city, and make plans for the rest of their visit. The air was brisk, but not unbearably so, and the wind was light enough that Sylvia’s wool coat, scarf, and mittens warded off the cold. “Should we take advantage of the after Christmas sales?” she teased, tucking her arm through Andrew’s as shoppers hurried past with bags from Bergdorf Goodman and FAO Schwarz. She laughed at her husband’s disconcerted expression as he struggled to find a good excuse to refuse. She knew that the afternoon of shopping he had promised her was not his favorite item on the honeymoon itinerary.

At four o’clock, they circled back and met Adele and Julius at Mon Petit Café, a charming bistro only steps away from the 1863 House. Adele greeted Sylvia with a warm embrace. “Such a lovely bride,” she exclaimed, and told Andrew that he was a lucky man. Andrew proudly agreed, but a wry twist to his smile told Sylvia that he did not expect to receive such a resounding endorsement at the next stop on their honeymoon tour.

Inside the bistro, a low murmur of voices and the aromas of roasting meats and spices warmed the air. Their table near the window offered a sunny view of Lexington Avenue, but Adele’s irrepressible joy diverted Sylvia’s attention from the sights outside. She seemed about to burst with a happy secret, and Sylvia hid a smile, knowing that her expressive, demonstrative friend would not be able to keep them in suspense for long.

Andrew, a quintessential steak-and-potatoes man, at first looked askance at the menu when he saw the French names for each dish. Just as the waiter appeared, he brightened and ordered Steak Frites—which as far as Sylvia could discern, was French for steak and fries. Since one of them ought to be daring, she chose Magret de Canard, roast duck breast in raspberry coulis with wild rice, even though she had only tried duck once and had no idea what a coulis was. “Don’t tell me,” she said when Julius began to explain. “I want to be surprised. Perhaps that should be my New Year’s resolution: to take more chances and seek out more surprises.”

“That’s my resolution every year,” said Adele, raising her wine glass in a toast to herself.

“It’s worked well for you so far,” remarked Julius. “Think of all you’ve accomplished because you’re willing to take chances. We should all have your courage.”

“You make me sound much braver than I am,” Adele protested, but her smile thanked him.

When Sylvia and Andrew urged them to explain, Adele reminded Sylvia of how she had once had a lucrative career as a stockbroker. “I was successful by most people’s standards. I had a corner office, great salary, all the perks—but I was working eighty-hour weeks. I had no time for my friends. I gobbled all my meals on the run. I read stock reports on the treadmill at the gym and answered cell phone calls in the bathroom. You laugh, but I’m serious. I was always working. It never stopped.”

“Just imagining it wears me out,” said Andrew.

“It wore me out, too,” Adele confessed. “But whenever thoughts of slowing down or taking a vacation crossed my mind, I drove them away. I had always pushed myself beyond other peoples’ expectations, and to stop doing so would be a sign of weakness, or worse yet, some kind of moral failing. I couldn’t let myself down.”

“I don’t know who she was doing it all for,” Julius confided to the older couple. “She makes it sound like she was under constant scrutiny and judgment, but I’ve always believed that people are far too wrapped up in their own concerns to pay much attention to others’ struggles.”

“For better or for worse, that does seem to be the case,” admitted Sylvia, although she could have shared many personal anecdotes of small-town life to the contrary.

“I don’t blame anyone but myself for the pressure I felt in those days,” Adele said. “All around me were colleagues with the same responsibilities, long hours, and stresses I had, but they were thriving. They enjoyed waging the daily wars. It took me a long time to admit to myself that I wasn’t happy. But I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to stop without giving up, without admitting defeat.”

Sylvia nodded, although she did not see how leaving a miserable job could be construed as admitting defeat. There was far more virtue to be found in diverting from a course that clearly wasn’t working than in plodding down a road one knew led to a bad end.

“So I went through the motions.” Adele sighed and toyed with her fork. “And then came September eleventh.”

When she fell silent, Andrew gently asked, “Did you lose loved ones?”

“I don’t know anyone who didn’t. I lost several friends that day, acquaintances I knew through work, clients—” Adele took a deep breath. “There are no words. There just aren’t any words for it.”

Her listeners nodded.

“Adele also lost her home when the Towers collapsed,” said Julius.

“Oh, dear,” said Sylvia. “I had no idea. You never mentioned it.”

“My apartment building was covered with soot and debris,” Adele explained. “None of the residents could go home. I stayed with a friend—slept on her sofa, tried to figure out what to do next. Weeks passed before we were allowed to return for some belongings. Everything I owned was covered in a thick, white shroud of dust. I threw a few salvageable things into a bag and never looked back. It was hard to care about
things
when so many innocent people had lost their lives.”

Sylvia reached out and patted her hand. “I understand, dear.”

“I had long since returned to work. After all that had happened, it seemed trivial to brood over my dissatisfaction with my career. My feelings hadn’t changed; I just stopped thinking of them as important enough to act upon. Then one December afternoon, I was out apartment hunting when I passed the 1863 House.”

“She went inside, took a tour, and made an offer within a week, even though she had never run a bed and breakfast in her life,” her husband broke in, shaking his head in proud incredulity.

“It didn’t happen quite that quickly,” Adele said, laughing. “I did my due diligence. I made a business plan. But if I hadn’t seen that quilt in the window, I might still be toiling away on Wall Street.”

Sylvia was eager to hear how a quilt had played a role in Adele’s story, and she urged her friend to continue. Adele explained that not long before she bought the 1863 House, her therapist had encouraged her to take up a creative hobby—something for pure enjoyment completely unrelated to her job. Since her grandmother had quilted and because at that low point in her life she felt drawn to items of warmth and comfort, she signed up for a beginner’s quilting class at the City Quilter.

“I was a newly minted quilter, with all the zeal of a recent convert,” said Adele. “When I walked past the brownstone that day, I glimpsed a quilt through the window, a Crazy Quilt draped over the davenport. I wanted a closer look, but rather than risk arrest by peering through the window, I knocked on the door and asked the proprietor if I could come inside for a closer look.”

The proprietor was a quilter herself, and so pleased by Adele’s interest that she offered to show her all the antique quilts in the inn. One very special quilt she saved for last, withdrawing it from a custom-made, muslin-lined wardrobe in the family’s private quarters on the fifth floor.

“It was the quilt I placed on the bed in your suite,” Adele said, confirming Sylvia’s guess. “Can you imagine sewing together all those tiny triangles by hand? And those fabrics—it’s a veritable catalog of mid-to late-nineteenth-century prints. The proprietor unfolded the quilt with such reverence that I had to know why. She told me that the quilt had come with the brownstone when she and her husband bought it forty years before. The previous owners had told her that the quilt was there when they purchased it, too. Intrigued, she traced its ownership as far back as she could and finally concluded that the quilt had probably belonged to the original owners of the house.

“As she returned the quilt to the wardrobe for safekeeping, she remarked that the quilt and the house had been together so long that it would be a shame to part them. She only hoped that whoever bought the house would cherish both quilt and residence as much as she had.” Adele smiled. “That’s when I knew I had to make an offer.”

“Was it the quilt you wanted, or the house?” asked Andrew.

“I couldn’t have one without the other,” Adele pointed out with a laugh. “I wanted the quilt, sure, but I wanted the house and the life at least as much. Talk about hubris. I didn’t think there would be anything to running an inn. Change the sheets every once in a while, take reservations, serve bagels and coffee—” Adele rolled her eyes. “I thought if I could handle Wall Street, I could handle a little B&B. Let’s just say I had a very sharp learning curve. But I never regretted it. I closed on the property on the afternoon of New Year’s Eve. As I signed the papers, I told myself that 2002 would be my new beginning. No more would I stay in a safe, predictable routine that made me miserable. Predictability is a trap and safety is an illusion. Love and happiness, on the other hand, are real, but you don’t find them without taking chances.” She smiled at Julius. “Love for my work eventually led to love of another kind.”