I was rattling on, a behavior that made him nuts. But I’d been holding back a steady stream of ideas for too long.
He was looking at me with that dead one-eyed stare only Marines and cops can do so well. And sometimes husbands.
I stared him down. If we were home this could lead to other things.
“You are going to sew tonight. Do you understand? I’ll handle this.”
“Door-to-door?”
“Yes. And phone canvassing. Harks has the names now. We’ll find her, Rache. Stay calm. Trust me.”
I did, of course. Always have. As much as I can trust anyone. But….
“Okay, fine. You’ll keep me informed, or you know what will happen.” I was still imitating his dead-eye.
“Step-by-step and blow-by-blow. I promise. Which reminds me, has Gloria called Abigail’s cell?” I had to admit I didn’t know if Abigail had a cell phone. I’d never seen her with one. I told him I’d ask.
She didn’t, turns out. Gloria thought they were a toy, but I thought Gloria couldn’t afford it.
“Be careful Matt….”
We kissed, and I could have sworn I heard several females swoon in the house.
When I got back inside the rack was down, the overhead lights were on, and the quilt was spread wide.
Stunning.
Simply stunning.
I joined the group of admirers looking in awe at Abigail’s completed part of the quilt. The lighting for our sewing was now exposed above us and turned on, as it had been hidden behind the quilt. Before us, illuminated as if by heavenly light was Abigail’s top sheet. The oohs and ahs lasted for several moments. A butterfly flitted into my belly asking me, Is your quilt top good enough for this group of experts?
We were each expected to complete a top sheet with its dramatic stitched-together design before our particular bee—an event that occurred once every eight months, of course, because there were eight of us.
At least, there were supposed to be eight of us, but now they seemed to be dropping like flies.
Bad thought. I erased it immediately. Abigail was fine, probably just tardy.
This was the part we were all expected to do on our own then present at our particular bee so we could all do the quilting. The “quilting” is the act of sewing the top sheet to the middle padding and the bottom sheet into one comforter.
Abigail’s top sheet was a mosaic pattern. I’ve seen pictures of mosaics online, and even in a museums, but never like this, up close, where I could touch it. Three thousand or more tiny squares of fabric combined like the tiles of a floor mosaic to create a dramatic picture.
I looked for the smallest of errors in lining up the many corners and didn’t see a single one. The alignment was perfect.
For a design, Abigail had recreated one of her lilies on an undulating navy blue background. This lily was done in purples and aquamarines and touches of flaming red and flamingo pink at its center. It must have taken her hundreds of hours, I mused.
“Okay ladies, we’re ready to begin sewing now that Gerry is here,” Victoria said.
It was traditional for Victoria to signal our beginning. It was traditional for her to tease the mother of four for being late, her wrinkled old face grinning slyly as she did.
Gerry moaned, but it was all part of the act.
Suddenly Gloria collapsed on the porch rattan couch in tears. The sight of her brilliant daughter’s quilt had brought her terrors to the surface again.
It took ten minutes of talking and soothing to get her calm again. I told her what Matt was going to do. I told her to trust him, just as he’d said to me.
She listened and agreed just as I had with him. As much as she could. Inside I knew she was containing a raging need to rush screaming into the night in search of her child.
Then we returned our attention to the quilt. Our next task was to roll up the three layers of the quilt to a more manageable size.
The width of about ten feet would remain open. The length of the quilt, top to bottom--again about ten feet--would be shortened so that we could reach the center of the quilt comfortably to create a starting line of stitches. To begin with, the quilters would sit four women at the top and four at the bottom.
One of four small sewing supply tables that would be arranged around us later was moved closer to the hanging quilt.
The first step was to assure that the three layers had been smoothed properly when being attached to the top and bottom dowels of the rack, something that Abigail and Gloria had done alone a few days before the bee. Victoria was a perfectionist and demanded perfection from each of us.
Victoria directed us to check the smoothness of all three layers before removing the two ten-foot side dowels, which were not actually attached to the quilt. They were used only to stretch the top and bottom dowels apart.
With four of us on the top and four of us on the bottom, we tugged and re-pinned the quilt as necessary until Victoria was content with the alignment of the three layers.
Next, I listened as Victoria instructed us to remove the two parallel sides of the floating rack. The excess length of the quilt would now be carefully rolled up onto the top and bottom dowels.
That done, we next turned our attention to the shorter dowels needed for this first stage of the quilting, which had been stashed near the wooden support horses. Then, the two shorter side dowels were secured. There were notches in the wood of these side dowels that the ends of the ten foot padded dowels would rest in. Four of us supported the corners, and three of us held the other dowels while Victoria placed one short dowel for maximum stretch along the left side.
She reached for a well-used strip of material from the supply table earlier positioned for easy access and quickly wrapped and secured her corner. She then moved to each of the other corners and repeated this process.
Now that the quilt was secured in its frame, with a four-foot-by-ten-foot field of material visible, the side stretchers were attached. These stretchers were plastic, paddle-shaped grippers that first were wrapped around the side dowels by thick rubber bands, and then were tightly clamped down on the three layers of material. I’d seen these plastic grippers used to secure the sides of deck awnings and figured we were good for up to fifty knots of wind.
Then Victoria told us to place the side horses under the side dowels to steady the rack. The gentle swaying stopped. We were finally ready to sew. I glanced at my watch; it was well after eight and full dark out with occasional gusts of chill mist. But inside we were toasty, and loading up on tea and sweets designed to keep us awake.
Victoria sat in her central position on the side facing the windows, and then instructed me to sit opposite but offset by one diagonally to her, just like the first quilt. My back would be to the cold glass for the rest of the night. At least there was a couch between me and those large windows.
Elixchel sat to Victoria’s left. Gloria was told to sit on Victoria’s right, where Abigail would normally have sat. To the right of Gloria was Andrea the pixie vixen.
On my left and directly across from Andrea was Hannah, and on my right sat Gerry, who was exactly opposite Victoria. The remaining seat Anne took. A wave of sadness swept over me as I contemplated that this was where Ruth would have been--to the right of Gerry and across from Elixchel.
All of this was so familiar to me from the first bee I half expected a fireplace to appear at one end of the room to help cheer us. But the room was warm enough without it, and fortunately there was no infernal Regulator clock to tick and chime away the endless hours as there had been in Victoria’s sewing room.
I don’t know whether Victoria was stalling the process in the hopes that Abigail would appear, but that was what she did. We would take two breaks during the layering and stretching--breaks in which we mostly stood around and stared at each other anxiously.
I began worrying that we would never finish this quilt. We had been ready to sew at that first bee by seven, but this one was starting much later.
&nb
sp; At long last, we approached the readied quilt. We sat. Again we endured more stalling as Victoria prayed, or whatever she did, with her head bowed. We respectfully waited for Victoria’s ritualistic behaviors to take us where we needed to go.
With one last great sigh, Victoria led us into the long night of stitching. She lifted her ancient and gnarled hands to the quilt, one on top, one hidden beneath, and placed the first stitch.
A muted sound of rain began tatting the roof above us.
Under the special lights hung from the ceiling to illuminate our careful stitches, the space around us slowly melted away as we watched her focus on this most important part of the quilting, the beginning stitches that would bring the three parts together into one. I mused that for hand quilters this was akin to the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost joining as one Comforter.
Like a drum roll of expectation that didn’t know how to quit, the sound above us intensified.
In my now seated position, hands clasped in my lap and tingling in anticipation--I said my own prayer, that Matt not be caught in the frigid rain suspended above Pinto Springs. And then it fell in earnest.
Chapter 63
Matthew Lyon’s LIRI Journal
Saturday, Nov. 1, 8:15 pm, dictated outside Rosemary’s Café
Met Will outside Cleveland County Hospital in hopes Luis was awake and coherent. Turns out he wasn’t. But Will had good news.
His connection with gang expert Deacon Harks could be the break we need. We’ve got 43 square miles of mostly undeveloped forest to search for Abigail Pustovoytenko and we need a goddamn lead or two.
Will reported Harks is arranging to come down from LA tonight with a couple of his people. He’s been hearing rumors up his way that Hidalgo, the Tijuana-based cartel, is infiltrating SoCal. Hidalgo, ironically enough, was an honorific for Spanish nobility—fijo dalgo means son of something—SOB is more like it.
Will confirmed the Hidalgos’ tag sign is MH with the M blended with the H. That’s what Luis thought he saw carved into the chest of the Pinto found dead behind the school.
Will and I entered the hospital, dodged the reception desk and made our way up to the private room Luis has been moved to from ICU. Will ran interference with a security guard that was trying to run us down, probably ordered to prevent any further gang retaliation. Like we look like ‘bangers. Jesus.
Luis was out and looked like death warmed over, covered in bandages, tubes and monitoring wires. Sandy must have left to catch some shuteye—a lucky break. She’ll be tearing me a new one next time she sees me, I’m sure.
The nurse indicated he hadn’t woken yet and might not for several days. I asked her to get a doctor on the horn, that we had a kidnap victim that Luis might be able to help find before it was too late. She wasn’t happy but she went off to find one.
I snapped a capsule open under Luis’ nose, but couldn’t rouse him. That’s when the doctor—Carnes was his name—came in and started lecturing me about cerebral edemas and messing in police business.
Cerebral edema. Goddamn ‘bangers.
Called Beardsley on the way out of the hospital; he told me what I didn’t want to hear. The Amber Alert for Abigail was going nowhere—not enough evidence she was “in peril.” I told him to try Famine and Pestilence over at PSPD, to keep pressing.
Will followed me to a coffee shop downtown and we had grinders and talked about Harks’ posse. Will said he’d be bringing Chicanos, which is good, as my Spanish isn’t gonna cut it.
I told Will to take a few of Harks’ men and work the condos on La Suenga, two to a door, bottom to top, with guys at the exits so no one sneaks out. Will said he thought the gang leaders will be in SFRs, overpopulated houses, not condos, and that the first floor guy will just call upstairs and warn off the others. He could be right. But we aren’t getting jack out of the gang leaders anyway. Need to find some vato who might be willing to talk.
Will thinks Harks might be able to sweet talk ‘em. I’ll work with him. We’ll see.
Chapter 64
By tradition, Victoria was the one who began the sewing. The rest of us would then join her, slowly, so that a good smooth base was formed. The stretchers made it unnecessary for us to wait for Victoria to complete a full foot of her section this time, but we still had to wait for her to establish an inch or two of all her lines. Then each of us in turn could lay down our set of rows, working outwards from her good beginning.
She bent to her briefly solitary task. I watched in admiration as ancient hands placed each stitch without a tremor and with no sign of weakness. I wondered if it was sheer will that made this possible. But I also mused that her steady hands were a testament to the ALS medications I knew her to be taking. I sent a thanks to God that I was blessed with living in this modern era when so much was made possible because of our medical knowledge.
My turn arrived. My hands positioned themselves as if by their own will and I was transported back to a month ago, to the first time I’d sewn with Victoria. And then from there, I traveled back in time by hundreds of years to Colonial America. We were doing what the women of those times had done. They had come together to quilt, and eventually to share their cares and concerns as the sewing progressed.
More than fabric was being stitched together as a whole in this room.
We sat on wooden chairs--chairs I knew would become a torture by the time the long night was over. Again, I wondered why. Victoria reportedly had said that it was to keep us awake. But I was convinced I could stay awake on a cushion as well. Maybe I’d lobby for comfort next time.
Surely Colonial women had used cushions.
Gerry’s cell phone interrupted my silent grousing. She dug deep in her fabulously expensive bag and pulled it out. Since she was sitting right next to me I half listened. It was Tom, her very junior detective brother, but I really couldn’t tell what he was saying. Gerry made a series of neutral noises in response to his masculine words.
But finally she broke into Tom’s monologue to say, “She’s right here, Tom. I’ll just give her my phone.”
She handed it across to Gloria and thus the long night of painful waiting took another step toward its eventual end, whatever that might be. And with this act Gerry had moved her nervous brother into direct communication with Gloria.
We all listened as Gloria made similar innocuous noises of understanding and acceptance, and then she hung up. At least she didn’t cry.
Gerry pulled out her charger cord and handed that across to Gloria as well, suggesting she plug the phone in behind her and keep it nearby for her to use during the night.
Finally, Gloria said, “He has no news of my Abigail. He just calling to connect.” She kept her head bowed, I believed to hide her emotions.
Topstitching on a quilt is the sewing that connects the three layers: the top sheet, the stuffing, and the bottom sheet or backing. Topstitching is the quilting stage.
Of course, on any quilt the top sheet of the quilt holds the key design element.
It can consist of many pieces of fabric sewn together to form the design or be one solid cut of material which is then embroidered or stitched upon decoratively to create a design in that manner.
But however it is done, the top sheet contains the design, while the topstitching holds the three separate layers of the quilt together.
I mention this, because topstitching can also be decorative, as is most obvious in single color quilts where the only design element is the topstitching. Therefore with a solid color comforter—usually white or cream--the emphasis is on the elaborate design of the topstitching, not the sewing together of multicolored pieces of fabrics. There are many two- and three-hundred-year-old examples of solid color quilts in museums across America.
Pieced quilts evolved as an expedient way to produce a “new” blanket out of used pieces of material—clothing, even food storage sacks--when no large piece of fabric was available.
But Grandma’s old nightshirt wasn’t very interesting after fifty o
r more washings. And Grandpa’s one suit might have survived several threadbare elbows before the lapels finally gave out. So bringing together interesting patterns and colors in large enough quantities of fabric to create an eye appealing quilt had always been difficult before the advent of machine-made fabrics.
Once machine-made fabrics became commonplace at the local general stores of America, this new folk art took off. American women had found a new way to express themselves, and the popularity of quilting blankets out of many scraps of material increased dramatically.
A very elaborate quilt uses several design elements at once in the process of its creation. In those cases the quilt was usually completed entirely by one person. Ada’s masterpiece had been such a quilt, the one that I’d been handed at the end of the last bee.
However, what we were confronted with at this point was what topstitching design to use on Abigail’s quilt. Unfortunately she was not here to tell us her preference, so we agonized over what was best--which at least distracted us from agonizing over where she was.
Since most quilts today contain at least two design elements on one quilt--the top sheet design and the topstitching design--the topstitching becomes very important.
Selecting the best topstitching pattern for your particular quilt involves not letting one design overwhelm the other.
So we sat for a few minutes debating whether to do a subtle topstitch or a more active one. The subtle topstitch of choice is called stitch-in-the-ditch.
Stitch-in-the-ditch is exactly what it sounds like. The stitches are laid down in the “ditch” formed between two pieces of fabric, or in the seams themselves. Done properly, they’re not even visible on the quilt from the top side.
This was my personal choice. This method of topstitching would allow her picture to dominate the quilt.
Gloria had thought a cross hatch design, one that evoked the pattern on a garden trellis, would make more sense because of the large mosaic flower pattern we saw on her quilt.
Ripping Abigail, a Quilted Mystery novel Page 24