by Unknown
Upon his death in 1904, he left the library his extensive collection of books and archives, a Steinway baby grand piano and a dozen straw hats made at one of the small mills he’d owned in the valley. The last Sanderson had vacated Knights Bridge during the Depression, when the family mills were demolished ahead of the damming of the Swift River for Quabbin. Homes, businesses, barns, fences, trees—everything in the valley went. Even graves were moved to a new cemetery on the southern end of the reservoir.
Old George’s portrait still hung above the fireplace in the library’s main room. He was handsome and stern-looking, not exactly the sort Phoebe imagined would encourage story hours for small children. As she headed up the sunlit brick walk, she heard squeals of laughter through the open front window, where the children’s section was located.
Her five-year-old nephew, Aidan, Maggie’s younger son, pressed his face against the window screen. “Hey, Aunt Phoebe!”
“Aidan Sloan, do not poke that screen,” she said firmly, picking up her pace.
He giggled and disappeared from sight.
Phoebe ran up the steps and went inside, welcoming the cool, solid wood-paneled interior, hardly changed since the library was built to George Sanderson’s specifications. The main room included a small stage, the piano tucked on one end. Before Phoebe’s arrival as director, the library had seldom used the stage and the trustees had complained about the “wasted space.” With careful planning, she’d gained their support and found the money to launch a modest concert series, with musicians who didn’t expect more than a few dozen in the audience, and opened up the stage for art and garden shows. It was where the library would hold its vintage fashion show in less than two weeks.
We make use of all that we have.
That was Phoebe’s motto for the library as well as her own life. Why moan about what she didn’t have when so much was right within her grasp?
Her older nephew, Tyler, almost seven, was sitting cross-legged on the hardwood floor in front of the stage with a book about raptors in his lap. “Aunt Phoebe, did you know that raptors have three eyelids?”
“In fact, I did, Tyler.” She laughed. “You’d be surprised at what a librarian knows. Would you like to see a raptor’s eyelids sometime?”
He nodded eagerly.
“We’ll have to figure that out, then. Right now, though, let’s go in with the other kids.”
“I want to stay here.”
Tyler—as redheaded as his mother—preferred to read a book on his own than to be read to, especially with his squirming younger brother. Phoebe put out a hand, but he ignored it and stood up on his own. He shuffled past her into the children’s section, his head down, shoulders slumped, as if she’d asked him to walk the plank.
He and Aidan would be tired after spending most of the day with Elly O’Dunn, their energetic maternal grandmother. She’d taken the afternoon off from her job at the town offices to look after the boys while Maggie catered a lunch and then met with Olivia at Carriage Hill. Phoebe, her mother and her two youngest sisters were doing what they could to help Maggie as she managed two young boys and a catering business on her own, without Brandon Sloan, her adrenaline-junkie carpenter husband. Phoebe didn’t have all the details, but she knew Brandon’s construction work in Boston had been on-and-off at best the past year or so. It had to have put a strain on his marriage. He had a tendency to take off into the mountains or up the coast when things got tough, instead of talking.
Brandon was the third of six Sloan siblings—five brothers and a sister. His family owned a successful construction business in Knights Bridge and would welcome him back, but returning to his hometown would signal defeat in his eyes. Phoebe had known him since nursery school. He’d wanted out of Knights Bridge at ten. Then he and Maggie fell for each other as teenagers and married in college. Almost no one in town had believed their marriage would last. Phoebe had hoped it would, because they were so much in love.
She sighed. She could be such an idiotic romantic. Hadn’t she learned by now?
She gathered the dozen boys and girls onto a round, dark red rug. They came quickly to order, even her nephews. They were reading Beatrix Potter and had just started The Tale of Peter Rabbit, their last book of the summer, and they couldn’t wait to find out what happened next.
* * *
With Peter Rabbit and Knights Bridge’s little ones safely back with their families, Phoebe locked up the library and walked across South Main Street and through the common to Main Street and the Swift River Country Store, a town fixture for the past hundred years. It sold everything from galoshes to canned goods and fresh vegetables to a decent selection of wine. The afternoon heat had eased but it was still warm when she headed back to the library with two bottles of pinot grigio, already chilled. Olivia would bring a bottle of some kind of red from a California winery owned by Noah Kendrick, Dylan’s best friend and founder of NAK, Inc., the high-tech entertainment business that had made them both fortunes. The only thing Phoebe knew for sure was that her choice of white wine wouldn’t be nearly as pricey as whatever red Olivia brought.
Having a friend fall for a wealthy Californian had its unexpected advantages.
Normally she’d have walked home but her visit with Maggie and Olivia meant she had her car. She got in, set her wine on the front seat next to her and shut her eyes a moment, listening to the rustle of leaves as a gentle breeze floated through the shade trees on the wide library lawn.
Finally she started her Subaru and turned off South Main onto Thistle Lane. The library stood on the corner. Thistle Lane led away from the common, connecting to a back road with views of the reservoir in the distance. On her trips to the library as a girl, Phoebe had dreamed of living on the quiet, tree-lined street, away from the chaotic life she had out in the country with her parents and younger sisters. Thistle Lane represented order, independence and, at least to a degree, prosperity.
In less than five minutes, she turned into her short paved driveway. An old American elm graced the corner of the yard next to hers, holding on against the ravages of Dutch elm disease, in part due to intervention by the town. It was a beautiful tree, a symbol of the past and yet very much part of her everyday world. When she bought her house eighteen months ago, she’d thought she was being practical, never mind that she was the only one to make an offer. The house was built in 1912 by one of the early directors of the library, then sold to a series of owners, until, finally, the town was forced to take possession when the heir to the last owner couldn’t be located and property taxes went into arrears.
Phoebe rolled up her car windows, shut off the engine and collected her wine bottles as she stepped out into the shade. With its new roof, furnace, windows, wiring and plumbing, the house was no longer a notch above a tear-down. It still needed a new kitchen and bathroom, but she had to save up before she tackled any more big projects. Right now, she was concentrating on some of the fun cosmetic work—paint, wallpaper, gardens and restoring flea-market and yard-sale finds.
With her painting skills and eye for color, Olivia had been a huge help, but The Farm at Carriage Hill and her new life with Dylan were creating uncertainties for her. Phoebe had welcomed having Maggie and then Olivia move back to Knights Bridge, but that didn’t mean more changes weren’t coming. Change was inevitable, Phoebe thought. Her own life was more settled than the lives of her sisters and most of her friends. Her job at the library was secure. She had no plans to move, go into business for herself or get involved with a man.
Five years from now, her life would likely look more or less as it did now.
“Just without an avocado-green refrigerator in my kitchen,” she muttered happily as she headed down the curving stone walk with her wine.
The narrow clapboards of her small house were painted classic white. At Olivia’s suggestion, Phoebe had chosen a warm, welcoming green for the front door. It was framed by pink roses that she’d pruned and trained to climb up the white-painted trellis by the porch steps
. When she’d moved in, the yard was an overgrown mess. She didn’t have Olivia’s green thumb, but she’d nonetheless managed to save many of the shrubs and perennials that had come with the property.
As she started up the steps to the small, covered porch, she saw that her twin sisters had arrived ahead of her. They were seated on wicker chairs that Phoebe had reclaimed and painted white, adding cushions in a mix of pink, blue and white flowers. Ava and Ruby, at twenty-three the youngest of the O’Dunn sisters, were fraternal twins, but they were so much alike that people often assumed they were identical. In both appearance and temperament, they took after their late father, Patrick O’Dunn, an auburn-haired, green-eyed, gorgeous-looking dreamer, as hopelessly impractical as the widow he’d left behind almost ten years ago.
“Thanks for coming,” Phoebe said as she unlocked the front door. “Olivia and Maggie will be here any minute.”
“This is going to be so much fun,” Ruby said, tucking a pink rose blossom behind her ear. She had on a long black skirt and a white tank top, her short, wavy hair dyed a purple-black that made her skin seem even paler, more translucent. “We brought all our goodies. Makeup, wigs, hairpieces, curling iron, needles and thread. We’ve already done up a half-dozen masks. Three are simple. You’d be able to recognize whoever’s wearing them. Three are more elaborate. It’d be tougher to recognize who’s wearing them.”
Ava smiled. “We will not fail you.” She twirled a rose stem in her fingertips. Her hair was its natural reddish brown, trailing down her back in a loose ponytail. Her skirt, which came to just above her knees, was a deep, warm red that worked surprisingly well with her turquoise lace top. “A masquerade ball in Boston. It doesn’t get much fancier than that.”
Phoebe pushed open the door. “Dylan has extra tickets if you want to go.”
“I wish,” Ava said wistfully, tossing her rose over the porch rail into the grass. “We have to work, and classes start again next week.”
“Otherwise we’d go in a heartbeat,” Ruby added.
No doubt they would, Phoebe thought. “It does sound grand,” she said as she led them inside. “Maggie and Olivia are counting on your theatrical flair. What do you think of Maggie in the blue gown Grace Kelly wore in To Catch a Thief and Olivia in Audrey Hepburn’s black dress from Breakfast at Tiffany’s?”
Ava turned, intrigued. “Do you have the dresses?”
Phoebe nodded. “I have the dresses.”
“Oh, wow. Excellent. Ruby?”
“Grace’s icy-blue chiffon gown? Audrey’s little black dress?” Ruby laughed. “That’s fantastic.”
“I even have pearls and a cigarette holder,” Phoebe said.
“Where did you get them?” Ava asked.
“I’m thinking of including them in our vintage fashion show,” Phoebe said evasively. Her sisters followed her into the kitchen, where she put the wine in the refrigerator, a relic that, somehow, still worked.
Ava leaned against the counter, a cheap wood that Phoebe had painted creamy white, her first renovation when she’d moved in. “So, Phoebe,” Ava said, crossing her arms on her chest. “Have you decided what you’re wearing?”
Phoebe got out wineglasses and set them on the cracked Formica counter, sidestepping her sister’s question. The twins were in graduate school—Ava in New York, Ruby in Boston—but they were spending the summer in Knights Bridge, living at home to save money. They had student loans that would take years if not decades to pay off, and big dreams that might never pay off, but Phoebe hoped everything would work out for them, believed in them. She knew they felt the same way about her but suspected they had their doubts about her choices. Not her library work. Her solitary life—or what to her sisters seemed like a solitary life. Meaning she didn’t have a man.
She’d had one, once. She’d been on the road to marriage and a happy ending of her own, but it hadn’t worked out that way.
Everyone in town knew her story—Phoebe O’Dunn, jilted at twenty, within forty-eight hours of finding her father dead from a tree-trimming accident. She’d shielded her mother and sisters from the depth of her pain, but the shock had taken its toll. Broken hearts healed but that didn’t mean life was ever the same. Phoebe had deliberately shut the door on romance, at least for herself.
But it was fine, all fine, because she was fine. She loved her work, her family, her friends, her town. She couldn’t be more content than she was right now.
Ava looked out the window over the sink at the backyard flower garden, dominated now, in mid-August, by hollyhocks that ranged from soft white through three shades of pink to deep maroon. “You’re not going to the ball, are you, Phoebe?”
Phoebe changed her mind and decided to pour the wine now. She grabbed the pinot grigio out of the refrigerator and set it on the counter. “No, I’m not going,” she said matter-of-factly as she rummaged in the utensil drawer for a corkscrew. “Do you both want wine?”
Ruby plopped her tote bag onto a chair at the table. “Phoebe, you know you’d have a great time. You never go anywhere—”
“I have so much to do here. I’m taking vacation days before the end of the summer. I’ll go someplace then.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know. Someplace.” Phoebe held up a glass. “Wine?”
“Sure,” Ruby said with a sigh. “Just don’t think I’ve given up.”
“Me, either,” Ava said. “You should go to this ball tomorrow, Phoebe. Maybe you’ll change your mind when you see the masks Ruby and I made. Anyway, wine for me, too. I’ll get our goodies out of the car.”
“Hang on, I’ll help.” Ruby withdrew a square of golden-colored soap from her tote bag and tossed it to Phoebe. “Check it out while we’re setting up. It’s a new soap Mom, Olivia and Maggie are trying out. Mom wants your opinion.”
Olivia and Maggie were experimenting with making their own artisan goat’s milk soaps to sell at The Farm at Carriage Hill. If it worked, Elly O’Dunn’s goats could go from being an expensive and impractical hobby to earning their own keep. Phoebe was happy to do what she could to help and knew Ava and Ruby were, too, although Ava in particular wasn’t crazy about their mother’s goats—especially when she had to clean up after them. They all appreciated the mildness and purity of the soaps.
Phoebe took in the gentle lavender scent of the bar Ruby had tossed her. “It really is lovely, isn’t it?”
“Olivia’s already designed the labels,” Ruby said. “Dreams do come true, Phoebe. Olivia’s are.”
“I know. I want yours to come true, too.”
Ava stopped in the hall doorway. “What about your dreams?”
“My dream,” Phoebe said lightly, abandoning the soap for her wine, “is to see Maggie and Olivia all set for their charity ball. Go grab your stuff. I’ll get the dresses.”
* * *
Three hours, two and a half bottles of wine, a pot of vegetable curry and much laughter later, Phoebe was again alone in her kitchen. Olivia and Maggie had precise instructions, beautiful handmade masks and everything else they needed to transform themselves into their own versions of Audrey Hepburn and Grace Kelly.
The dresses had worked out even better than Phoebe had imagined.
The dresses.
Ava had recognized them first. “Phoebe, these aren’t like the dresses Audrey and Grace wore in Breakfast at Tiffany’s and To Catch a Thief. They are the dresses.”
“Close copies,” Phoebe had said, then again deflected questions about where she’d gotten them.
She turned out the light in the kitchen and walked down a short hall to a small back room. For most of the past eighteen months, she’d used it to store paint supplies, tools and junk she’d collected from the rest of the house but wasn’t sure what to do with. Then, on a rainy night earlier that summer, she’d cleaned everything out, wiped down the walls, mopped the floor and considered the possibilities. A guestroom? A study? A spa bathroom?
In another life, it would have made a great baby’s room.
>
She felt the same pang of regret she’d felt that night, but it was ridiculous. If her father hadn’t died and her steady college boyfriend hadn’t given her an impossible ultimatum, she wouldn’t have ended up on Thistle Lane at all, with or without babies.
Florida.
She’d have ended up in Florida.
She tore off the dry-cleaning plastic to a third dress she’d had cleaned along with the Grace Kelly and Audrey Hepburn dresses. It hung on a hook in the back room.
She stepped back, marveling at the creativity and the workmanship of the gown. It was Edwardian, one of the period pieces in the hidden room. Its creator had chosen a warm, rich brown silk satin, decorated it with sparkling beads, lace and embroidery, all in a matching brown. It had an empire waist, a deep square neckline and loose, belled lacy sleeves.
And there was a matching hat.
It was as romantic and beautiful a dress as any Phoebe had ever seen.
A gown for a princess.
She tried to shake off the thought. She’d had too much wine. Just two glasses, but she felt...well, a little reckless.
And why not?
After all, what could be more perfect for a masquerade ball than a gorgeous, mysterious dress from a secret attic room?
Copyright © 2013 by Carla Neggers
ISBN-13: 9781460325292
CIDER BROOK
Copyright © 2014 by Carla Neggers
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.