The Package

by Sharon Dunn

  She retrieved a flashlight from her bedroom. Boots followed her up the attic stairs.

  “When are you going to start doing your job?”

  Boots didn’t respond.

  Annie surveyed the attic space, promising herself that she would not get distracted by looking through Gram’s treasures. Besides, she already had the stock certificates to deal with. Everything in this room told a story, and every item revealed more about Gram. If Gram had not known this Joan person well enough to ever mention her, how had they known each other? Joan had trusted Gram enough to give her the package.

  Annie decided to start in the corner where they had moved the antique dresser. Finding the package had distracted her from her search. She swept the flashlight over the area. Boxes were stacked on top of one another, and she noticed a broken doll crib. A mouse might nest in a box.

  She moved several boxes, looking inside each one. She opened a small trunk, closed it, and pushed it away from the wall. Nothing. Annie stood back to study the area again from a different angle. Silence blanketed the room. She took in a breath of musty air.

  Across the room, a box crashed to the floor. Annie jumped and her heart skipped into double time. Boots scooted out from behind the box.

  She shook her head at the cat and picked up the contents of the box, mostly old magazines. As she set things back in order, an old wooden box that advertised peaches caught her eye. Annie reached over and picked it up, but put the box down almost immediately when she saw what was behind it. A long fabric tube, like the ones used to keep out a draft underneath a door, caught her eye. The tube had been chewed in several places, revealing that it was filled with rice, a tasty treat for a mouse. Now she was getting somewhere.

  Trying to keep more rice from falling out, she gathered up the tube and placed it in the wooden box. Enough rice was scattered across the floor to warrant getting a broom. She had just closed the door to the attic at the base of the stairs when the doorbell rang. Annie set the box on the landing and headed toward the front door.

  She opened the door and Alice offered her a bright smile. “I have to deliver a Princessa jewelry order up to Seaside Hills Assisted Living, and on a lark I thought I would see if you wanted to come and talk to that Joan lady that Mary Beth said she knew.”

  “Sure.” Annie checked her watch. Peggy was probably done with dinner by now. “Let’s call Peggy and see if she wants to meet us there. I think she is feeling kind of left out.”

  “That’s a great idea.” Alice opened her purse and pulled out her cell. “I can call her right now.”

  “Let me grab my coat and the sample stock certificate.”

  The sky had darkened even more by the time Annie and Alice got into Alice’s Mustang.

  Alice turned the key in the ignition, and the car roared to life. “Peggy said she would meet us there. She’s bringing Emily.”

  All day long the air had felt thick with the promise of rain, though none had fallen. Annie was starting to think that the rule about spring in Maine was to be ready for rain anytime. She was adjusting to the change in weather, though the cold breeze off the ocean often made her feel she had a permanent chill underneath her skin. Fortunately, the bathroom at the end of the hall featured a deep claw-foot tub to soak in at the end of the day.

  They drove across town past the bank and turned onto Elm Street. The Mustang hugged the curving road up to Seaside. Annie pushed open the door and breathed in the salt air. She walked to the edge of the parking lot. The night view of town lights and the ocean beyond stirred up her heart. Gram had done dozens of cross-stitch landscapes of different settings around Stony Point but never the view from this hill. Sorrow flooded through Annie as she thought about all of the works of art her grandmother could have made. The body of work for Betsy Originals was substantial, but still, how wonderful it would have been to have more days with Gram.

  Thinking about her summer visits, she could picture her and Gram coming up here, Gram with her sketch pad and she with a book or crochet project. Always, when she had gone with her grandmother, she ended up watching her sketch, entranced by the focused eye of an artist as her gaze went from canvas to landscape.

  Alice placed a hand on Annie’s shoulder. “Some memories turning in that head of yours?”

  Annie nodded.

  “I miss her too.” Alice said as Annie turned back around.

  Peggy waved at them from across the lot. Emily held onto her mother’s hand while holding a doll in the other hand. Annie was used to seeing Peggy in her waitress uniform with her hair pulled back. The effect of the quilted jacket done in shades of blue and Peggy’s short dark hair framing her face made her look quite stylish.

  Emily rocked back and forth, heel to toe. “Come on, Mama, let’s go.”

  “She loves coming here,” Peggy said. “Her first-grade class has been doing a volunteer project where they come up every Tuesday afternoon.”

  “I get to read stories to my friend Elizabeth. She says she’s a movie star,” Emily drew her eyebrows together, her expression growing serious. “But Mama says she’s just pretending.”

  The foursome stepped through the glass doors into an expansive foyer that featured a huge Oriental rug done in shades of green and gold.

  “I’m going to go find Elizabeth.” Emily bounced, waiting for her mother’s OK.

  “All right, sweetie, but ask the nurse first if Elizabeth wants to have visitors.”

  “I will.” Emily gleefully scooted around a corner and disappeared.

  They stepped into a solarium containing numerous lamps and soft couches and plush chairs. The lighting was subdued and warm.

  Alice pointed to the bag she held that had the Princessa jewelry logo on it. “I’ll be right back. My client is expecting me.”

  Annie looked to Peggy. “I am not sure where to start. I don’t even know Joan’s last name.”

  Peggy pointed to a woman behind a counter flipping through papers on a clipboard. “She looks official.”

  The woman couldn’t have been a day past twenty-five, and she offered Peggy and Annie a wide smile as they approached. “Hi, I’m Katrina, the activities director.”

  “We are looking for someone,” Annie said. “Her first name is Joan, and we know that she likes to go to A Stitch in Time to buy supplies.”

  “You must be talking about Joan McTavish; she’s quite an avid knitter. I think I saw her come into the solarium a few minutes ago. May I ask why you want to talk to her?”

  Annie explained about finding the stock certificates and the note from Joan.

  “That seems benign enough.” Katrina came out from behind the counter. “Forgive me for being nosy. Sometimes relatives come in to ask for money or pick a fight over something that happened twenty years ago. I feel a little protective toward the residents.”

  “I understand,” said Annie.

  Katrina led them across the carpet to a woman sitting in a chair beneath a lamp.

  “Joan, these ladies would like to have a word with you.”

  Joan looked up from her knitting. She was a round woman with steel-gray hair cut close to her head and large wire-rimmed glasses. She rose from her chair and strode toward them.

  Annie’s heart skipped into double time. Maybe this was the mysterious Joan. She introduced herself and then Peggy. “I’m so sorry to take you away from your knitting.”

  “It’s quite all right.” Joan’s trilling voice reminded Annie of a songbird.

  A tightness entered Annie’s voice as she realized she might finally get some answers. “The reason we wanted to talk to you is to ask you if you know anything about this.” Annie pulled the stock certificate out of the envelope.

  Joan’s eyes lit up, and a tiny bit of hope crept into Annie’s heart. Joan took the certificate. Her face glowed as she studied the piece of paper. “Oh my, it is just beautiful. This isn’t mine though. Look, see, the name here.”

  “It came with a note that was signed with the name Joan.”

>   “Oh really.” Joan held the stock certificate out at arm’s length as though she were trying to remember something.

  “We found it in Betsy Holden’s attic. Did you know her?”

  “Of course I knew her. Everybody knew Betsy.”

  “So did you give my grandmother a package with these stock certificates?”

  Joan’s arm dropped. “I’m sorry. I knew Betsy, but we weren’t close. I knew who she was. We said hello on the street. I’ve never been to her house.”

  Annie felt like a balloon losing air. “So you didn’t leave a package with her for safekeeping?”

  Joan shook her head. “I’m so sorry, dear.”

  Alice entered the room from the far side. Her energetic stride slowed when Annie looked in her direction.

  “No luck, huh?” Alice said as she neared.

  Peggy shook her head.

  “Would you dears excuse me?” Joan smiled. “I have a project to get back to.”

  Annie stared around the solarium. A woman in the corner sat under a lamp sewing a button on a jacket. Across the room, another woman was busy with a cross-stitch in a hoop. With the exception of two knitters who sat across from each other, no one was interacting with anyone else.

  “Maybe this trip wasn’t for nothing,” Annie said as hope returned.

  “What do you mean?” Alice leaned closer to her friend.

  “Look around; this is a senior citizen Hook and Needle Club.” Annie pointed at each of the different women working on projects. “They just don’t know it. Alice, do you remember how Taylor said she wished they could do a project that wasn’t just about making something for herself?”

  “You mean the seniors and the teens do a project together?” Alice brightened.

  “I bet Katrina could help us organize it.” Peggy sounded excited. “We could plan some evening meetings, so I could come and help.”

  “I have an even better idea.” Alice shifted her weight. “The hospital accepts donations of little knitted and crocheted hats for newborns.”

  Annie grabbed her friend’s hand. “The seniors and the teens could get together and make a whole layette.”

  “I have a client who works in labor and delivery at the hospital. I can talk to her.” Alice checked her watch. “She might be off duty tonight. I can swing by her place and run the idea by her.”

  Annie’s mind raced. “Peggy and I can broach the idea with Katrina tonight, and then we will see if the teen girls will go for it.”

  “I can give you a ride home,” Peggy offered.

  A few minutes later, Peggy and Annie hunted down Katrina as Alice sailed out the door, promising to let them know how her talk went with her friend from the hospital. Katrina’s eyes grew wide as Annie shared her idea.

  “You know, some of those ladies used to sit together in a sewing circle. After the unofficial leader passed away, they all just sort of drifted apart. I’ll get started on talking to them to see what the level of interest is.”

  Peggy retrieved Emily from her visit with Elizabeth, and the threesome headed toward the foyer.

  “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could pull all this together: three generations of women giving to the new generation entering the Stony Point community?”

  Peggy looped her arm into Annie’s. “It’s coming together pretty fast. Now you just have to get the teens excited about it.”

  Annie pushed the doors open, and they stepped out into the dark, clear night. She thought of each of the girls who came to the class. “Yes, that is one challenge we face.”

  6

  Peggy dropped Annie off and waited in the driveway with the headlights on until Annie was safely inside. She had decided to crochet a newborn’s jacket with the yellow yarn she had bought. The girls might be excited about working with the seniors when they saw what they could do with their skills. She grabbed her crochet hook and yarn, and headed up to the master bedroom, which had a comfortable chair with good light. Annie worked on the little jacket until she felt her eyelids getting heavy. She let the project rest in her lap and leaned back in the chair, slowly drifting off to sleep after she clicked off the floor lamp.

  She awoke with a start in total darkness. She couldn’t see the glowing numbers of the alarm clock from where she sat. Had the electricity gone out again? Her heart pounded out an intense rhythm when she detected scratching sounds above her. Sweat trickled down Annie’s back. She leaned forward, fumbling for the light, but as she knocked against it, the lamp crashed to the floor.

  The scratching sounds grew louder, more intense. Still half asleep, Annie scrambled across the room toward the main light switch. When she clicked it, light filled the room. Good, she had electricity.

  She let out the breath she had been holding. Now to deal with the scratching noises. It had to be coming from the attic. Could mice make that much noise? Annie stepped out of the bedroom and headed toward the landing where she had left the box with the draft blocker filled with rice.

  Now the scratching was accompanied by a plaintive meow. “Oh, Boots.” Annie scrambled toward the attic door at the bottom of the stairs. She opened the door and the cat burst toward her, rubbing against her leg and complaining profusely. “You poor thing.” Annie gathered the cat into her arms. “Did you get hungry and kill some mice?”

  Annie took Boots into the bedroom and settled her on her favorite cushion. She glanced around the room. The noise and the darkness had stirred her up. The memory returned—of feeling like someone had been in her house. The noises had just been Boots’s desperate attempt to escape, but still she felt vulnerable. Annie opened the drawer where she’d put the stack of stock certificates. She pulled a box out of her closet that contained yarn and crochet patterns and books. She pulled out most of the yarn and placed the stock certificates in the bottom of the box, pushed the box to the back of the closet, and placed several pairs of shoes on it.

  She sighed. It had been a long day, filled with both disappointment and renewed hope. The prospect of doing something that would make her feel like an integral part of the Stony Point community buoyed her up. Fatigue settled into her muscles, and she slipped beneath the soft comforter. Boots crawled onto the bed beside her and purred. She hoped there wouldn’t be any more scratching noises in the night.

  ****

  The week went by in a whirl of activity. Wally and Douglas came by a few afternoons to work on the library. Only one section of plaster had to be removed to replace some old wiring. Annie ran errands when needed. She brought home paint samples, hoping to match the color that was already on the library wall. In the end, she decided she’d just repaint the whole thing. So far, there didn’t seem to be any further problems with the electricity. Now that she had found the food source for her unwelcome guests, maybe they would skedaddle.

  Alice phoned to say that her friend who worked in labor and delivery at the hospital was enthusiastic about such a big donation. Annie worked on the yellow infant jacket. If she could get most of it done by Wednesday, the girls might be inspired and get excited about the intergenerational project.

  Tuesday morning, Annie put the nearly complete yellow jacket in her bag and headed over to A Stitch in Time. All of the women but Peggy had already taken their usual chairs.

  Gwendolyn looked up from her knitting. “Alice just told us about your idea.”

  “I think it sounds wonderful,” Kate added.

  “What do you have planned for tomorrow’s lesson?” Gwen adjusted her glasses and held a knitting pattern at arm’s length.

  “Cross-stitch,” said Alice. “That means I’m on board to teach.”

  “And then for the week after that, we’ll go through some basic knitting,” Mary Beth stood outside the circle of chairs watching the door for customers. “By then, each of the girls may want to choose a project doing whatever she likes best.”

  “I am definitely coming for that.” Gwen’s knitting needles clicked at a rapid pace. “I haven’t done much cross-stitching, Alice. You might b
e teaching me.”

  “You should come anyway. Get to know the girls.” Annie laid the little yellow jacket on her lap.

  “I have to admit,” said Alice. “I’m a little nervous. They can be a tough crowd.”

  “I wonder,” mused Annie, “if they would like to see some of the cross-stitch work my grandmother did.”

  “That is a great idea, Annie.” Mary Beth crossed her arms over her chest. “I could talk forever about Betsy Originals and what an artist she was, but seeing her work makes all the difference.”

  “What those girls really need is inspiration.” Alice cut off a piece of brown embroidery thread with her little scissors. “We need to get them excited about being creative.”

  Peggy slipped into her chair and pulled out the appliqué quilt square she had been working on. “Sorry, got caught up in a rush at work.”

  As usual, Stella sat up very straight in her chair focused on her knitting. The older woman always added a sort of regal presence and dignity to the group.

  “You know, when Wayne and I were so busy at the Chevy dealership because we were doing a big sales push, the thing that got me through the day was thinking about working on a project, just sitting alone in my chair at night in the quiet.”

  Peggy pulled out several different quilt pieces. “I know what you mean. I love thinking about color combinationswith my quilts, coming up with something new that hasn’t been done before. Sometimes at night I dream about fabric.”

  “Oh, I do that too,” said Kate. “Only with me, it’s different stitch combinations and blending different kinds of yarn.”

  All the women laughed.

  “Dreaming about yarn. Well, I never!” Stella huffed, but the corners of her mouth turned up in amusement.

  “Speaking of color combinations—” Peggy held up two fabric pieces cut into diamond shapes. “I’m piecing a new quilt. Do you think these two colors go together?”

  Gwendolyn leaned forward and narrowed her eyes. “They both have teal in them.”

  “I like them together. If you paired them with a solid in a shade of green, it would work,” Mary Beth offered.