“If she hadn’t come across them locked in an embrace, she could have stayed with him and gotten even more deeply involved, that’s true,” Edward considered. “Perhaps it’s best that she did see that, even though it hurt her terribly. God was truly looking out for her. It does seem that sometimes He takes us through the valley only to show us the sunshine, doesn’t it?”
Silas looked at his uncle. “You’ve become quite the poet recently.”
Edward shrugged. “Blame it on love, I suppose. You’ll probably take up the lute and start composing romantic ballads yourself, and I’ll have to listen to you all hours of the day and night, strumming and singing your heart out.”
“I don’t think so,” Silas said with a grin. “I’d never subject you to my singing.”
“It’s good to see you like this,” his uncle said. “There’s so much joy in being in love. I’m glad you’ve found it. Eliza is a wonderful woman.”
Their path took them near Birdbath House, and they stopped in to see what was left to be done. Tiger, who was at the Collier house while Eliza and Hyacinth were gone, had clearly done her job well. There was no evidence of mice.
“You know what we should do?” Edward said as they walked through the house. “Let’s get this ready for them so when they come home they can move right in. We just have some cleaning and painting to do, and get this old furniture out and move the new in from the boardinghouse.”
“That’s all we have to do? All?” Silas surveyed the house. “I suppose I could—we could—in two or three days if I didn’t go to the Robbins house.”
“Cleaning should be the first item on the agenda.” Edward ran his finger over the windowsill and held up the grimy proof. “As far as the Robbins family goes, they might like a break from the constant hammering and sawing. You’ll catch up.”
His uncle had an excellent point.
“All right, let’s do it.”
For the rest of the afternoon, the two men scrubbed and swept and polished and wiped, until the house glistened. Silas leaned against the doorjamb. It was really quite amazing what they had accomplished. “Tomorrow we’ll move the old furniture out. Then we’ll move the items from Mrs. Adams’s place in here.”
“So you think two more days?”
“That should do it. We’ll be quite the pair when Eliza and Hyacinth come back into town. We’ll be achingly stiff and sore.”
“But it’ll be worth it. I can’t wait to see my petunia blossom’s face when she realizes she can stay in Birdbath House.”
“Petunia blossom? You’re saying Hyacinth is a petunia blossom? Is that even botanically possible?”
Edward winked at him. “Poetic license, Silas. Poetic license.”
Silas laughed.
Edward mopped the sweat from his forehead as they packed up to leave the house. “I’m clearly not as young as I once was—or as I thought I was. Whew!”
Silas studied him covertly. His uncle’s knuckles were swollen with arthritis, and during this short stint of cleaning, he’d managed to cut his thumb fairly deeply, and one fingernail was going to be black after he’d dropped a picture frame on it.
It wasn’t right. People you loved weren’t supposed to get old and weak.
“I know, Silas.” His uncle’s voice was soft and understanding. “I’m not what I used to be, not on the outside, and you know, not even on the inside. Each whack I take on the outside teaches me something on the inside. That’s how life goes.”
“Uncle Edward—”
His uncle held up his hand and stemmed Silas’s objection. “I need to say this. As you know, I’ll be taking Hyacinth as my bride soon—and yes, I know you don’t approve of it, but I know what’s in my heart and hers, so we are getting married whether you’re there or not. Over the years, I’ve gotten a fairly profitable carpentry business built up.”
“You do excellent work, Uncle.” Silas picked up a pail and began spreading out the wet rags over the edge of it.
“When I manage to stay on the ladder. Which brings me to the next point. I’m looking at some changes, not just with my marrying Hyacinth. Silas, I’m offering you the business. I’m not getting any younger, and the time has come for me to have whatever adventures are ahead, to enjoy them while I can.”
“But—”
“The right answer is, ‘thank you,’ ” Edward said. “Not ‘but.’ You’re a good carpenter, and you’ve become like my own son. I’m proud to pass the business on to you. . .if you want it. I’m hoping you’ll say yes.”
Silas put the pail down and looked at his uncle. In his face he saw the man who took in the untaught teenager, spent hour after hour, day after day, teaching him the ways of the wood, and all the time putting his own life on hold.
Was he the reason his uncle had never married before?
“Thank you,” he said, and reached out, giving his uncle a long-overdue hug.
❧
Silas looked up at the stars. His uncle had already gone to bed, and Silas was a bit concerned about the way Edward had winced on the stairs. He’d done too much too soon.
The stairs hadn’t been easy for him, either, and he was thirty-something years younger than his uncle. They’d worked hard and they’d worked long today, and now they were going to pay for it.
Silas groaned as he thought of what he’d feel like in the morning. And he’d scheduled them to move the furniture out!
Would he be able to sleep tonight? His body needed rest, but his mind wouldn’t stop turning over the conversation at Birdbath House.
He had the carpentry business. His future was secured.
He picked up Professor Barkley’s Patented Five Year Plan for Success. What did the professor have in store for him today? He opened and began to read.
What have you left undone? Is there something that you’ve been ignoring because you simply don’t want to see it? Maybe it’s a pile of papers on your desk. Or a stain on the rug near the door? That missing button on your coat?
Or is it more than that? Is there an apology you’ve been avoiding? Do you have some anger that you need to diffuse? Some ill will that’s taken root in your soul so deeply that it’s going to be painful to pull it out?
Today, deal with what you have put aside for later. It is later.
Memory verse—Proverbs 3:27: Withhold not good from them to whom it is due, when it is in the power of thine hand to do it.
Well, that was an odd little entry, and it certainly didn’t fit into the day, not at all.
He read through the memory verse until he had it learned, and then, after his prayers, he slipped into his bed. As he fell into sleep, Professor Barkley’s words taunted him. What had he left undone?
It was, he decided, another one of the professor’s puzzles. Remembering what one had forgotten was about as easy as expecting the unexpected.
He’d never figure it out.
Eleven
Eliza and Hyacinth stood in front of the police station. A light spring snow was falling that melted as soon as it touched the ground. “I don’t know if this is the right place or not,” Eliza said, “but there’s only one way to find out. Are you ready?”
“Let’s say a prayer first,” Hyacinth suggested, and the two women stepped to the side and, holding hands, dropped their heads. “Dearest God, we ask that You guide Eliza’s words and actions now, in His name, Amen.”
Eliza laughed. “Short but effective.”
“We can hope. Shall we go in?”
After being sent from one desk to another and speaking to a series of law enforcement officials, they finally ended up speaking to the chief of police, a kind-looking man with a thick white moustache. He listened closely to Eliza and asked questions, but mainly he let her tell her story.
She handed him the list of the names of the “investors” and their promised returns and watched as he studied it. At last he nodded. “This appears to be exactly the document we need. With the name of the unfortunates he took advantage of, we’ll be able t
o gather even more witnesses.”
“I wish something could be done for these young women who were take advantage of,” Eliza said. “I know they’ll all be grateful to see him behind bars, but that’s a small cold comfort when you’ve lost your money.”
The chief smiled. “Come to find out, Loring has quite the eye for art. His collection is worth quite a bit of money. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to hear the court order it to be sold, and the profits distributed among the women. After all, it was their money that purchased the items.” He smiled at her. “I believe that would be equitable.”
She nodded. “I see. I’m glad to hear that. It makes this all a bit easier to accept, knowing that my friends will see at least some recouping of their losses.”
He stood up. “Thank you very much for coming forward, Miss Davis. You are extraordinarily brave.”
He shook her hand, and then Hyacinth’s, and guided them to the exit. Eliza paused for a moment, long enough to let her knees stop shaking, and she heard the chief call to the captain, “Come to my office. We’ve got him now! Loring is ours!”
She looked at Hyacinth and smiled. “He believed me.”
“You must feel relieved that it’s all over,” Hyacinth said to her.
“It’s not quite over. I have some apologies to make.”
Eliza led Hyacinth to her old neighborhood. Most of the women she knew were still there, and to her delight, they listened readily to her story and forgave her. “We knew your heart,” one of them, a soft-spoken nanny, said to her. “You would never have hurt us on purpose.”
“I have some things of yours,” another said, her apron and cap indicating kitchen service. “We heard that the Loring fellow was going to go through your shop and your home—what he was looking for, I don’t know, but it wasn’t right. So some of us went to the shop and some to your quarters, and we got out what we could.”
A third woman, her hands crusted from the harsh soaps she used to clean, added, “His men aren’t so tough. They took one look at us, and they tucked tail and ran, like a bunch of mangy curs.”
The group laughed, and the cook led them to the storeroom where in a box were the rest of Eliza’s clothes, all neatly folded, and the rest of her sewing materials. “And behind here, I’ve got your machine.” The cook opened a cupboard, and in it sat Eliza’s sewing machine, dismantled to fit, but all there.
“You are all absolutely the best!” Eliza hugged each one of them. “I’ll take these with me now, but you all must promise me that if you ever can get to Remembrance, you’ll come and see me. Promise?”
There was nothing quite like good friends, she thought as she surveyed the group of women she’d known before, and Hyacinth, who came all this way for her. Friends made all the difference.
And now it was time for her to be a friend, as she took Hyacinth to her favorite store to buy some lovely yellow silk for her wedding dress, white lace bands for the sleeves and neck, and pearl buttons to march down the back in a tidy row. She couldn’t wait to start on it.
As she sat on the train coming back, Hyacinth snoring softly at her side, she took stock of herself. She was finally happy, and her spiritual housecleaning was well underway. She’d cleared out the dirt and the webs and flung open the doors to let the sunshine in.
Her life was taking shape at last.
❧
“Do you see them yet?”
“No, Silas, not yet.” Uncle Edward walked with only a faint limp, but today he was using the cane again. All the bustle to get the house ready for the women had taken its toll. “But soon. I think I heard it a minute ago.”
The station was empty. There wasn’t much call for the train to stop in Remembrance. Usually materials for the store were the only reason that the train even slowed down.
“Silas, since your own dear father long ago left his earth for his heavenly reward, I feel I should be the one to talk to you about love.”
Silas laughed. “You? But you’re Pudding Plum, as I recall. It seems to me that anyone who lets himself be called Pudding Plum is in no position to advise anyone else.”
“You’ll see, Silas. One day Eliza will call you something equally as ridiculous, like Lovey Lamb, and you’ll absolutely melt. That’s the way it is with love.”
“Lovey Lamb?” Silas shuddered. “Oh, spare me!”
“I’m serious. If anyone else were to call you that, you’d probably straighten him right out. But because it’s the woman you love, you’ll smile and get fluttery and although you’ll be as embarrassed as anything, you’ll treasure it.”
“I can’t see Eliza doing that.”
“Just wait. You never know. You’ll be at church or with a customer, and she’ll come in and she’ll call you Lovey Lamb, and you’ll want to sink through the floor—but you’ll be as proud as anything that it’s you she called Lovey Lamb.”
“Lovey Lamb? Honestly, Uncle Edward, Eliza?”
His uncle chuckled. “Maybe not. But, Silas, you need to be able to have fun with the woman you love. Enjoy her company. Share laughter. Have secret jokes that belong to just the two of you. Remember that in marriage, two have become one.”
“Uncle Edward, aren’t you jumping ahead just a little bit? Or maybe a whole lot? You’ve got Eliza and me getting married. Don’t you think we ought to court a little while?” Silas grinned.
The sound of the train came closer.
“Isn’t that what you two have been doing?” his uncle responded. “You two learn to talk and laugh and not get so caught up in your own pride, and you’ll be ready to marry.”
“I think I’ll wait a little bit, if you don’t mind.”
“You know what you need to do?” Uncle Edward asked.
The chicketta-ticketta of the train grew even louder, and his heart beat faster at the thought that she’d soon be in Remembrance.
“What do I need to do, Uncle?” Silas asked.
The train was too loud for him to hear his answer clearly, but it sounded for all the world like, “Kiss her.”
He was never one to ignore good advice. The minute she stepped onto the platform, he swung her into his arms and kissed her squarely on the lips.
For a kiss that was tinged with locomotive smoke and grit, it wasn’t bad at all. But just in case it could get better, he kissed her again. And again. And again.
❧
The children crowded around Eliza. “This is a sewing machine,” she said, letting them each look at it. “When I move the crank on this wheel like this, see how the needle goes up and down?”
The children were transfixed by the machine that Eliza set up in the Robbins home for the day. Silas carried it over in its wooden carrying case. They’d never seen anything like it. Analia stood at Eliza’s shoulder, Tiger cradled in her arms.
“But just having the needle go up and down isn’t enough with a machine, even though it is with hand sewing. For a machine to make a stitch, two threads are required, and that’s what this little shuttle under here is for. It loops with the thread from up above to make the stitch. Now watch. I’m going to sew this seam.”
She put the gown she was making for Mrs. Robbins in place and within a minute had the seam sewn. “Compare that to how long it takes me to hand stitch a seam, and you can understand why we take very good care of our sewing machines.”
“Wouldn’t it be nice,” Silas said from the other side of the room where he was still putting up cupboards, “if someday someone would invent a machine that could put nails in place as easily as that puts stitches in? Then I could stand here, and instead of hammering in each nail, I could simply pop-pop-pop-pop them into place.”
“Not likely to ever happen,” Luke commented. “That’s just dangerous.”
Eliza looked up and smiled surreptitiously at Silas. Luke was very sweet, but very ten years old. He was at the age in which he knew it all, or at least most of it.
“Well, if they do invent a nail machine, I’ll be the first in line to buy one. This hammering al
l day long is really hard on my arms.” He rubbed his right shoulder.
“If you need help,” little Mark offered, “I’m very good at pounding nails.”
“Thank you, Mark. I’ll keep that in mind.”
The staccato hammering and the whirr of the sewing machine blended to make a solid background noise that, at least momentarily, drowned out the constant chatter of the children.
Having the machine back made so much difference, she thought, as the boys’ shirts almost finished themselves. This had to be one of the best inventions created.
Once her world had tilted upside down. Now it was being righted, and it was wonderful. She took stock of all that had happened for the good.
She had fallen in love. That was the best, of course. When she first met him, he’d been so solemn, his eyes studiously serious behind his wire-rimmed glasses. Now, he’d come out of his own shadow, and she enjoyed being with him so much that loving him came easily.
She had a friend. How could she have gone on without Hyacinth at her side, advising and supporting her all the way? She had a sewing machine. She had a cat. She even had a house now, at least for a while. Hyacinth had added some charming touches to Birdbath House, so it truly felt like home.
Plus spring was definitely in the air. The snow and ice had begun to melt at an amazing rate, so that walking under any eaves or awnings meant sure splatters of water on one’s head. Even the birds seemed happier.
Mary Robbins had actually gotten out of bed and come into the front room twice. The doctor told her that if she continued to regain her strength, she’d be back to health by summer’s end.
Tomorrow Eliza would start on Hyacinth’s wedding dress. The date was set for the first Sunday in June, right after the church services. All of Remembrance was invited, and even Mrs. Adams said she’d try to come back for it. She’d left four days ago, and Hyacinth and Eliza were reveling in having their dinner at 12:01 or even 12:02.
All in all, everything was perfect. Couldn’t be better. Nothing to change.
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