The Christmas Boutique Page 6

  “No,” Diane said abruptly. Turning her back, she sat down on a stool and resumed her work. Summer murmured something to her, probably a reproach, and Diane muttered a response. Mary Beth couldn’t make out the words, but the disparaging tone was unmistakable. Drawing closer, she spotted several large padded envelopes torn open and lying empty in a stack just within Diane’s reach, and on the cutting table between her and Summer, several quilt blocks were arranged in two neat rows.

  Summer smiled pleasantly at Mary Beth to make up for her rude companion. “Bonnie’s not here, but may I help you?”

  “I suppose so,” Mary Beth said, resigned. She would much rather deal with Bonnie. “You’re Summer, right? Summer Sullivan?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Your name is in the letter, so I guess you’ll do.” Mary Beth took the Elm Creek Quilters’ request letter from her purse and gave it to the auburn-haired girl. “I believe this was sent to me by mistake.”

  Summer skimmed the page, nodding. “We definitely meant to send this. You’re listed as the contact for the Waterford Quilting Guild, and we hoped you would announce it at your next meeting.”

  She tried to return the letter, but Mary Beth waved it away. “Oh, no, I couldn’t.”

  “Why not?” asked Diane.

  “I couldn’t impose on my fellow guild members like that. They’d probably feel obligated to participate, and that isn’t fair. It’s not like this is for charity. If I endorse your project, where does it stop?”

  “We’re not asking you to endorse it, just announce it,” said Diane. “Just tell them about the quilt and let them decide whether they want to help.”

  “Many of your guild members have known Sylvia for years,” said Summer, bewildered. “Don’t you think they would want to know about her bridal quilt?”

  “Don’t you think once they see the finished quilt they’ll be ticked off that you kept them from participating?” Diane added.

  Mary Beth regarded her sourly. “If those few members of my guild are such good friends of Sylvia’s, I’m sure you have their addresses and can contact them individually. Our guild happens to be very busy, so regardless of their feelings for Sylvia, we would appreciate it if non-members didn’t come around begging for blocks.”

  “How would you know if you never ask them?” Diane protested. “If they don’t want to participate, fine, but you won’t even give them the chance to refuse for themselves!”

  The consternation and outrage on Diane’s face were priceless, but Mary Beth had completed her errand and refused to waste time in debate. “Make sure to take our address off your mailing list,” she told Summer over her shoulder as she turned and left the shop. The chime rang again as the door closed behind her. From the safety of the sidewalk, she stole a glance through the front window in time to see Summer throwing the invitation into the trash where it belonged.

  Later, over supper, she glowed as she shared the story of her triumph with Roger and Brent. “It felt so good to put Diane in her place,” she said. “I’m sure those blocks scattered all over the cutting table are supposed to be for Sylvia’s bridal quilt.”

  Roger and Brent nodded and continued eating.

  “The ones I saw weren’t anything special,” she mused aloud. “I guess those Elm Creek people aren’t the wonderful teachers they consider themselves to be. Or the people who sent the blocks didn’t send their best work, which doesn’t say much for how they regard Sylvia.”

  “Or they were beginners,” said Roger, reaching for another piece of chicken, “and that was their best work.”

  “That couldn’t possibly be the case,” said Mary Beth. “Beginners know better than to ruin a group quilt with their sloppy blocks.”

  “It’s a gift to congratulate a bride and groom, not a masterpiece to display in a show. If beginners want to express their good wishes, they shouldn’t be criticized for the number of stitches per inch they use.”

  “Stitches per inch refers to quilting, not piecing,” snapped Mary Beth. “Which just shows you don’t know anything about it.”

  “Mom, you’ve been going on about this stupid quilt for months,” said Brent. “You should really just forget about it. It’s not that big of a deal.”

  “It is a big deal. Diane and those Elm Creek Quilters think they’re the best thing that ever happened to quilting in Waterford. They dismiss everything my guild has done for this town as inconsequential, as if quilting didn’t exist in the Elm Creek Valley before their ridiculous quilt camp.”

  Only then did Mary Beth realize that this was what bothered her most—not that the Elm Creek Quilters included Diane in their circle, because for all she knew they kept her around for comic relief, but that they excluded her—and not just Mary Beth but her closest friends and the organization to which she had devoted countless hours and immeasurable energy. The Elm Creek Quilters held themselves aloof and superior up in that grand old manor, snubbing the Waterford Quilt Guild—except for paying customers—until they needed a favor.

  She knew Roger would disagree with her interpretation, so she didn’t share it with him. Anyway, the matter was settled. The Elm Creek Quilters would have to stitch that bridal sampler for Sylvia without help from Mary Beth or her guild, and with any luck, she would never hear another word about it.

  But luck was not on her side, and Diane proved to be as unwilling as Mary Beth to let things go.

  A little more than two weeks later, at the guild’s monthly meeting, Mary Beth’s cell phone went off in the middle of her introductory remarks. Since all of her friends were present and Roger and Brent were under strict orders never to interrupt a meeting, she could only assume it was an emergency.

  Heart racing, she turned the program over to the vice president, dashed into the hallway, and accepted the call even though she did not recognize the number. She heard only silence. “Hello?” she said. “Who’s there?” Still nothing.

  She held on for a moment just in case it was a bad connection, but eventually she hung up and returned to the meeting—only to find Diane at the podium reading the block request letter to a very attentive audience.

  Horrified, Mary Beth wrested the microphone away, but after Diane blurted out a few last taunts and made a hasty retreat, she struggled in vain to restore order. The guild turned on her, demanding to know why she had not told them about the Elm Creek Quilters’ request, shouting down her attempts to explain, protesting that it was her fault they had barely enough time to sew a block for Sylvia, which, apparently, every single quilter in the room wanted to do. Distressed, realizing that she had irrevocably lost control of the meeting, she handed the microphone to her vice president and fled.

  She drove home in a daze. In the safety of her living room, she clung to Roger and sobbed out her tale of woe. The commotion drew Brent downstairs from his bedroom. He sat beside her on the sofa, wide-eyed and incredulous, as the story of her humiliation spilled from her.

  Roger stroked her back and sighed. “I guess maybe now you’ll finally drop this silly feud with the Sonnenbergs.”

  “Dad,” protested Brent. “She’s upset.”

  “That’s your response?” Mary Beth pulled away from her husband and reached for the box of tissues on the end table. “Your wife is dishonored in front of all her friends, and that’s how you respond?”

  “What do you want me to do? Run next door and challenge Tim to a duel?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. This is between me and that—that evil witch. How can you call it a silly feud? It’s much more than that, and that woman’s behavior tonight proves it.”

  Dabbing at her eyes, she told Brent that she did not want him to spend time with Diane’s son anymore. He protested that none of this was Todd’s fault, and they had midterms coming up, and they always studied together. “We’re partners for the physics project,” he added. “Not to mention he’s been my best friend since the second grade.”

  Mary Beth sniffled into her tissue. She hated to disappoint her s
on. “Well—”

  “Please, Mom. This way, I might overhear her if she plans anything else.”

  “By all means,” said Roger, exasperated. “Let’s spy on the neighbors.”

  “If she tries anything else, I’m pressing charges.” Still, Brent had a point. “All right. You can still be friends with Todd under one condition. If that woman says a single word against me, you’ll defend me.” Unlike her husband. She glared at Roger, but he had collapsed against the sofa cushions and was shaking his head at the ceiling.

  “I promise,” said Brent solemnly.

  And that, she later realized, had been the point of no return.

  Mary Beth swallowed hard, fighting back the all-too-familiar taste of remorse and shame. Why had she made defending her honor a condition of Brent’s friendship with Todd? She had only meant for him to speak up for her, certainly nothing more than that. She should have been more specific. She should have taught him better so that she would not have needed to clarify, as one would to a toddler, that he should use his words, not his hands.

  No. She should have left her son out of it entirely, as Diane had.

  As Mary Beth later learned, Diane had never drawn Todd into their escalating conflict. He had not known that his mother had disrupted the guild meeting, or even that she and Mary Beth disliked each other, until Brent told him several days afterward, blurting out an accusation like opening a release valve on pressurized anger and resentment. How much worse Brent had felt when Todd’s utter bewilderment proved that the hostilities tormenting his mother were so inconsequential to Todd’s mother that she had never even mentioned them.

  The snowfall was steadily increasing, the small icy crystals on her windshield giving way to thicker, wetter flakes. Mary Beth switched on her wipers as she turned onto Church Street and drove uphill, leaving campus and the defunct quilt shop behind. When the news first broke of the incident at Grandma’s Attic, she assumed that Bonnie and her staff would clean up and restore order, and everything would go on as before. She had not known that the store had been struggling for years. She never would have guessed that one act of thoughtless cruelty could push it over the edge.

  On the morning of April 2, one day after the deadline to submit blocks for Sylvia’s bridal sampler had passed, Mary Beth was eating breakfast with her family before Roger left for work and Brent for school. “Here’s something you’ll enjoy,” said Roger, folding the front section of the newspaper and sliding it across the table to Mary Beth.

  “What is it?” asked Mary Beth, dubious. She rarely read more of the news pages than the headlines; the national stories were always so depressing and the world news inscrutable.

  Roger reached across the table and tapped the weekly police report. “What?” Mary Beth said, and then words leapt off the page: One week before, Grandma’s Attic had been robbed and vandalized. The cash register had been emptied and the previous day’s receipts, which the proprietor usually deposited in the bank after closing but had failed to do on that day of all days, had been taken from the office. Although more had been damaged than stolen, assorted tools and equipment were missing, as was a carton of quilt blocks.

  Mary Beth gave a start. The police report was deliberately vague, but the missing quilt blocks surely were the contributions for Sylvia’s bridal quilt.

  “I heard it was a real mess,” Brent offered, watching her intently as she read.

  “This is the first I’ve heard of it.” She should have been informed immediately. Bonnie was no longer a member of the guild, but this crime was relevant to the Waterford quilting community, and Mary Beth was the center of the Waterford quilting community. She slid the paper back to her husband. “Why on earth would you assume I would enjoy reading this?”

  He feigned innocence. “Bonnie Markham’s one of those Elm Creek people, right?”

  “Yes, but that doesn’t mean I’d celebrate her misfortune.” She frowned when her husband and son exchanged a look of surprise. Honestly, what did they take her for?

  Brent shook his head, baffled. “You never shop there anymore. You’re always talking about how much you hate them.”

  “And now they’ll be too busy to interfere with your quilt guild,” said Roger.

  “And that quilt for old Mrs. Compson,” Brent added. “Now they won’t be able to bother you about that stupid quilt anymore.”

  There was that. Still, she liked Bonnie, and it was unsettling that the criminals had targeted a quilt shop. Why a quilt shop, when robbers usually focused on convenience stores and gas stations? It was unnatural, a strike at the heartland, at home and family and all that quilting represented.

  And what did it say about her that her husband and son assumed she would find any robbery and vandalism in their small town a cause for celebration?

  Although she had not realized it, the pieces were falling into place.

  First, there was the break-in.

  Next, Brent surprised her with an early Mother’s Day present—a new Bernina, the sewing machine of her dreams, with a computer touch screen and all the features and attachments she would ever need. He claimed he had bought it for fifty dollars at a garage sale.

  Then, soon thereafter, Diane phoned to ask if Brent knew anything about the incident at Grandma’s Attic. Diane’s key to the shop had disappeared from her purse after Brent had spent the night at their house, the day before the break-in. And since the police had found no signs of forced entry—

  “How dare you!” Mary Beth snapped.

  “I’m sorry. I know this is a terrible thing to suggest, but—”

  “My son was here at home that entire night. What about your son?”

  “Todd was—”

  “Not Todd. Michael. He’s the troublemaker in this town. Everyone knows his reputation. I bet this wouldn’t be the first time he took your keys.”

  A careful pause. “You would be right, but he assures me he had nothing to do with it.”

  “He assures you. Oh, that’s rich.”

  “Please, Mary Beth, just talk to Brent.”

  “I’m hanging up now.”

  She slammed down the phone and clutched the back of a chair for support, head spinning. That nasty, spiteful, vicious woman! She knew for a fact that Brent had been asleep in his own bed that night; not that it mattered, because he absolutely could not have been involved, he was always home on weeknights. Except . . .

  Mary Beth felt a chill. The robbery had occurred during spring break. Brent and a friend had spent the night of the break-in at another friend’s house.

  That was what he had told her. Why shouldn’t she believe him? She did believe him, but just to be sure, she invented an excuse to phone the other boys’ parents.

  Brent’s alibi quickly fell apart.

  That still didn’t prove he was involved—and yet. The new, very expensive sewing machine. The missing blocks for the bridal quilt Mary Beth had spent weeks denouncing.

  Apprehension and uncertainty plagued her, but she dared not ask him outright, so deeply afraid she was of what he might say, what truth he might confess or implausible lie he might invent.

  And what of poor Bonnie? Mary Beth had learned through her few remaining quilting friends that Bonnie’s insurance claim had been denied because the police suspected it was an inside job. She was holding a special sale in hopes of raising enough cash to pay off her debts and avoid bankruptcy, but rumor had it that little salvageable inventory remained. Even if she sold every item on the shelves and then sold the shelves as well, she could not possibly earn enough.

  Could Brent have played a role in inflicting this misery upon Bonnie? Surely not. He was just a boy.

  And yet.

  In her last official act as guild president, Mary Beth sent out an email to all members, soliciting donations of fabric, notions, books, and other like-new items for Bonnie to sell at her shop. Then she sent out another email, a copy of the Elm Creek Quilters’ request for contributions to Sylvia’s bridal quilt, to which she added her
apologies for failing to tell them sooner and her hopes that the guild would be well represented in the finished quilt despite the late notice. Then she gathered up the guild’s files, turned them over to the vice president, and submitted her resignation. She heard later that the sale had been a great success, thanks to the enhanced inventory.

  Eventually the police came calling.

  Although the other two boys’ parents cooperated with the investigation, Mary Beth balked. She insisted that Brent had been home at the time of the incident, even when the officers informed her that his friends disputed that claim. Brent refused to answer any questions about that night, not for the police, and not for his parents. Tearfully Mary Beth begged him to tell her something, anything, that she could use to disprove the accusations, which could not possibly be true. “I don’t care if you were drinking beer in the arboretum,” she choked out, for she suspected he and Will and Greg spent many summer nights doing exactly that. She had always looked the other way.

  Brent gave her one long, bleak, wordless look, dragged himself upstairs to his room, and shut the door.

  “Mary Beth, honey.” Roger came up from behind her and took her in his arms. Tears glistened in his eyes. “He doesn’t have another explanation to give. He did it. We both know he did it.”

  She nodded, unable to speak. They held each other and wept. Then they calmed themselves, dried their eyes, and called the police.

  Soon thereafter, realizing his mother would no longer support his lies, Brent confessed the truth. The new evidence allowed Bonnie to dispute the insurance company’s ruling, and they soon overturned their original decision and paid her in full. But although their decision kept Bonnie from bankruptcy, it came too late to save Grandma’s Attic.