Elm Creek Quilts [04] The Runaway Quilt (14 page)

I did not wish to dance with him, but I could not refuse without good reason, so I gave him my hand and allowed him to escort me to the dance. He was a fine dancer, much better than I, but his lead was strong and confident enough that I managed to avoid treading on his feet. Rather than strike up a conversation with me, he directed his attention to his friends, who exchanged greetings and jokes in passing. I had no objection to this, for it
was a complicated dance that required my full attention, and moreover I could not think of any particular subject I wished to discuss with him. He seemed satisfied that I smiled at his silly jokes.

I thought I was faring rather well, until he said, “You are accomplished in so many things. I had expected dancing to be one of them.”

“I’m sorry to disappoint you,” said I shortly. I had at that moment spotted Jonathan partnered for yet another dance with the pretty dark-haired girl.

“I would not call it disappointment, merely surprise,” said he. “Perhaps in your youth you should have been practicing your dancing instead of sharpening your wit.”

I halted at once and released his hand. “Perhaps you should have been practicing your manners.” I meant to leave him there in the middle of the dance, but my grand gesture was spoiled by the musicians, who chose that moment to end their song.

I marched back to our quilt, fuming and wishing I had stayed home, when suddenly Jonathan appeared before me. “Are you free for this dance?”

“Oh, she’s free,” drawled Mr. Pearson, behind me. “Good luck, Doctor.”

Jonathan watched him as he brushed by us, and then looked questioningly at me. Embarrassed, I took his arm and urged him toward the dance floor before he could ask me to explain.

In Baden-Baden I had learned to be amusing on the dance floor since I could not be graceful, and what I lacked in comeliness, I believe I more than made up for in wit. Jonathan seemed to enjoy himself well enough in my company; he smiled much more with me than with his previous partner, and I made him laugh out loud where the dark-haired girl had only made him smile. And yet, after two dances with me, he escorted me back to the quilt and requested a dance with Anneke, followed by one
with his sister, and then the dark-haired girl was on his arm again.

“Her name is Charlotte Claverton,” murmured Anneke as I watched them dance.

I had thought my observation discreet, and so Anneke’s awareness of my interest bothered me. “Is it,” said I, feigning indifference, but glad that Anneke had, in my absence, apparently asked the questions I could not.

“Her family’s farm lies adjacent to the farm of Jonathan’s and Dorothea’s parents. He has known Charlotte all her life.”

“We must endeavor to make her acquaintance, then,” said I. “I would surely like any friend of Dorothea’s.”

“I did not tell you this so that you might become her friend,” said Anneke. “I told you so you would not worry. If he has known her all his life, surely if he meant to marry her, he would have asked her by now.”

My hopes, which until that day I had been unwilling to admit even to myself, rose. I nodded, unable to find words in my relief. Anneke smiled reassuringly, and just then, I caught Dorothea’s eye. She smiled her serene smile and resumed conversing with Thomas, but I wondered how much she had overheard.

As afternoon turned into evening, I danced again with Jonathan, and with my brother, but I was happiest with Jonathan. Other men invited me to dance, too, but it was not until later that I realized I had been quite a popular partner that night. I would have enjoyed myself enormously if I had noticed, and if I had not been acutely aware that Jonathan seemed to be at Charlotte’s side at least as often as mine.

The hour grew late, and one by one, the families from the most distant farms began to depart. At last Charlotte rode off in a wagon with her father and mother, and only then did Jonathan remain with me. He was an attentive and courteous escort,
and so I repeated Anneke’s reassurances to myself and tried to forget young Charlotte with her shining dark hair and graceful figure.

Not long after Charlotte’s departure, the Nelsons bid us good night. Jonathan walked with Hans, Anneke, and me to our wagon before heading for his own home. Anneke gave me a look that implied this was of great significance, but I had to wonder if he would have helped me into our wagon if Charlotte had remained, or if he would have assisted her instead.

On the drive home, Anneke deliberately avoided Hans’s eye and said to me, “I overheard many compliments of your dress.”

I was ashamed that in my distraction with Jonathan I had forgotten my sister-in-law’s problem. “I have you and your skill with the needle to thank,” replied I.

“And our parents,” remarked Hans. “Don’t forget, they provided the fabric for that fine dress. Fabric I intended to sell in town to pay for our new house.”

There was only a mild rebuke in his words, so I quickly added, “Mrs. Engle, especially, admired your sewing.”

“I spoke with her myself,” said Anneke. “She said she would have work for me in her dressmaker’s shop, if I am so inclined.”

“Did she,” said Hans. “What about your work at home?”

“Whatever work she cannot do, I can, as well as my own,” said I.

Anneke gave me a grateful look, and said to Hans, “We will get a much better price for your parents’ fabric if I sew it into clothing first.”

Hans looked thoughtful, and for a long while we rode in silence, Anneke and I watching him anxiously. By the time we reached home, he had decided that Anneke would be permitted to assist Mrs. Engle one day each week in her dressmaker’s shop, and that she could dispose of the fabric however she saw fit. “I’m pleased you had the good sense to ignore me when I said
to leave those bolts be,” said he, smiling affectionately at his wife.

I was delighted for Anneke, and pleased that Hans had not let pride get the better of his pragmatism, but in my wistful heart, I wished that someone would smile so affectionately at me, too, and that that someone would be Jonathan.

On the following Sunday afternoon, Sylvia greeted the new campers on the veranda, guiding them inside while impatiently eyeing the circular driveway for the shuttle bus that would bring Grace Daniels back to Elm Creek Manor.

Sylvia and Grace had been friends for more than fifteen years, united by their love for quilting. In addition to her work as a curator for the De Young Museum in San Francisco, Grace was a master quilter who had once specialized in story quilts, folk-art-style appliqué works that interpreted historical stories or themes, often with African-American subjects. Her passion for history had not diminished when multiple sclerosis forced her down a new creative path, and she had long wished to see the quilts from the manor’s past. Grace attended Elm Creek Quilt Camp the same week every year, to reunite with friends she had made on her first visit as well as to see Sylvia. This time, at long last, Sylvia intended to fulfill her promise to show Anneke’s quilts to Grace.

Another airport shuttle bus arrived, and finally Sylvia saw Grace emerge, supporting herself on two metal crutches. Matt spotted her, too, and bounded down one of the semicircular staircases to assist with her luggage. When Sylvia called to her and waved, Grace looked up and called, “When do I get to see the quilts?”

“As soon as you like,” Sylvia promised, delighted to see her
friend looking so well and in such good spirits. Grace rarely spoke about her illness over the phone, leaving Sylvia to wonder how much it had progressed between their visits.

After Grace completed her camp registration, Sylvia instructed Matt to deliver Grace’s bags to her room. Then, before Grace’s friends could whisk her off for their annual reunion, Sylvia invited her to the west sitting room off the kitchen, where she had laid out the quilts in anticipation of Grace’s visit.

“What a find, Sylvia,” exclaimed Grace when she saw the quilts. She studied them without speaking, occasionally lifting a corner up to the light or bending close to inspect a particular scrap of fabric. Every so often she jotted notes on a pad, then returned her attention to the quilts.

“Well?” prompted Sylvia.

“I don’t suppose you’d consider donating these to the museum?”

“Absolutely not,” declared Sylvia, then conceded, “Not yet, at least. I might consider leaving them to you in my will, since I know you’ll take good care of them.”

“In that case, I’m willing to wait a long time.” With effort, Grace sat down on the sofa beside the Log Cabin quilt and turned it over, searching the muslin backing for an appliquéd tag or embroidery, just as Sylvia had done weeks earlier. She shook her head when she found neither. “I wish the quilter had documented her work.”

“There might be a record of their history, even so.” Sylvia retrieved the slim leather book from her writing desk and handed it to Grace. “My father’s great-aunt Gerda’s memoir. I believe my great-grandmother Anneke Bergstrom made the quilts, and I hope Gerda wrote about them.”

Grace glanced at the first page. “That would definitely help determine their dates of origin.”

“Can’t you do that by inspection?”

Grace shook her head and returned the memoir to Sylvia. “Only to some extent. The pattern choices tell us something, and I can place the fabrics, but I can’t determine when the quilts were pieced from them. Think about how long you’ve had some of the fabric in your stash. The material might be from 1987, but your quilt will be completed in the twenty-first century.”

“Of course.” Sylvia thought of the Tumbling Block quilt she had begun earlier that summer with hundreds of diamonds trimmed from scraps used over several decades of quilt making. Fortunately, she always embroidered her name and date in the border of her quilts, so no one would mistake who had made them, or when.

“There are some fabulous examples of the dye and discharge process in here,” said Grace, touching several of the logs gently. Her finger lighted on a yellow fabric with a small, close print. “This was called a butterscotch print. They were popular in Pennsylvania from around 1840 through 1860.”

Sylvia nodded, pleased that the dates corresponded so well to Gerda’s time.

“Prussian blue,” continued Grace, indicating several scraps in turn. “Here’s a turkey red, and here’s another. Oh, I’ve seen this purple print before, or one very like it. It’s probably imported.”

Sylvia frowned at the brown fabric. “That doesn’t look very purple to me.”

“The dye was fugitive. All of these”—Grace pointed to several different brown pieces, some dark prints on light backgrounds, others medium in value and embellished with small, white floral designs—“were purples once.”

An awful feeling struck Sylvia. “Is it possible that the black center squares were not originally black?”

“No,” said Grace, studying the quilt thoughtfully, “I don’t believe so.”

Relieved, Sylvia inhaled deeply to settle her nerves and asked,
“What about the other quilts? I’ve spotted some of the same fabric in all three.”

“Yes, I noticed that, too.” Grace looked from the Log Cabin quilt to the four-patch and then to the Birds in the Air, examining the quilting stitches closely. “They seem to be the same age, but I don’t believe the same quilter made all three. Even accounting for a quilter’s improvement with practice, the quilting stitches in the Log Cabin and the Birds in the Air aren’t as accomplished as those in the four-patch. And, of course, the Log Cabin and Birds in the Air are machine-pieced. I’m surprised you didn’t mention that.”

“I didn’t realize it.”

Grace must have detected her dismay, for she smiled. “Don’t worry. That doesn’t mean they weren’t completed in your great-grandmother’s time. Quilters have been piecing by machine for as long as there have been sewing machines.”

“One of my Elm Creek Quilters won’t be happy to learn that,” said Sylvia dryly, thinking of Diane, who insisted that only quilts made entirely by hand could be considered “true quilts.”

“She’s not the only one. Many people become uncomfortable when they discover their traditions are founded on shaky ground.”

“My great-grandmother did own a sewing machine, but if different quilters made the three quilts, I suspect Anneke made the four-patch and Gerda made the Log Cabin.” Family lore attributed the Log Cabin quilt to Anneke, but it seemed the most logical explanation. “I’m not sure about the Birds in the Air.”

“The piecing quality is inconsistent,” noted Grace, “as is the quilting. Maybe they worked on this one together.”

“Of the two, Anneke was the better seamstress. Gerda—Hans’s sister—quilted only because she had to. She despised sewing.”

“She must not have despised it too much. Whoever made the Log Cabin put a great deal of care into it.”

“I should think so.” Sylvia gave Grace a pointed look over the top of her glasses. “I’ve told you my great-aunt Lucinda’s story about this quilt.”

“And I’ve given my professional opinion about that story,” replied Grace. “It’s highly unlikely that Log Cabin quilts with black center squares were used as signals on the Underground Railroad. The block didn’t even come into widespread use until the 1860s, years after the Underground Railroad functioned as it did in the time leading up to the Civil War. I’ve looked, and the earliest published description of the Log Cabin block I could find was in 1869.”

“That hardly matters,” scoffed Sylvia. “Patterns were transmitted from quilter to quilter long before they were printed up in magazines and newspapers. Have you ever been to the Carnegie Natural History Museum in Pittsburgh?”

The apparent change in subject clearly baffled Grace. “What?”

“The Carnegie Natural History Museum in Pittsburgh. The Egyptian exhibit, to be precise. I saw the mummy of a cat there once, and its wrappings were made up of tiny folded Log Cabin quilt blocks.”

“I don’t deny that the design itself might have existed, but I’ll guarantee you the Egyptians didn’t call it a Log Cabin block.”

Grace’s painstaking distinctions made Sylvia impatient. “But why, then, do so many stories—not merely my great-aunt’s—describe Log Cabin quilts with black center squares used on the Underground Railroad?”

“Unfortunately, most of these stories are based upon misdated quilts.” Grace sighed. “Look. I’m a quilter, I’m an African-American, and I’m someone who loves a good story, but I’m also a historian, and I have to go by the evidence in the historical
record. Until now, there haven’t been any surviving quilts of that era meeting that description.”