Elm Creek Quilts [09] Circle of Quilters (36 page)

After she heard Sylvia and her companion continue on their way, Gretchen wrapped up her little talk and bade the quilters good-bye. She left the manor, returned to her car, and sat in the driver’s seat watching campers pass in and out of the back door, reflecting upon the chance encounter with a beautiful quilt she had, in a sense, helped create. But how different it appeared from her own quilt and from those of her eight Dogtooth Violet students! She had encouraged them to use floral calicoes and solids in class, and her most daring student had only ventured as far as a geometric, tone-on-tone palette. As a result, her students’ quilts resembled differently hued versions of her own rather than an entirely new expression of their individual creativity. What might they have created if she had not steered them toward her own preferences? What might she have learned from them?

Had her resentment of Heidi’s rejection of her favorite traditional fabrics blinded her to an entire world of artistic possibilities?

For years, she had clung stubbornly to her favorite blocks and fabrics as if she had to fight Heidi for the right to use them. Would they have remained her favorites if not for that? Would Gretchen’s tastes have evolved naturally over time if she had not felt obligated to defend her first choices?

Had her refusal to capitulate to Heidi allowed her to stagnate as an artist?

It was an uncomfortable thought, but she forced herself to face it. For years, she had defined her quilts in opposition to Heidi’s instead of striking out on her own independent path. Her designs were fine; the chance encounter in the manor had proven that. But what might her quilts be today if not for her relationship with Heidi? In the very act of struggling to avoid Heidi’s influence, she had allowed Heidi’s tastes to define her own.

With still more than an hour to go before her interview, Gretchen ate the sandwich and apple she had packed for lunch, wishing she had remembered to bring along something to drink and that she had not left home so early. With too much time to fill,
her thoughts bounded from her new uncertainty about her growth as a quilter to the heightened importance of her forthcoming interview until her stomach was in knots.

A continued tour of the manor seemed out of the question, not that Gretchen really believed she was likely to run into anything else as disconcerting as she had already experienced that day. Still, she could not remain in the car working herself into a state of nerves or she would be in no condition to meet the Elm Creek Quilters. She left the car, shutting the door firmly behind her, and strode briskly away from the manor, across the bridge over the creek, past the red banked barn, and into the orchard, where already fruit was ripening. The fragrance of the apples and the sound of birdsong restored her sense of calm, and she resolved to put forth her best effort in the interview.

She prepared for their questions as she wandered among the rows of Red Delicious and Jonathan apple trees, rehearsing possible answers and points she intended to raise if the interviewers did not. With still more than a half hour to go, she returned to the manor in time to witness the back door open with a bang and the bearded man from the ballroom emerge, briefcase in hand. He strode across the parking lot and climbed into a newer model blue car, shaking his head in either disgust or disbelief. She instinctively turned aside as he drove past, but he did not appear to even notice her, much less recognize her as the presumptuous woman making herself too much at home at the front of an impromptu Elm Creek Quilt Camp class.

With any luck, Sylvia would have the same reaction. Gretchen stopped by her car for her purse and the accordion file containing her Elm Creek Quilts block, steeled herself, and returned to the manor. When she passed the kitchen, she glimpsed two of the young men from the banquet hall scrubbing pots halfheartedly while another swept the floor. Her fingers itched to take the broom and demonstrate the proper technique, but she left him to it.

Assuming that one of the Elm Creek Quilters would expect to
meet her at the front door, she headed toward the front foyer, but just before she reached it, she heard voices coming from a room on her left. She glanced through the open doorway and discovered the Elm Creek Quilters gathered within a charming Victorian parlor. She paused and rapped twice on the open door.

“Hello,” she greeted them, smiling as they looked up from an intense conversation. “I’m Gretchen Hartley. I’ve come for an interview. I realize I’m a bit early. Should I wait outside?”

“No, come right in,” said a brunette in her thirties, whom Gretchen recognized as Sarah McClure, one of the founders of Elm Creek Quilts. “Our last interview ended early.”

She said the last with a disapproving frown for an attractive blonde woman at least ten years her senior, who responded with a pout of injured innocence.

“Please sit down,” said Sylvia Compson, gesturing to an armchair on the other side of a coffee table from the Elm Creek Quilters. Gretchen nodded and took her seat. She waited nervously during the few moments the Elm Creek Quilters took to rearrange papers and files. Before long, Sarah looked around the group, noted that everyone was ready to begin, and turned to Gretchen with a smile and a request to describe her quilting experience.

At sixty-six, Gretchen had a lot of history to share. She told them about the old days, when she felt as if she was the only woman who quilted anymore, and how the quilting revival had brought her new opportunities to teach and lecture. She described the founding of Quilts ’n Things, carefully selecting details to avoid any appearance of conflict with Heidi. She reflected upon how she had traveled to quilt guilds, conferences, and trade shows—to teach and to learn, to observe shifting trends in the modern quilting world, and to pass on the traditions that previous generations had bequeathed her. This wealth of experience made her uniquely qualified to become an Elm Creek Quilter.

Or at least that was what she tried to tell them. Joe had made
her promise to promote herself as if she were praising her best friend, but Gretchen had been brought up to believe that no one liked a woman who bragged, that confidence was often mistaken for arrogance, and that it was always best to err on the side of modesty and allow others to sing her praises on her behalf. She struggled to articulate how much she had to offer Elm Creek Quilts, but to her own ears her voice sounded meek and humble, as if she felt undeserving of the honor of their presence, as if she knew she were only Heidi Mueller’s cleaning lady suffering delusions of grandeur. For the first time since childhood, she wished she were more like Heidi, who never allowed anyone to see her disturbed by a moment of self-doubt.

“I’m familiar with the Quilts ’n Things pattern line,” said Sarah. “Have you published any of your designs?”

“No.” Compelled to be completely honest, Gretchen added, “I have submitted designs to my business partner, who makes the selections, but she didn’t believe my quilts fit in with the rest of the line.”

“And yet your patterns are being distributed by your former students and enjoyed by others,” remarked Sylvia. “Or so I overheard earlier today. I’m surprised you didn’t mention it.”

Gretchen shrugged. “I didn’t think that counted. And—I didn’t want to brag.”

Several Elm Creek Quilters exchanged smiles of amusement. “This is an occasion when bragging is perfectly acceptable,” Sarah told her.

“I understand,” said Gretchen. “But bragging isn’t something that comes naturally to me.”

“That much is apparent,” said Sylvia, the corners of her mouth turning in the barest hint of a smile. “In fact, you must be the most inappropriately unassuming quilter I’ve ever met. You talk about how the quilting revival gave you so many opportunities, and yet never once do you point out that without quilters such as yourself nurturing and passing on the traditions of quilting, that
revival never would have come to be. Elm Creek Quilt Camp itself likely never would have existed without quilters like you.”

For a moment, the praise from her former teacher left Gretchen speechless. “And quilters like you,” she said to Sylvia when she had recovered.

Sylvia nodded her thanks, and a look of understanding passed between them.

“That’s all well and good,” said the pretty woman with the blond curls, “but let’s not overstate things.”

“By all means, let’s hear it,” declared Gwen, whom Gretchen recalled as an outspoken woman inclined to make innovative, artsy quilts of the sort Heidi preferred. “You certainly haven’t minced words with any of our other applicants. Why start now?”

“Because she made our last applicant flee for his life,” said Judy, gesturing toward the door.

Diane raised her hands in appeasement. “I admit I’ve challenged our applicants. We should. We’re Elm Creek Quilts. We ought to have the most rigorous hiring procedure around.”

Sylvia regarded Diane sternly over the rims of her glasses. “Thorough questioning is important, dear, but so are respect and diplomacy.”

“Of course,” said Diane, a faint flush appearing on her cheeks as she studied a copy of Gretchen’s résumé. “I agree that you deserve some credit for keeping quilting alive through a long dry spell, Gretchen, but isn’t it true that your style never really left the late seventies?”

Gwen shook her head and sighed.

“Diane,” warned Sarah. “Tread carefully.”

Gretchen forced herself to remain perfectly still in her chair, against her better instincts that were shouting at her to follow the previous applicant’s example and flee for the door. “If you’re suggesting my quilts are traditional, I accept that. Willingly. But I must add that my traditional quilts and traditional ways appeal to
many quilters. My students’ achievements and my full lecture schedule are proof of that.”

“You say traditional,” said Diane. “I say old-fashioned. If I had not been warned to use tact, I might have said dowdy or frumpy instead. I definitely would have said boring.”

“That is quite enough,” said Sylvia. “Do I have to ask you to leave?”

“I won’t leave before asking her about this.” Diane pulled a sheet of paper from the file on her lap. Gretchen could not read what was printed upon it, but it brought uncertainty to the Elm Creek Quilters’ expressions. “You might not like my tactics, but you have to admit this raises doubts about her qualifications to teach for us—and her truthfulness.”

Gretchen could not imagine what she was talking about. Every detail of her résumé was true, if understated. Her students’ letters of recommendation praised her so highly that she had almost been too embarrassed to include them in her packet.

“Even if you don’t care for my quilts,” said Gretchen, breaking into the sudden silence, “I hope you can agree that my artistic style and my teaching ability are two very different things. My skills are sound whether or not you like what I do with them. I have taught for a very long time, and I’ve taught many different types of students successfully.”

“Not everyone thinks so.”

Gretchen stared at Diane in confusion. What on earth could she mean?

“Allow me to share a few excerpts from an employer evaluation.” Diane frowned at the page in her hand. “‘Mrs. Hartley runs her classes in a strict, didactic fashion and is impatient with questions…. She is short-tempered and sarcastic with anyone who suggests modernizing her patterns or techniques…. Her classes are the least popular of those offered at our shop and the drop-off in attendance each week is significant.’ Shall I go on?”

Gretchen felt tears welling up in her eyes. The letter had said
“our shop.”
Heidi
had written those hateful things about her. “You called Quilts ’n Things?” she managed to say. “You told them I’m applying for this job?”

Diane regarded her incredulously, and Gretchen realized that the first words from her lips should have been an emphatic denial. Now it appeared that she agreed with the evaluation and was distressed only because the Elm Creek Quilters had discovered the truth.

“Of course we called the shop,” said Diane. “We had to check your references. You only had two, and everyone from your era retired from the Ambridge School District a long time ago.”

Gretchen blinked back the tears and cleared her throat. “I have no idea why my employer said those things, unless she’s angry that I’m looking for another job. All I can tell you is that those—those things are simply not true.”

“Indeed,” said Sylvia dryly. “One wonders why she has kept you on so many years if you are so dreadful a teacher.”

“One wonders something else,” said Sarah, studying Diane.

“Why would you of all people want to undermine Gretchen’s chances for this job? You’re an old-school quilter yourself. For years you’ve been telling us to offer more hand-piecing classes, more hand-quilting workshops. I’ve heard you say that only quilts made entirely by hand are true quilts. And here we have an applicant who is everything you say you want. Why aren’t you begging us to offer her the job?”

“That’s right,” said Summer, her expression taking on a new light of understanding. “You’re not only nasty to the quilters you don’t want to hire. You’re nasty to everyone.”

Warily, Diane looked around the circle of suspicious quilters.

“I’m just a nasty person.”

“True,” cried Gwen. “You heard her admit it. I didn’t say it this time. She said it herself.”

Sylvia sighed, rose from her chair, and sat beside Diane. “The
jig is up, my dear,” she said gently, taking Diane’s hand. “Why don’t you tell us what this has been all about?”

Diane maintained her expression of wide-eyed innocence for only a moment before it crumpled into distress. “I don’t want to hire anyone.”

“Of course, dear.” Sylvia patted Diane’s hand. “I understand.”

Gretchen didn’t, and by the look of things, neither did the other Elm Creek Quilters, who seemed to have forgotten her. She was so relieved that the subject had shifted from Heidi’s malicious letter that she sat motionless in her chair rather than remind them of her presence.

Diane ran her index finger below her eyelids to prevent her mascara from smearing. “It was working,” she told Sylvia defensively.