A Drunkard's Path

by Clare O'Donohue

  She nodded, scratched out White’s class on my form, and added the other one. “The teacher for that course is really very good,” she said, and gave me a sympathetic smile.

  I handed her a check, took my completed form, and vowed to console myself with a big breakfast before heading to work. I made my way past the line that had formed behind me, just in time to hear another disappointed budding artist plead his case to the registrar.

  I was heading into the parking lot and toward my car when I caught sight of an older man walking to the school. Without any idea what I was going to say, I ran over to him.

  “Mr. White?”

  He looked down at me. “And who would you be?”

  “Nell Fitzgerald. I met you last night at the opening.”

  I reached out to shake his hand, but I realized too late that I was still holding my quilt blocks.

  “Ouch.” He pulled back and removed a needle from his palm. “What’s all this?” He took the blocks from my hand. As he examined my snowmen and Santas, I briefly considered running. Instead I stood there, staring at the ground, humiliated by the idea that my silly little paintings were being seen by one of the best artists in the country.

  “These are on fabric,” he said. “What are you going to do with them?”

  “I’m making a quilt,” I said quietly.

  He looked at me. “You make quilts?”

  “This is going to be my first, if I can get it done.”

  “Are you self-taught or do you have a teacher?”

  “My grandmother. You met her last night.”

  “I remember.”

  “She owns a quilt shop in Archers Rest,” I said. “I work there part time, and I’m trying to take some art classes.” Stop talking, I kept saying to myself. He doesn’t care about my grandmother or my ambitions.

  He took one more look at my blocks then returned them to me. “You should take my class, then.”

  I nodded. “I tried. It was all full up.”

  He took a deep breath. “And that stopped you? How disappointing.”

  He started to walk away. My embarrassment was overtaken by my curiosity, and I followed him.

  “Did I have a choice? I can’t just show up at the class.”

  He stopped. “You want to learn. I want to teach. It seems like a perfect match to me.” He sighed. “Of course if you don’t want to play . . .”

  “I do,” I insisted. “I came here two hours early, and I still didn’t get in. Are you saying I should just show up?”

  “When I was a young artist I didn’t let anything stand in the way of my dream. It mattered more to me than anything in the world. Perhaps that isn’t the case with you. But in my experience a truly dedicated artist doesn’t allow for any interference in his dream.”

  He walked away, leaving me wondering if he was issuing a dare or a warning.

  CHAPTER 4

  “I’m looking for a batting that will give this an old-fashioned look.” A woman spread a flying geese quilt top across the counter. It was made of reproduction fabrics that I recognized from our inventory.

  “Civil War collection,” I said confidently. “One of my favorites.”

  The woman smiled. “I was in here a few months ago, and I was telling an older woman about my love of antique quilts. But the good ones are getting so expensive.”

  “So she told you, just because you hadn’t inherited one didn’t mean you couldn’t own one,” I said. “That was my grandmother.”

  I walked her over to a large built-in bookcase that had been subdivided into sections. It held all the batting we carried, and we carried it all.

  “We have polyester, cotton, poly-cotton blends, silk, wool, and bamboo,” I said. “Silk is wonderful but pretty expensive. I’d suggest using a cotton batt and then washing the quilt after it’s been quilted. It will give it a puckered antique look.”

  “Wash it?” She practically gasped.

  I smiled. “First quilt? Don’t worry, quilts are like babies,” I said, repeating my grandmother’s mantra. “They’re a lot hardier than they seem.” I pulled down a full-size cotton batt and walked back to the counter. “Anything else?”

  “I guess I need quilting thread,” she said as she stared, blinking, at two large racks of thread.

  I walked her through the difference between hand and machine quilting threads, helped choose a color that would blend into the material and hide a first-timer’s mistakes, and rang up the sale, all with the confidence of an expert. And I was an expert, as long as no one else was in the shop.

  I’d been working at Someday Quilts for only three months, but I’d spent much of that time listening to my grandmother advise customers. The rest of the time I leafed through quilt books and rearranged fabrics, getting ideas for my first quilt—or first through fiftieth since there were already more quilts I wanted to make than I would ever have time for. “Sign of a true quilter,” Eleanor often said to me. Another sign would be actually finishing a quilt.

  Since the shop was quiet, I sat behind the counter and picked up my Christmas blocks to finish piecing them together. Five more blocks and the quilt top, a simple four-by-five block arrangement with sashing, would be done. Or almost done. I still had to add borders and quilt it. Everyone in the quilting group told me how much faster the process would be by machine, but, in truth, the sewing machine intimidated me a little. My grandmother owned several, and while one was a simple Singer Featherweight, the other two were computerized and, to me, complicated. One could even embroider without anyone sitting at the machine, for heaven’s sake. Eleanor, who had never learned to set the clock on her VCR, could operate both as if it were child’s play. One of these days, I promised myself, I would sit down and figure them out.

  I comforted myself with Maggie’s advice that every quilter should learn how to hand piece first. And I had to admit, I was getting the hang of it. I added a reindeer block to a sashing strip in record time.

  “Pretty good there, Nell,” I congratulated myself, and looked up just in time to see someone familiar pass the shop.

  I headed to the door as the Morristown police chief paused to light a cigarette a few feet away from Someday Quilts.

  “Hi,” I said. “Nice to see you again.”

  He looked up, utter confusion in his eyes.

  “I’m a friend of Jesse’s,” I tried to clarify, sounding more like an idiot with each word. “I was at the murder scene the other night.” Ridiculous. I was making it sound like we’d met at a party.

  He walked toward me and held out his gloved hand. “Marty Powell,” he said as he shook my hand. “You’re Dewalt’s girlfriend.”

  I blushed. “I’m . . . I don’t know” was all I got out. That stumped me. I needed a change of subject. “How’s the investigation going?”

  He took a puff of his cigarette. “Slow, but we did get one break. The victim’s name was Lily Harmon. Ever hear of her?”

  “No. But I’ve only lived in town for a few months,” I said. “I’m sure if she were local Jesse would have—”

  “He doesn’t know her either. No one around here does.” He took one last drag and threw his cigarette on the ground. “Strange that she’d come down here to kill herself among strangers.”

  I nodded and said good-bye. I watched him walk in the direction of the police station and I went back inside. I stood in the middle of the shop, staring blankly at the walls. I was supposed to be getting it ready for the quilt club meeting. That meant I was supposed to grab a bunch of chairs from the classroom and put them in a circle and throw on a pot of coffee, but instead I kept going over the conversation in my mind. Or, actually, just two words of it: “down here.” If Powell didn’t know who she was, why did he think she came from north of town?

  “He probably just used it as an expression,” Natalie said when the quilt meeting was under way. She was tired, but these days she was always tired. Natalie had just announced that she was eight weeks pregnant with her second child, and after we’d
exhausted baby name ideas, I told them about running into Chief Powell.

  Natalie sat, munching on cookies, next to her mother, Susanne, a former beauty queen turned doting, and in Natalie’s eyes, too-involved grandmother. Bernie had closed up her pharmacy early, as she always did on Fridays, and was sitting next to Susanne. Maggie and my grandmother rounded out the circle. I hadn’t even bothered to sit down yet because I was busy getting everyone coffee and passing out cookies, which Natalie was eating as fast as I could get them to her. Carrie was the only member of the group not yet in attendance.

  “What kind of an expression is ‘down here’ anyway?” Bernie asked.

  Susanne nodded. “I agree. It’s a bit suspicious.” She leaned forward. “And he wasn’t very nice to my nephew, Richie.”

  “Rich found the body, along with a couple of his friends,” Natalie offered before her mother could finish.

  “What were teenagers doing by the river on a January night?” Eleanor asked.

  “Something they didn’t want anyone to see,” I suggested. “You know, the kind of thing you wouldn’t admit to a cop.”

  “Maybe that’s why Powell wasn’t nice to Richie,” Eleanor said.

  “Maybe he knew he was up to something.”

  “Richie’s a good boy.” Susanne’s voice raised a little. “It’s that cop. I don’t like him.”

  “I’m surprised Jesse is working with him,” Maggie added.

  “Why is Jesse working with him?” Bernie turned to me.

  I was a little embarrassed to admit it, but I did anyway. “I don’t know. Jesse hasn’t told me anything.”

  “Well, he will tomorrow.” Natalie smiled, and with that the conversation turned to where Jesse and I were going on our date, what I was wearing, and whether it would actually happen this time.

  Quilt meetings, I’d learned in the last couple of months, were almost never just about quilting.

  “How late am I?” Carrie burst through the door, carrying a half-finished star quilt.

  “You missed the discussion about the girl in the river, but we’re still on Nell’s love life,” Bernie said cheerfully.

  “Good, then I’m right on time.” Carrie dropped her quilt in a heap and grabbed a cookie.

  “Why don’t we talk about quilting?” I offered, to everyone’s general amusement. “I’m having trouble keeping the sashing straight as I sew.” I held up my Christmas squares.

  “It’ll iron out.” Susanne smiled a slightly mischievous smile.

  “Will it? That’s good news,” I said.

  “No, it won’t.” Eleanor shook her head at Susanne. “That’s just the lie we tell ourselves so we don’t unsew everything. The truth is, when you sew your nose is six inches from the fabric. You notice every imperfection. But once it’s finished, and you take a step back, you won’t remember what was wrong in the first place.”

  “And no one else will either,” Maggie offered.

  I leaned back in my chair as far as I could and stretched the arm holding my blocks. I could still see the imperfections.

  “Are you sure that isn’t another lie we tell ourselves?” I asked.

  Bernie leaned back in her seat. “Speaking of lies, I think it’s interesting that the other sheriff said the girl killed herself.”

  “Don’t start that again,” Eleanor said. “It’ll only encourage her.” She nodded toward me.

  “It will not,” I defended myself. “Besides, I thought of that. He didn’t realize that Jesse had already told me it wasn’t a suicide.”

  Bernie nodded. “I just don’t like the idea of Jesse having his investigation interfered with by an outsider. I think he’s trouble, that sheriff.”

  “Is that a psychic prediction?” Susanne laughed. Bernie often talked about her psychic abilities but rarely was able to demonstrate them.

  Bernie leaned forward toward Susanne. “Mark my words,” she said. “This is the beginning of more trouble.”

  “That’s enough about dead girls and police officers,” Eleanor declared. “Honestly, you would think we got together to gossip.”

  “God forbid,” Natalie said, laughing, “when we really get together to dissect Nell’s love life.”

  “Then why do we bother bringing fabric and thread?” I asked.

  “It’s our cover, in case the police bust in.” Bernie smiled. “Who would suspect a bunch of quilters to be up to no good?”

  CHAPTER 5

  Eleanor was quiet the entire way back to her house, which made me a little suspicious. When we pulled up in front of it, she didn’t get out. Instead she stared out the window into the clear night sky.

  “I agree with Bernie,” she said nearly in a whisper.

  “About what?”

  “About you staying out of the investigation. You have nothing to do with this case.”

  “I don’t think that’s what Bernie said,” I laughed.

  “I won’t split hairs with you, Nell,” Eleanor snapped. “I’m telling you to stay out of it.”

  I was about to point out that I was, in fact, a grown woman and therefore too old to send to my room. But I saw the worry in her eyes and softened my approach. I took her hand and held it. Though her hands were wrinkled and covered with spots, they were strong and beautiful. They had made thousands of meals, hundreds of quilts, held her children and grandchildren, and survived more than seventy years of life. Next to hers, my hands, though unblemished and youthful, didn’t seem nearly as lovely.

  “I’m not doing anything, Grandma,” I said. “I’m just a busybody like everyone else in town.”

  She nodded. “Anyway, you have to concentrate on school. And Jesse.”

  “It’s just a first date, if we ever actually go on it. Don’t go imagining we’re in love, because we’re not.”

  Eleanor let go of my hand and reached for the door. She got out of the car before she spoke again.

  “Don’t be so sure that love isn’t important,” she said. “Love is the most important thing in the world.”

  Before I could answer, she slammed her door and headed toward the house.

  The next night I was in my bedroom, wondering if love was the most important thing in the world—or if the most important thing was the right pair of shoes. I held up the black boots I’d worn for my original date with Jesse, along with the black check skirt and pink sweater I’d been wearing that night. It was a perfect date outfit, but I figured it was bad luck to wear the same thing I’d been wearing when Jesse stood me up, so I went through my closet in search of something else. After trying on three pairs of pants, two skirts, and a dress, I was back in the black check skirt but paired this time with a light blue sweater. That is, until I noticed the sweater had a spot on the sleeve, and then, after trying on nearly every top I owned, I settled on a black cashmere cardigan over a black silk tank.

  When I put on my mascara, it left goop under my left eye that made me look like I’d been in a bar fight. In an effort to fix the problem, I ended up making it worse and had to do my makeup all over again. By the time I was searching for my favorite earrings, I was nearly in tears. What was the point of this anyway? I was a disaster in relationships, and this one hadn’t exactly gotten off to a good start. I was about to give up and call off the night when I heard an odd knocking at my door. Barney was pushing his head against it until he had enough room to nudge his entire body through. He walked over and sat in front of me, expectantly.

  “I don’t have any cookies, old friend,” I said. He pushed his head under my hand. “Oh, you want a cuddle, do you?” I asked, but I already had my answer. I scratched his ears as he wagged happily. He rubbed his head against my skirt, and I couldn’t bear to push him away even though I knew I didn’t have time. I stayed five more minutes and petted the old dog, then frantically tried to brush off the evidence of our encounter.

  As always I learned a little something from Barney. Happiness is a thing you have to go find for yourself, but dog hair is something that finds you.


  When I arrived at the restaurant twenty minutes late, Jesse was looking at his watch.

  “I’m sorry,” I said quickly. “I couldn’t figure out what to wear.”

  He stood up as I got to my seat. “You look great.”

  Then he paused and so did I. We couldn’t exactly shake hands, but should we kiss or touch or something? It was clear that neither of us knew what to do, so we sat down in embarrassed silence, grabbing menus to hide behind.

  “How’s the investigation going?” I asked as soon as the waiter had taken our orders.

  “It isn’t,” he admitted. “We found out that the woman was from Kitchener, in Ontario, Canada.”

  “So that’s what Chief Powell meant by ‘down here,’ ” I said.

  Jesse smiled. “Already on the case, I see.”

  I knew I was blushing. “No, I just happened to chat with him outside the quilt shop yesterday, and he mentioned something about the girl coming down here to kill herself,” I said. “Only, he didn’t acknowledge that it wasn’t a suicide.”

  Jesse nodded. “We still have no idea why she was in Archers Rest.”

  “But you know that she was,” I said as the waiter put my salad down. “I mean, you know she wasn’t in a neighboring town.”

  “No, I don’t. I just mean in the area.” Jesse took a stab at some lettuce. “Don’t look for hidden meanings in everything I say, Nell.”

  “I wasn’t. I was just asking.” I went back to my salad, feeling a little scolded. Several minutes of silence passed. This date was not going well. “I signed up for classes,” I offered as a conversational olive branch.

  Jesse’s face brightened. “Did you get that class you wanted?”

  “No, it was all filled up. But I ran into the teacher outside the school, and he sort of suggested I just bully my way in.”

  Jesse smiled. “Sounds like he’s figured you out.”

  “So you think it’s a good idea to push my way into places I don’t belong?” I smiled. “That’s good to know.”