Orinda Lou smiled. “Of course it was. It’s not like I have a long string of men coming and going from my house.”
“But wouldn’t it be fun if you did?” Kristin chuckled. “Imagine what that would be like.”
“My sister had suitors lined up around the block, and they gave her nothing but heartache. I’d much rather have one nice, steady man—like your Charles.”
Kristin grinned. “He’s a keeper, that’s for sure. I still don’t know why he chose me out of all the girls he could have had.” She wiped her hands on her apron. “So this Mr. Perry. He’s very good-looking. Tell me more about him.”
Orinda Lou sighed and leaned on the fence too. Thankfully, it had been well built. “He’ll have to restring the whole piano. Not all the keys are showing the same amount of wear, of course, because they aren’t all played equally, but it’s foolish to change out only half the strings and leave the other half. What?” she said when she noticed Kristin roll her eyes.
“That’s not what I meant! Tell me about him.”
“Oh.” Orinda Lou felt her cheeks warm up a little bit. “We’ve known each other for about eight years now—he tuned my piano for me after I lugged it here in a wagon, and he’s come by regularly ever since.”
“Is he married?” Kristin waggled her eyebrows.
“He’s not married, and yes, I do like him. It’s just . . .” She sighed again. “He’s changed somehow since the last time he was here. He says he’s been ill, but it seems like more than that. His whole personality is different, and I have no idea why.”
“A mystery!” Kristin had been borrowing novels from Orinda Lou’s extensive library, and her favorites were the ones that featured some sort of intrigue. “Are you going to investigate?”
Orinda Lou laughed. “No. What I’m going to do is walk down to the general store and buy a few groceries. Would you like to come?”
Kristin looked over her shoulder at the laundry basket. “Sure. Just let me get this on the line and grab my hat.”
“All right.”
While she waited, Orinda Lou pulled some dead blooms off her rose bushes, thinking about the man currently in the parlor. She didn’t think for a minute that there was anything to investigate, but she would like to know why Mr. Perry was acting so strangely.
A few minutes later, Kristin was ready to go, and the two women walked toward Main Street. When they were just two buildings away from the store, Kristin grabbed Orinda Lou’s arm. “Look! The new millinery shop is open!”
Sure enough, the window display was full of brightly ribboned hats, and they could see women inside fingering lace and feathers.
“Let’s go in. Just for a minute,” Kristin implored.
Orinda Lou smiled. Sometimes the younger woman reminded her a bit of a frisky puppy. “All right. I could use some new ideas for hats, and looking is always fun.”
Kristin all but threw the door open, and they stepped inside.
“Hello, ladies.” A lovely woman in a maroon bustled dress stepped toward them, both hands outstretched. “My name is Alexandra Evans, and welcome to my new shop. If you’re looking for something special for Friday’s dance, I’m at your service.”
“Thank you,” Orinda Lou said. “I’m Orinda Lou Britt . . .”
“But you should call her Ori, because it’s so much easier,” Kristin interjected.
Orinda Lou ignored her. “And this is Kristin Owens.” Her eye fell on a rack over in the corner. “Oh, you sell dresses as well as hats. They all look lovely, Mrs. Evans.”
“Thank you.” The woman paused. “It’s Miss Evans, actually. Or rather, it’s not.” She looked a little flustered. “I was married several years ago, but I was widowed soon after, and it’s . . . it’s a complicated situation, but I decided to return to using Evans. I hope it’s not misleading, but it’s easier in a number of ways.”
“I understand,” Orinda Lou said. In reality, she was more curious than she cared to admit, but she could give this newcomer the benefit of a doubt. After all, many of the people in town had come here to escape from something, to start a new life—Orinda Lou included.
“Please feel free to look around,” Miss Evans said, motioning at the shop in general. “Of course, I’ll also be taking special orders, so if you have an idea of what you’d like but you don’t see it on display, just let me know.”
“Thank you,” Orinda Lou and Kristin said in unison.
As soon as Miss Evans walked away, Kristin grabbed Orinda Lou’s arm again. “Another mystery,” she whispered.
“Just how many of my books have you borrowed in the three weeks since you moved here?” Orinda Lou asked good-naturedly.
“A few. All right—eight. But I don’t have any children yet, and my housework’s all done by noon. What else is there to do?”
“Well, I don’t think Miss Evans is any more eager to be investigated than Mr. Perry is. Let’s look around and then get over to the store, all right? I just used up the very last of my tea, and I need it to soothe my throat so I can sleep tonight.”
“Oh, that’s right. I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to delay your shopping with my silliness. Should we go now?”
“No, we can look around for another few minutes. I’m sorry to say, though, that we don’t have time to launch an all-out investigation, so you’d best leave that to the detectives in the novels.”
Nathan Perry reached into his bag and pulled out a pair of wire cutters, then paused, the tool sitting in his hand unused. He’d been dreading this visit for a whole year. Dreaded seeing her, dreaded not knowing what to say. But he’d known he wouldn’t be able to put it off forever, and he had to get it over with. He had to make things right somehow.
He remembered the very first time he’d ever met Miss Orinda Lou Britt. He was walking up the street after tuning a piano several houses down the road, and he saw her standing in front of a house that looked as though it had been unoccupied for some time. She stood there like a queen in a royal purple satin dress, her hands on her hips as she watched several men hoist a large bundle out of the back of a wagon. He almost felt her tension as he approached, watching as the men managed to get the bundle into the house.
“I beg your pardon,” he’d said, tipping his hat. “A piano?”
She turned to him with wide eyes the color of topaz. “Yes, it is,” she said in a voice that was so soft, it took a little effort to hear it. “How did you know?”
“It has a rather distinctive shape,” he replied, nodding toward the house.
“That it does. I just pray that I wrapped enough quilts around it to keep it protected.” She shook her head and turned back to the house as though she could somehow see through the walls and ensure that her instrument was safe.
“I wonder if I might be of some use. My name is Nathan Perry, and I’m a piano tuner.”
She whirled on him so fast, he was almost startled. “You’re a piano tuner? Walking past my new house right now, just as I’m arriving? This is miraculous. Please, come inside. You can help me unwrap it and inspect it for damage.”
They’d worked side by side to take off the quilts and then play a few notes to make sure nothing was damaged. There were no scratches on the exterior, either, which was yet another miracle considering how it had been transported.
“Will you please tune it now?” she’d asked, her eyes pleading.
He knew in that moment that he would never be able to look in those eyes and say no.
But he would eventually have to break her heart—that is, if her heart felt anything like his. Maybe she didn’t care for him that way at all and he wouldn’t be doing her any sort of disservice. He couldn’t think that way, though—the hope of her was all that had sustained him for the last year, and he wouldn’t be so cruel as to deny himself that bit of light.
He blinked, refocusing on the wire cutters he held in his hand. Enough of this. He had work to do.
Chapter 3
Orinda Lou opened her eyes as the first rays
of sunlight peeked through the lace curtains at her window. She loved this time of day, these quiet moments before wagons started rolling past on the street outside and voices called back and forth. She stretched her arms high above her head, wondering if she really ought to get up or if just maybe she should give herself the luxury of dozing back off for a few minutes.
But then she remembered that Nathan Perry was in town, and she sat bolt upright.
She washed up and dressed, putting on her blue sprigged gown and pinning up her hair in record time, then hurried into the kitchen. She’d left the dishes from tea the afternoon before as well as her simple dinner dishes, and she had to get them washed up before Mr. Perry arrived. She really should have put her kitchen to rights before she went to bed, but she was just as bad as Kristin—she’d been caught up in a novel, and it was much more exciting than scraping bits of chicken off a plate.
Within a matter of moments, everything was washed and put away. That was one of the benefits of living alone—there were never very many dishes. After glancing around to make sure she’d gotten it all, she picked up the dish basin and carried it over to the door, balanced it on one hip while she turned the handle, and then flung the water outside.
And gasped when she saw Mr. Perry leap to the side to avoid getting drenched.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, her hand flying to her throat. “I had no idea you were coming up to the door just now.”
He chuckled. “I really should have come to the front door, I admit, but I could see movement through the window and thought I’d come to this door to save you from walking all the way through the house just to let me in.”
“That was very thoughtful of you. And if you’d stayed where you were just one second longer, I could have given you your second bath of the day and saved you the trouble of bathing tomorrow.”
“Oh? Is that how it works? Bathe twice today, skip tomorrow?”
“Of course.” She stepped to the side to let him in, wondering if she could possibly be any more embarrassed than she was. Between being covered in flour yesterday and trying to throw her dishwater on him today, she couldn’t possibly hope to win his affection now, and she wondered if there was even the slightest reason to hope.
“I was about to start some coffee, and in fact, I haven’t eaten yet. Can I get you anything?” she asked him.
“I ate at the Brody before I came, but I’ll take some coffee,” he replied. He stood out of the way, his hat in his hand, but he didn’t go into the parlor and he didn’t sit. In fact, he looked a little uncomfortable, and that made Orinda Lou a little uncomfortable as well.
After she filled the coffee pot with water and set it on the stove, she said, “I have four perfectly nice chairs in here, and they’re going to feel slighted if you don’t take one of them.”
“Hmm? Oh, no. That’s all right. I was just . . . well, I have a question for you.” He shifted from one foot to the other, suddenly looking like a schoolboy.
“Yes?” Whatever was bothering him, it certainly made him look all the more charming.
“They’re holding a dance over at the Brody tomorrow night. Mrs. Brody was just telling me about it.”
“Yes, I’ve heard about it,” Orinda Lou said as she took a loaf of bread from the breadbox and picked up a knife.
“And I wondered if I could escort you.”
She paused in the middle of slicing. “You’d like to take me?”
“If you’d like to go.”
She honestly didn’t know how she felt about that. She was forty years old—should she be attending dances on a man’s arm? Wasn’t that sort of thing for girls who hadn’t already lived an entire lifetime and had nothing but the future ahead of them? Then again, forty wasn’t dead, and this was the sort of thing she’d always dreamed about when Mr. Perry crossed her mind.
“Miss Britt?”
She blinked and realized she’d been holding her knife in midair for several seconds. She must have looked ridiculous. She finished cutting her slice of bread and set the knife down, then said, “I’d be delighted to go to the dance with you, Mr. Perry.”
He grinned, still looking like a schoolboy, and she couldn’t help but return the smile. Perhaps one didn’t have to be young to feel young.
“I’ll get started on the piano,” he said. “If you just want to call me when the coffee’s done . . .”
“Of course,” she told him, and he disappeared down the hall.
A dance. Her hands trembled as she buttered her bread and added jam. She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d attended a dance. Did she have anything to wear? Of course she still had her opera gowns, but those were probably a little too ornate. Hmm. Maybe if she took one and simplified it . . .
It was good to have something to feel excited about again.
Nathan smelled the coffee before he heard Miss Britt’s footsteps in the hallway. He expected her to call him into the kitchen, but instead, she brought him a cup.
“Such service.” He accepted the cup with a smile. “Thank you.”
She peered into the inner workings of the piano. “Tell me what you’re doing. It all looks very complicated and mysterious.”
“Complicated, a little bit. Mysterious, not at all.” He took a sip of his coffee and then set the cup on the end table. “I’ve taken out all the old strings and discarded them. I dusted the interior—”
“Which I imagine was quite the task,” Miss Britt interjected. “I’m not the best housekeeper. My mother would have fits if she saw how I do things sometimes.”
“Like throwing dishwater on your guests?” he teased.
Her face went pink, which he’d secretly hoped for. He loved seeing those little roses appear on her cheeks. “I thought you’d decided to forgive me for that.”
“I did. And I actually believe you take excellent care of your piano,” he told her. “There was very little to dust. Now I’m cutting the new wires to the proper lengths. I have a heavier gauge wire down here for the lower notes, and a thinner wire for the higher notes.” He held up a piece of each to show her the difference.
“Once I’ve cut the wire, I thread the end through the tuning pin, like so.” He held up the small pin and tucked the end of the wire through the hole in the pin, then coiled the wire around the pin three times. “Now this is the fun part.” He held up a small hammer.
“You use a hammer on my piano?” Miss Britt looked appropriately shocked.
“It’s the only way. Trust me.” He put the tuning pin in the small hole right in front of him and tapped it a few times with the mallet to secure it in place. “Now we bring the wire across the body of the piano, over the bridge, and here to the other side. It goes around this corresponding post and then back over to where we started, where we affix the end in another tuning pin.” He tucked the wire through that pin and tightened it, then pounded it in place.
“So the wire is like a big tight loop,” Miss Britt observed.
“Exactly. Now, once I’ve done that for every single string, it will be time to tune them, and I do that by tightening or loosening the pins with my pliers.”
Miss Britt shook her head. “How long does all this take? I’m getting overwhelmed just thinking about it.”
“And that’s why you’ve hired me to do it for you.” He grinned. “It will take me about three days to restring all the wires, and another day and a half or so to tune them.”
“Your patience is amazing.” Miss Britt took a seat on the chair nearest the piano. “You must love what you do in order to spend this kind of time on one project.”
“None of the best things in life can be rushed,” he replied. Suddenly feeling a little bit awkward, he picked up his cup and sat on the chair across from Miss Britt. “Thank you for bringing this in,” he said, nodding toward the coffee he held.
“Of course.” She sat back and regarded him. “I realize this is none of my business at all, but I’ve been worried about you ever since you mentioned your illness. I ho
pe everything’s all right.”
His illness. That had been a clumsy lie, but nothing better had come to mind. “Everything’s fine, Miss Britt, but thank you for being concerned. I promise, I won’t have any sort of dramatic relapse while I’m here.” He forced a smile, and to his relief, she responded with a genuine grin of her own.
“Well, if you do, I happen to know a very good doctor.” She rose and held out her hand for his coffee cup, which was now empty. “May I come back and watch you more later on? This is really fascinating. Unless I’d be a distraction, of course.”
“You will most definitely be a distraction, but that doesn’t mean you’d be unwelcome.”
She smiled again, and the pink in her cheeks came back. “I need to run some errands. You’ll be all right here alone, won’t you? You can find whatever you need?”
“I’ll be more than fine.”
He watched as she left the room, then returned to his work at the piano. Why couldn’t he just summon up the courage to tell her the truth? They were friends, weren’t they, even if she didn’t have any romantic feelings toward him, and couldn’t friends be open and honest with each other? As it was, he felt like a mere actor in a play, saying the things he was supposed to say and doing the things he was supposed to do, but with no meaning, no sincerity. He was nothing more than a shadow.
Chapter 4
Orinda Lou opened her wardrobe and pulled out armful after armful of gowns, laying them across her bed so she could inspect them more closely. She felt a little foolish—they’d been hanging there for a number of years serving no purpose whatsoever, and the idea to have them remade had only hit her that morning. All that wasted time.
She remembered the music she’d sung while wearing these gowns. She remembered the audience, the applause, the roses that were thrown up on the stage. She remembered taking bow after bow, the private parties she attended—all of it.
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