Moonlight in the Morning (Edilean 6)

One was of Tristan kissing a young woman under the mistletoe in Mrs. Wingate’s house, then another was of the two of them opening gifts.

At the end were two photos taken one after another. The first was of Tristan in the conservatory, looking at one of his orchids with an expression of concern. The next one was of him looking up at the camera, his face just breaking into a smile, his eyes full of love for the photographer.

Gently, Jecca closed the album and held it against her chest. No wonder Mrs. Wingate adored Tristan! To have a person look at you like that . . . Well, a look like that could melt a woman.

She sat there for a while, holding the photo album to her, looking at Tristan’s orchids. For a man she’d never seen in the daylight, she was certainly finding out a lot about him.

Right now all she could seem to think about was that he might be in the house next door. All she had to do was walk down the path through the woods, then . . . What? Have lunch together? Go through that awkward phase of talking about where they went to school? Did they have siblings? Where did they work?

No, she preferred meeting in the dark and exchanging deep secrets with each other, like about the married woman he was nearly in love with.

On the other hand, they had also told each other all the normal, mundane info that people exchanged when they met.

Just the visuals are lacking, she thought, smiling.

She was c1eme photstill holding the album to her chest but made herself put it down. It was time to go to work!

She stacked all six albums on the coffee table in the living room, then went upstairs to get her paints. Yet again she’d missed the early morning light to photograph the orchids, but maybe she could catch sundown.

At the top of the stairs she heard the familiar buzz from Lucy’s room, but today it seemed louder. When she saw that her door was open, Jecca couldn’t help looking inside.

What she saw intrigued her. Around three walls were low cabinets with several different kinds of sewing machines on them. In the middle was a huge cabinet at countertop height, shelves and drawers below. The fourth wall held a deep closet, and inside Jecca could see bolts of fabric, solids and patterns, all arranged by color. They went from white to pink to red to orange, purple, then the blues. Browns led into black and white prints.

“Oooooh,” Jecca said and felt herself drawn to the cave of colors.

“I thought you’d like that,” Lucy said. “Please come in and look around.”

“I don’t mean to bother you.”

“You aren’t. I hope you don’t mind if I keep working. I’m trying to fill orders for the shop.”

Jecca went to the closet and ran her hands across the bolts of fabric. They were mostly cotton, the kind used in quilts. But there were also white, ecru, and pastels in the softest fabric she’d ever felt. She looked at Lucy in question.

“Swiss batiste,” Lucy said. “Livie only uses the finest fabrics. The insertion and entredeux are in those drawers below.”

Jecca pulled one out and inside were cards of what looked to be the most boring trim she’d ever seen. It seemed to be a tiny ladder bordered on both sides by plain cloth. She looked at Lucy.

She held up a baby garment. Near the hem, the laddered design had been sewn in, and Lucy had threaded the holes with narrow pale pink ribbon.

“Very pretty,” Jecca said, but her interest was still with the bolts of colored fabric. “What do you do with all these?”

“Not much,” Lucy said. She was cutting out what looked to be a tiny bodice. “When I first came here I wanted to quilt, so I bought a machine, then went crazy buying bolts of fabric. But then I got involved with Livie’s shop and . . .” She shrugged.

“So you didn’t come here to work with Mrs. Wingate?”

“Oh, no,” Lucy said but didn’t volunteer any more information.

“Didn’t you know her before you came to Edilean?”

“No,” Lucy said, and there was caution in her voice.

Jecca knew when to back off and decided to change the subject. “I was wondering who a man in the photo albums is. He was with Tristan a lot when he was a boy, but then the man just seemed to disappear.”

Lucy glanced toward the door and lowered her voice. “I don’t know. c#828221 Odd that you’d pick him out. I did too and I asked Livie about him. She said he was just the gardener, but she had a funny look when she said it.”

It seemed that Lucy was quite willing to talk about Mrs. Wingate, but when it came to herself, she clammed up. “What happened to him? The gardener, I mean.”

“I don’t know,” Lucy said. “I asked Livie that and she stopped talking. Actually, she looked really sad. Would you hand me that—”