INTERIORS BY TAYLOR was operating illegally. The town had an ordinance against home-based businesses.
That Shelby, Vermont, population 8500 on a good day, had ordinances at all had been a surprise. But it did, and this one was inviolate. You couldn’t operate a business from your house even if you’d been raised under its roof after your mother took off for parts unknown.
Tally’s pleading had gained her a two-month reprieve.
She’d found a soon-to-be-vacant shop on the village green. Each night, long after Sam was asleep, she’d worked and reworked the costs she’d face. The monthly rent. The three-months up-front deposit. The fees for the carpenter, painter and electrician needed to turn the place from the TV-repair shop it had been into an elegant setting for her designs.
And then there were all the things she’d have to buy to create the right atmosphere. Add in the cost of increased advertising and Tally had arrived at a number that was staggering.
She needed $175,000.00.
The next morning, she’d kissed Sam goodbye, put on a white silk blouse and a black suit she hadn’t worn since New York. She’d pulled her blond hair into a knot at the base of her neck and gone to see Walter Dennison, who owned Shelby’s one and only bank.
Dennison read through the proposal she’d written, looked up and frowned.
“You’re asking for a lot of money.”
“I know.”
“Asking for it in a home equity loan.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You understand what would happen if you were unable to pay the loan off, Ms. Sommers? That the bank would have the right to foreclose on your house?”
Taylor had nodded. “Yes, sir,” she’d said again. “I do.”
Dennison had looked at her for a long moment. Then he’d smiled. “You’ve got your grandmother’s gumption, Tally,” he’d said, and held out his hand.
The loan was hers.
She’d made the first payment…but not the second. Or the third. The contractors demanded their money according to the schedules she’d agreed to. Things couldn’t get worse, she’d thought…
And the furnace in the house went belly-up.
Pride in tatters, Taylor had gone to Dennison again. If he could see his way clear to lower the monthly payments…
He’d sighed and run his fingers through his thinning hair. In the end he’d done it.
Which brought her back to today’s phone call. It had come while she and Sam were having breakfast.
“I need to see you, Ms. Sommers,” Dennison had said. “Today.”
She’d almost stopped breathing. “Is it about my loan?”
There’d been a little pause. Then Dennison had said yes, it was, and she was to come to his office at four.
“Four,” he’d repeated, “promptly, please.”
The admonition had surprised her. So had the change from Tally to Ms. Sommers. She’d told herself it wasn’t a bad sign. A man who wanted to discuss a six-figure loan was entitled to be a little formal, even if he’d known you since you were a baby.
“Of course,” she’d said, all cool New York sophistication. Then she’d hung up the phone and tried to smile at Sam, whose eyes were filled with questions.
“Nothing to worry about, babe,” Tally had said airily.
Sam had grinned a Sam-grin, at least until she said she might not be home until suppertime.
“You can visit the Millers,” she’d said reassuringly. “You know how much you like them.”