Elm Creek Quilts [07] The Sugar Camp Quilt (13 page)

“On the contrary, they had known all along. After the school board agreed to make Thomas Nelson schoolmaster but before he came to Creek’s Crossing, his father disclosed his son’s incarceration, although he declined to reveal the particulars of the crime. Mr. Nelson the elder assured them that his son had repented entirely and asked only that a compassionate, Christian town allow him the opportunity to redeem himself through useful service.”

“So he will stay on as schoolmaster?”

Cyrus shrugged. “My mother says the school board was moved by his father’s pleas, and since he has all the other necessary qualifications and no other likely candidate has appeared, he will suffice as long as his criminal activities remain a part of his past.”

“I see.” No other likely candidate, indeed. Dorothea crossed her arms, drawing her shawl around herself at a sudden chill gust of wind from the creek. How could the school board entrust the impressionable minds and characters of the young people of Creek’s Crossing to a man whose objectionable opinions about slavery had driven him to commit criminal acts? For that matter, what had he done? Beaten a fugitive slave in the streets of Philadelphia? Set fire to a school for freedmen? Dorothea could easily imagine a dozen possible offenses, each reason enough to keep Mr. Nelson far from the Creek’s Crossing school, despite his respected father’s entreaties.

Cyrus eyed her and chuckled. “Now, Dorothea, don’t be cross. The school board was pleased with your efforts, but they never expected you to stay on. A young woman with your prospects—well, they had already recently lost one maiden schoolteacher. They did not want to so soon lose another.”

Dorothea shrugged and forced a smile as if she understood the school board’s judgment, when in truth she found it unfathomable. Then, when she thought of how Miss Gunther had been “lost,” the smile came easier, and with it, a blush. She turned so Cyrus would not see the color rising in her cheeks, knowing he enjoyed any opportunity to tease, and her eyes met Mr. Nelson’s again. She gave him her brightest, most cheerful smile, as if they were the very best of friends, and was delighted to see him turn away again, frowning in irritated bewilderment.

B
Y THE END OF
November, the harvest was complete, Uncle Jacob had drawn the last odd patch for his quilt, and the other members of the library board had debated and revised Dorothea’s letter for what felt to her like the hundredth time. Delicately, not wishing to appear overly protective of her prose, she suggested that they allow her to send out the most recent version without further revising, or they would have no time left to complete the quilt.

To Dorothea’s enormous relief, they agreed at last. “Now that we have a suitable letter,” said Mrs. Engle, “to whom shall we send it? I do hope each of you remembered to make up a list of proper candidates.”

“How many authors and personages of note do we require?” asked Mrs. Collins anxiously, clutching a sheet of paper in her lap. Dorothea glimpsed a list of perhaps five names, half the number Mrs. Engle requested from each woman present.

“I think we should send out a great many invitations,” said Miss Nadelfrau, glancing to Mrs. Engle for approval. “It will mean more letter-writing and more postage, but not everyone will respond, and the more requests we send out, the more signatures shall be returned.”

Mrs. Engle nodded, and Dorothea also agreed, but Mrs. Collins hesitated. “What if we receive too many autographs? We would not want our quilt to be too large and cumbersome or it will seem ridiculous.”

“We should be fortunate to have such a problem,” said Mrs. Claverton. “If we receive too many signatures, we can stitch the extra blocks to the back of the quilt.”

“We shall do no such thing,” declared Mrs. Engle. “That is a fine way to insult a renowned author, to tell him his signature is good enough only for the back of the quilt. No, if we receive more than we need, we shall choose those written in the most pleasing hand. The others we shall discard. If a discarded author should ever view the quilt and wonder what became of his signature, we shall feign ignorance and pretend his autograph was lost in the post.”

Dorothea was about to object to this plan when Mrs. Deakins said, “A splendid solution. This will give us the opportunity to pick and choose.”

“Which brings us again to our proposed authors.” Mrs. Engle turned to Mrs. Collins. “Hester, would you be so good as to record the names?” Mrs. Collins nodded and lifted her pen to indicate her readiness. “My list is as follows: President Zachary Taylor, of course; Mrs. Zachary Taylor; Governor William Freame Johnston; Mrs. Johnston; Mr. Charles Dickens; Sir Walter Scott; Miss Catharine Maria Sedgwick; Mrs. Ann Sophia Winterbotham Stephens; Miss Maria Jane McIntosh; and Mrs. Ann Radcliffe.”

“I believe Sir Walter Scott is deceased,” murmured Miss Nadelfrau. “Mrs. Radcliffe, as well.”

“Is that so? Very well, then. Scratch out their names and substitute mine and my husband’s. That should make ten.”

Mrs. Collins nodded, scribbling.

Next, Mrs. Claverton read her list—which boasted Washington Irving and James Fenimore Cooper as well as the painter Thomas Cole—followed by Mrs. Deakins. “Nearly all of my authors have been named,” wailed Mrs. Collins when Mrs. Deakins had finished, and insisted upon reading her own list next, before every person on her list had already been proposed.

Then it was Dorothea’s turn. “It was too difficult to choose only ten, so I have twelve,” she said, unfolding her paper. “Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman—”

“Goodness gracious, no,” said Mrs. Engle.

“Who is Walt Whitman?” asked Mrs. Collins.

“I believe he is the lieutenant governor,” replied Mrs. Deakins, looking to Mrs. Engle for confirmation.

“He is without question the most disgraceful poet of our age,” declared Mrs. Engle. “My dear Dorothea, I cannot imagine you have read his notorious works or you would have known better than to suggest him.”

“I did not know the lieutenant governor wrote poetry,” murmured Mrs. Collins to Mrs. Deakins.

Astounded by the objection, Dorothea asked, “Mrs. Engle, have you read his work?”

“I most certainly have not. I would not have any such trash in my house, nor the name of its purveyor in my quilt.”

“But if you have not read his work, how do you know it is trash?”

Mrs. Engle tittered, but her mirth carried an edge. “I do not need to be kicked by a horse to know it is not a pleasant experience.”

“We can’t expect to like all of one another’s choices,” said Mrs. Claverton, with a look that, while sympathetic, suggested Dorothea forgo further argument. “Besides, controversy may sell tickets. Dorothea, please continue reading your list.”

“Margaret Fuller,” said Dorothea, pretending not to notice the hard stare Mrs. Engle now leveled at her. “Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. William Cullen Bryant.”

“Absolutely not,” Mrs. Engle broke in.

Dorothea lowered her paper and suppressed a sigh. “He is a writer, and a personage of note. Why should he not be included?”

“Apparently we must make our criteria more specific,” said Mrs. Engle. “Dorothea, dear girl, I do not blame you. I am sure you have no idea what sort of radical diatribes in the guise of literature these so-called authors on your list have shamelessly paraded in front of the public. Your parents likely fed you these names, taking advantage of your innocence to turn our quilt into a political tool.”

Dorothea smiled, but regarded Mrs. Engle levelly. “I have read every one of these authors, and I do not understand how including a certain writer is any more political than including a governor or a president.”

“Presidents and governors are meant to be political,” explained Mrs. Collins. “A writer is supposed to enlighten and amuse.”

Dorothea looked around the circle of women, eyebrows raised. “I have found the writers on my list to be quite enlightening.”

“Let us agree that we shall include men who practice their politics overtly by running for office, and exclude those who conceal their politics in writing,” said Mrs. Engle. “Now go on, Dorothea, and finish up.”

Dorothea knew the rest of her list would not make the other women any happier. “Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, William Lloyd Garrison, James Russell Lowell, and Frederick Douglass.”

The women drew in a collective gasp, all save Mrs. Claverton, who seemed to be struggling to contain her laughter. “You do seem determined to shock us,” she said.

“I did not mean to.” Dorothea handed her list to Mrs. Collins, who, she had observed, had not added any of her proposed names to the official list. “I confess I do not understand why these men and women would not be worthy additions to our project.”

“We will simply have to come up with more names on our own,” said Mrs. Engle to the others. “Dorothea has done us more harm than good today.”

“She cannot help how she was brought up,” said Miss Nadelfrau. “She did write a fine letter, and the quilt was her idea.”

As all but Mrs. Claverton nodded and agreed, Dorothea decided she had had quite enough of being discussed as if she were not present. “I beg your pardon,” she began, but Mrs. Claverton reached over and clasped her hand. In an undertone she urged Dorothea to allow Mrs. Engle to have the last word in the argument. She would never back down today, not after expressing her opinion so forcefully, but later she might be persuaded to tolerate the signatures of authors she did not necessarily admire, especially if the quilters fell short of their goal of eighty Album blocks. With some regret, Dorothea complied. Life with Uncle Jacob had taught her the unpleasant necessity of occasional outward compliance to conceal inner dissent.

The rest of the afternoon was devoted to cutting pieces of muslin to send with the invitations, because, as Miss Nadelfrau pointed out, the male authors were more likely to respond if they did not have to first obtain the proper fabric from their wives. As they cut, they proposed additional names for the list. Mrs. Collins and Mrs. Deakins noticeably flinched whenever Dorothea spoke. Dorothea was amused but indignant; she would have spoken up more staunchly for her authors if not for Mrs. Claverton’s request and for her own reluctance to further offend Cyrus’s mother. She held her tongue when, at the conclusion of the meeting, Mrs. Engle assigned each of them a portion of the list, distributed the scraps of muslin, and instructed them to send invitations to the authors. Of Dorothea’s candidates, only Emerson, Thoreau, and the Brownings remained.

Cyrus must have sensed a certain tension in the air when he arrived to take her home, for he regarded her quizzically as they left the house. “Mother seems disturbed,” he remarked. “Did something upset her?”

“I regret that I was the source of her displeasure,” said Dorothea as he helped her into the carriage. As they rode toward the ferry, she gave him a brief, lighthearted account of the afternoon, taking care not to insult his mother’s taste or judgment.

“This is most unfortunate.” Cyrus’s characteristic grin had fled. “Mother’s good opinion, once lost, is rarely regained.”

“I assure you, I will do such a fine job on this quilt that she will forgive me entirely,” said Dorothea, studying him, not certain if he was once again teasing her, and would at any moment laugh with her about his mother’s behavior.

“I do hope so.” He shook the reins and chirruped to the horses, frowning.

He remained all but silent as they crossed Elm Creek, lost in a brood, but as the carriage brought her closer to home, he assumed a close approximation of his usual joviality. When he assisted her from the carriage and promised to call for her two weeks hence, she nodded, troubled by his obvious displeasure.

That evening after supper, Dorothea recounted the events of the afternoon for her mother as they layered Uncle Jacob’s eccentric quilt top with a pieced muslin lining and an inner layer of cotton batting. Lorena listened thoughtfully, but looked surprised when Dorothea told her how much the other women’s objections had astounded her. “Are you surprised that they object, or that they object so strenuously, without any appearance of shame for their opinions?”

Dorothea considered. “Both, I suppose.” She was not so naïve as not to readily understand the reason for their dismay, but she had not expected these particular women to react in such a manner. If Creek’s Crossing were a southern village, she might have expected objections to including abolitionists, advocates of woman’s suffrage, and freedmen in the quilt, but not so in the free commonwealth of Pennsylvania. If anyone did harbor secret prejudices, she would have expected them to be too ashamed to allow them to be detected.