Page 68 of The Wedding Dress Repair Shop
When I took them into the workroom and tried it, it worked well.
I opened the doors to the staff room and foyer, ready for the delivery, and found the front doors open, so workmen must have been around somewhere. Then I went back to unpacking boxes until the sound of a van in the courtyard told me the table had arrived.
The delivery man brought it into the foyer but was so grumpy I didn’t even bother asking him if he might possibly help me get it into the back room. Luckily, just then two men in painters’ overalls emerged from the Rosa-May Room and were a lot more obliging: they not only carried the table through, but set it up for me. They even took the packaging away, saying it could join the stuff in the back of their van. Then they went back to painting the window frame in Rosa-May’s room, so I took them cups of tea and biscuits through, as a reward.
It would be nice to be a strapping Amazon, who could heave heavy tables about without a second’s thought. However, beingthe size of a Christmas tree fairy can sometimes have its advantages …
*
By the time I’d finished for the day, the room looked a lot more workmanlike, with most things either on the shelves or neatly stacked away in lidded storage crates.
Before I went back into the cottage for the night I returned to the staff room. I’d had second thoughts about my wedding dress and decided it would be better hung on the rail.
I removed it from its tissue wrappings, shook it out, then put it on a padded hanger inside a new zipped plastic cover, before hanging it between Honey’s dress and that of Amy Weston.
There were others hanging there, whose stories I didn’t know, but they were probably far sadder than mine …
The bags moved and whispered together as I closed the door to the workroom and locked it. Perhaps they were telling each other secrets.
23
The Sun in Splendour
A little while later, Pearl rang, and when I answered she said, ‘You sound breathless – you didn’t rush to answer the phone, did you?’
‘No, I was playing with Golightly,’ I said, and explained about the feathery cat toy.
‘Hours of harmless fun,’ said Pearl, sounding amused. ‘What I actually rang for was to find out if you wanted to go to the pub tonight, because if so, you could pop round to mine at about seven and we’ll walk over together. It’s Italian food on Thursdays, and it’s excellent.’
I hesitated for a moment. ‘Yes, Thom mentioned it earlier, but, well … I had lasagne for dinner last night.’
‘Unless you made it from scratch, it won’t have been like the food you’ll get tonight. It’s authentic Italian home cooking. The publican’s mother-in-law is Italian and she takes over the kitchen on Thursdays. There’s usually tiramisu on the dessert menu, too,’ she added enticingly. ‘Andyou get those little wrapped almond biscuits with your coffee afterwards.’
‘Amaretti? I think that’s the clincher: I love those!’
‘So do come tonight.’
‘OK, I will. The cat does seem to be settling down and, luckily, with the cottage tucked away in this corner, I don’t think anyone will hear him even if he does start up his Soul in Torment performance. He’s an old fraud. I’m sure he only wants to make me feel guilty. Whenever I reappear, he never seems pleased to see me, just … sort of accusatory and miffed.’
‘You can’t let him run your life, or you’ll definitely be living under the cat’s paw,’ she said with a laugh, then added that she’d see me about seven and rang off.
It was a mild evening, so I just swapped my old jeans for newer ones and the now-grimy T-shirt for a jade top. A bit of makeup and some green Bakelite bangles, and I was good to go.
Golightly followed me into the hall and watched with narrowed yellow eyes as I put on my sandals and a thin cotton jacket.
‘You know the routine by now,’ I told him sternly. ‘You saw me put treats in your bowl and I won’t be out long.’
He pulled a face, though not one of the worst, then turned and vanished back into the living room, leaving me feeling strangely guilty. He had the knack of doing that.
I swung my heavy tapestry bag over my shoulder, the costumier equivalent of a doctor’s bag, ready for any emergency. I couldn’t cure myself of the habit of carrying basic sewing materials around with me, but since the affair at the theatre I’d been less comfortable taking the dressmaker’s shears.
The puppet workshop, Thom’s cottage next to it and Hetty’s Hats were all in darkness, so Thom and Simon must already have left.
Pearl was waiting for me just inside the bookshop door and stepped out when she saw me, locking it behind her.
She looked cool and elegant in floaty layers of fine linen in a shade of misty blue-grey. With her tall, slim figure, she’d havelooked like a model in anything, and the colour suited her pale skin and platinum-blond hair, too.
‘You look lovely,’ I said. ‘Perhaps I should have dressed up a bit, too?’
