Free Elm Creek Quilts [07] The Sugar Camp Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini Page B

because Abel is teaching me.”
    “That’s good. Where reading lessons are concerned, I’m sure a devoted husband would be more agreeable company than an old schoolteacher.”
    “And I already have a wedding quilt.”
    Dorothea thought of the string-pieced star quilt in the bedroom. “I know. I saw it.”
    “It ain’t as fancy as yours, but I’m sure I can sew as fine a seam as you.” Constance kept her eyes fixed on the men in the fields as they walked. “I saved scraps from what the mistress threw out ever since I was a little girl, ever since I was old enough to understand that every nice thing on that place belonged to the white family and not me, and that none of those pretty things could ever be mine. I saved all those scraps and kept them clean, and when Abel asked me to be his wife I started the quilt. I gave it to him when he came to bring me home. He said it was the prettiest patchwork ever made, and until today I’m sure he truly thought it was.”
    Dorothea was ashamed. “I’m sorry. I had no intention of insulting you with my gift. If I had known—”
    “I know. Now I know. And that’s why I suppose I’ll keep it.” Suddenly Constance grinned at her. “I’m not contrary or foolish enough to give it back. I did say I like pretty things.”

    A FTER DINNER, THE G RANGERS and the Wrights worked on until nearly dusk, when they hastily ate a cold supper so the Grangers could leave while there was still enough light to travel by. On the return journey, Uncle Jacob did not circumvent the town of Creek’s Crossing but passed along its main streets, knowing they would be quiet at that hour. Dorothea looked for, but neither saw nor expected to see, any of her friends. She did glimpse a slender man in spectacles—who might have been Mr. Nelson—entering a tavern, but she could have been mistaken.
    They were the only travelers on the ferry, so Dorothea stretched out in the back of the wagon, determined to rest as long as she could until Uncle Jacob ordered her to sit up and act like a lady. She watched the stars appear in the darkening sky, and the next thing she knew, the wagon jerked as the horses pulled the wagon from the ferry to the landing. She sat up properly again, returned a smile from her mother, and absently picked dried mud from the hem of her skirts.
    “Niece,” said Uncle Jacob suddenly. “If you truly need work to occupy your idle hands, and since you are so inclined to give away your quilts, maybe you would make one for me.”
    Dorothea and her mother exchanged a look of surprise. “Of course,” said Dorothea. “Did you have a certain pattern in mind?”
    She expected him to say no, since few men admitted to being able to distinguish one quilt pattern from another, but instead he nodded. “A scrap quilt like one my mother once made,” he said. “I will draw it for you. And I will need it by winter.”

T HE NEXT EVENING after the chores were done, Dorothea was making the most of the fading daylight by reading the last chapter of a borrowed book when Uncle Jacob interrupted to show her a sketch of a block he wanted in his quilt. Dorothea had not thought he would expect her to begin the quilt so soon, but she hid her reluctance and set the book aside. He lit the lamp and gestured with his pen as he explained the various features of his small, neat drawing.
    “It resembles the Delectable Mountains pattern,” remarked Dorothea, studying the arrangement of large right triangles set at right angles to each other, with smaller right triangles lining their shorter sides. Uncle Jacob nodded brusquely, frowned at the interruption, and directed her to make the blocks exactly as he had drawn them, with clear and distinct points.
    Dorothea declined to assure him that she was not known for sloppy piecing. “I assume you mean for me to fill in these blank places with light-colored fabric?” she inquired, indicating a diagonal row of squares from the upper left corner to the center of the