Round Robin (35 page)

“That's insane,” Sarah snapped. “I'm sure Sylvia's planned for that.”

“You're sure?” Matt barked out an angry laugh. “You don't know that. That's not how you people run things. In any other company we'd have some security, some kind of safety net, but not here. It's too damn risky, and I'm sick of living this way.”

“What are we supposed to do? What other way can we live?”

“I've been trying to figure that out for months. How am I suppose to know what to do? You're the one who got us into this mess. If not for
your damn Elm Creek Quilts, we'd be a lot better off. I don't know why I ever let you talk me into leaving my old job. Now everything's in one basket and it's all about to spill over. And you won't let yourself see it!”

“No one forced you to quit your old job,” Sarah shouted back. “That was your decision.”

“Yeah, and it was the worst one of my life.” He shot Sarah a furious glare. “Make that the second worst.” He shoved past her and stormed into the house.

His words burned in her ears. She stood there, stunned, so hurt she could hardly breathe. Then, somewhere over her right shoulder, she heard a noise. She glanced up in time to see a figure move away from the kitchen window.

Oh, no. Was it Carol or Sylvia who had overheard their fight? Sarah went inside, heart sinking, praying that the figure at the window had been Andrew.

When she entered the kitchen, Sylvia stood in the center of the room, alone.

“Sylvia—” Then Sarah could go no further.

“Please forgive me for eavesdropping,” Sylvia said, her voice quiet. “I should have left the window as soon as I heard you, but—”

“He didn't mean it.”

“Oh, I'm quite certain he meant every word.” Sylvia sighed. “The question is, what shall we do now?”

“I don't know. I don't know.” Sarah felt tears gathering. She couldn't remember when she had last been so upset or so scared. She clenched her hands together to keep them from trembling.

“Don't waste a single moment.” Sylvia placed her hands on Sarah's shoulders. “You'll have to go to them, to both of them, and apologize. Now, before it's too late.”

Sarah froze, stunned. “Apologize?”

“Of course. It's the only thing you can do.”

“I don't understand.” Sarah shrugged off Sylvia's hands. Apologize? Carol was the one who had given up and was running away. Matt was the
one who had become angry and insulted Sylvia and the other Elm Creek Quilters.

“What's to understand? March yourself upstairs and tell Matt you're sorry for losing your temper. Then sit down and discuss the matter rationally. When you're finished there, go speak to your mother.”

Sylvia's tone was matter-of-fact, but her words sparked Sarah's anger. “Wait a minute. Hold on. Matt's the one who lost his temper. Why should I be the one to cave in? Why aren't you telling him to apologize to me?”

“Because he isn't the one who sought my advice. If he were the one standing here, I would have told him the same. Someone has to bend. What do you have to gain from being stubborn?”

“Stubborn?” Sarah gasped. “I'm stubborn? You ignore your family for fifty years after one little argument and
I'm
stubborn?”

A muscle twitched in Sylvia's cheek, but her voice was cool. “That's simplifying things a bit, wouldn't you say? And we're not talking about my mistakes now, but about yours.”

Sarah felt the blood pounding in her ears as Sylvia continued, telling her how to approach Matt and Carol, what to say, how to say it. She used words like
responsibility,
and
maturity,
and
selflessness
—words that jumbled up and spun around in Sarah's mind until she thought she would explode.

Suddenly she couldn't bear one more word of criticism, one more sentence of blame. “Stop it,” she burst out. “What do you know about any of this? Your mother died when you were five, so what do you know about dealing with someone like Carol? And how long were you married? I've been married three times as long as you were, so who are you to tell me what to do? You're not my mother. Sometimes you don't even act like my friend!”

All the color drained from Sylvia's face.

In an instant, Sarah was shocked and sickened by her horrible words. She started to apologize, but Sylvia cut her off. “No, no, you're quite right.” Sylvia wouldn't—or couldn't—look at her. “Who am I to be giving out advice? As you pointed out, I have little experience.”

“Sylvia, please. I was just upset about Matt and my mother. I didn't mean—”

“You meant every word, just as Matthew did when he spoke his piece.” Sylvia sighed, and the sound wrenched Sarah's heart. “Well. This won't do. Such unhappiness won't do.” Her voice was bleak. “I'll say good-night now. I've had enough of being a meddling old busybody for one day. Thank you for letting me know how you feel.”

“But that's not how I feel, not really,” Sarah said, but it was too late. Sylvia was already leaving the kitchen, her shoulders slumped, her footsteps slow.

Sarah called after her, but the words caught in her throat, and only sobs came out. She clung to the kitchen counter, sick with remorse and shame.

A moment later, a movement caught her eye. It was Andrew, standing in the doorway of the west sitting room. He gave her a long, steady look as he passed her on his way through the kitchen after Sylvia. He spoke not a word, but she could sense his profound disappointment in her.

Never before in her life had she found herself so deserving of anyone's censure. Never before had she been more aware of her own selfishness, her potential for cruelty. Never before had she been so alone.

S
ylvia slept poorly. Andrew's words had been kind, but they had not comforted her. “She's just a young woman,” Andrew had said. “She loves you dearly. Don't hold this one moment against her.”

Sylvia promised him she wouldn't, but how could she ever forget how Sarah had lashed out at her? How could they go on as if nothing had happened? This could be the end of everything, everything, not just the hopes for a reconciliation between Sarah and Carol, but Elm Creek Quilts, the new life and joy they had restored to the manor, all of it.

Her dreams tormented her and shook her awake long before dawn.

As she lay in bed, waiting for the early morning grogginess to leave her, she felt uneasiness stirring, expanding until dread and worry filled her. Slowly she realized that there was something she had to do that morning, something urgent, something regarding Sarah and Carol. But what was it? What was it? She felt as if she had gone into a room to fetch something, only to realize she had forgotten what she had come for.

Sometimes retracing her steps helped her to remember. Yes. She would wake Sarah. As soon as Sylvia saw her, she would remember what it was that she must do. In the semidarkness, she sat up and groped for her glasses on the nightstand.

Just as her fingertips touched the fine silver chain, a searing pain shot through her skull.

She gasped.

Her left hand was numb, the left side of her face was numb, but her head was on fire.

This was wrong. The thoughts came slowly. Something was very wrong with her.

She should lie down and wait for it go away.

No. No. She couldn't.

Somehow she made herself sit upright. She tried to force her feet into her slippers, but she could not get her legs to move properly. She could see her slippers there on the floor beside her bed, and yet somehow she could not determine where they were. She tried to focus, but nothing would obey her, not her perception, not her limbs.

Afraid now, and barefoot, she forced herself to stand. She fell twice on her way to the door. She fumbled with the knob, slamming her shoulder on the frame as the door finally opened into the hallway. The blow registered, but not the pain.

Sarah, help me, she screamed, but no sound came out.

Leaning against the wall, she shuffled down the hallway toward Sarah's room. Right foot, left. Again, though she had no strength for it. Right foot. An eternity passed. Left foot.

She was nearly blind from pain.

“Sharuh,” she called out.

Her mouth was frozen stiff. She took as deep a breath as she could. She would have one more chance. That, and no more.

“Sharuh!”

It was the haunted wail of a stranger. It could not have been her own voice.

It was useless, useless. She could go no farther.

Then, as if in slow motion, she saw two doors open, one on either side of the hall. Sarah and Carol stepped from their rooms. Slowly their heads turned her way. Their eyes went wide with horror.

The last thing Sylvia saw as she collapsed was the mother and daughter running toward her.

Then she fell into darkness.

A
gnes was already awake when Sarah called from the hospital at six o'clock in the morning. The poor girl was so upset she could hardly get the words out, but the dreadful news was all too clear: Sylvia had suffered a stroke. The doctors did not yet know how serious.

“I'm coming,” Agnes told her. “I need to be there.”

Sarah must have anticipated this. “Matt's already on his way to pick you up.”

Agnes hung up the phone, numb. They didn't need her there, getting in the doctors' way. If Sylvia was going to be fine, they would have asked Agnes to postpone her visit until the afternoon at least. This was their way of telling her she would be coming to the hospital to say good-bye.

Agnes collected her appliqué patches, carefully folded the round robin center, and placed everything into her sewing box. Hospitals meant long waits, so she would take her quilting with her to keep her thoughts focused away from her grief.

Life was just one extended series of partings. She could not bear many more. She supposed she would not have to bear many more.

She put on a sweater and went to the living room, where she could see the driveway from a chair near the window. Was Sarah calling the other Elm Creek Quilters? Someone else should do it for her—Matt, perhaps, or Carol. Diane had made the calls for Agnes when Joe died, and Agnes had not been nearly as distraught then as Sarah sounded now. It wasn't
that Agnes hadn't loved Joe; she had. But he had suffered so terribly for so many months before finally succumbing to cancer that his death was, in a sense, a relief, though she wouldn't dream of telling her daughters that. And, too, no matter how much she had loved those who passed, every loss since Richard's had been diminished in comparison. No other loss could compare to that enormous, overwhelming pain, that severing—but Sylvia's passing would come close.

Suddenly she remembered Andrew, and her heart went out to him. How would he bear this? He had admired Sylvia since he was a child, and had fallen in love with her as a young man. Agnes remembered a time so long ago when Richard had teased him after the two boys returned to Philadelphia following a long weekend at Elm Creek Manor.

“Andrew here is sweet on my sister,” Richard told her, nudging Andrew.

“Is that so?” Agnes asked. She had not met Richard's family yet. Secretly she envied Andrew and wished Richard had invited her to come on the trip, too. “And how does she feel about you, Andrew?”

“It doesn't matter.” He shrugged, disconsolate. “She's married.”

“You mean you like Sylvia?” She thought Richard had meant Claudia, the pretty one, the eldest.

Richard grinned. “At least Sylvia's closer to his age.”

“Yes, but she's married,” Agnes said, scandalized.

“I didn't tell her,” Andrew protested. “What kind of a fellow do you take me for?”

Laughing, Richard patted him on the back and said, “We'll have to find a pretty girl to keep his mind off my sister.”

“I have a few friends who might be interested,” Agnes teased, and Andrew's blush deepened.

They were such good friends in those days, young and carefree, with all their days yet before them, or so it seemed. No wonder she had fallen in love with Richard. He was so handsome and confident and kind. She had never met anyone like him, not at the silly cotillions her parents forced her to attend, not at dancing school, not at any of the other society functions. The boys she met there, the boys her mother firmly steered
her toward, were virtually interchangeable in their backgrounds, their educations, their interests—even their mannerisms seemed identically practiced and polished. But Richard had a wild energy about him she had never sensed in anyone else. And to her amazement, she realized that he saw something unique in her, as well. He saw a part of her she had almost forgotten, a spirited girl with a mind of her own and the confidence to follow it wherever it led. For as long as Agnes could remember, her mother had labored to shape that girl into a carefully decorated, overrehearsed debutante—like her sisters, like the women her brothers would eventually marry. But her mother's idea of what Agnes should be was imposed from without, not brought forth from within. Richard had seen through the façade, and she knew she would never be the same.

Naturally her parents hated him. They pitied Andrew, the poor scholarship student who would be educated beyond his station and relegated to a life as a tutor to rich men's sons, but they despised Richard. Not that he was anything but respectful to them during those few times they were together. In fact, his manners were impeccable—which incensed her parents all the more, and delighted Agnes. Oh, but she would have loved him even if he had not been forbidden. Something in her soul recognized his, and they both knew from the moment they met that, somehow, they completed each other.

A red pickup truck pulled into the driveway, drawing Agnes from her reverie. She didn't wait for Matt to come to the door, but met him halfway up the path. Matt's expression was grim as he helped her into the truck.