Page 69 of Threads of Kindness
“Do you have a picture of the dress she wants?” the seamstress whispered when Anita caught up to her.
“I’ve seen one,” Anita said. “It’s a Cinderella ball gown style.”
“Lots of lace appliqué or beading?”
“Not that I remember.”
“We could make that dress for her,” the seamstress said. “She’s a perfect size six if I’ve ever seen one.”
Anita looked at her, and the two women exchanged a conspiratorial smile.
“We already have yards of fabric on hand that we could use,” the seamstress said. “Can you get your hands on a picture of that dress?”
“I’ll ask her to send it to me,” Anita said, snapping her fingers. “I’ll tell her I’m going to make inquiries in bridal shops around the state.”
“Ooh, I like that,” the seamstress said.
“I’m afraid she’s going to find out pretty quickly that this online seller doesn’t have her dress,” Anita said. “I’ll get Sunday to send me the photo before she leaves.”
“Andwe’ll spend the afternoon figuring out how to make that sweet woman her dream dress.”
CHAPTER 35
The young man bounded up the basement stairs two at a time and hurried across the first floor to where Jeff was studying a set of engineering plans unrolled on top of a glass display case.
“Hey, Jeff,” he said, slightly out of breath.
Jeff kept his finger in place on the plans and looked up.
“I’m sorry to disturb you,” the young man continued, “but you’ll want to see this.”
Jeff flipped his reading glasses to the top of his head and followed without a word.
They descended into the dank, musty basement. Workers had pumped out the standing water the day before. The young man had spent the morning removing the old whitewashed wooden planks from three sides of the foundation, revealing uneven, rough, irregularly shaped fieldstone walls—typical of 19th-century construction.
But the fourth wall told a different story. He’d pried away two planks, and, instead of revealing stone, the standing work lights now shone into a dark, cavernous void. The stale air that seeped from the space carried the sharp tang of rust, the acrid hint of old coal smoke, and the earthy smell of soil.
Jeff stepped off the last stair and gasped. “It’s a false wall, isn’t it?” he said. “There’s a room behind it.”
The young man nodded and handed him a flashlight.
They pressed their foreheads to the narrow rectangular opening and beamed the light inside. It illuminated a rusted metal cylinder, pocked and green with age. Wires and copper tubes curled from the top like skeletal fingers.
“That’s an old still,” Jeff said, a low note of wonder in his voice.
“That’s what I thought,” the young man said. “There’s a pile of broken bottles next to it.”
Jeff swept the light around. “Those bottles look like the ones we found in the crates. There’s a rolltop desk and an old banker’s chair. That must’ve been where they kept the ledgers. This was a full-scale bootlegging setup.”
He set the flashlight down. “Do you have an extra pair of gloves? Let’s widen the opening.”
The young man pulled a pair from his back pocket, and the two set to work. Nails shrieked as they pried boards loose. Dust and dry rot filled the air, clinging to their skin and clothing like soot.
“I’ll move one of the standing lights in here,” the young man said, stepping through the widened gap.
Jeff followed. The air inside was cooler, heavier. He crouched and scraped the dirt floor with his fingernail. “Strange. This side doesn’t feel as wet.”
The young man circled his flashlight. “The watermark’s lower—only about eighteen inches.”
