“That's wonderful, Bill. Whoever she is, she's a very lucky person. It was my childhood dream to marry Prince Herodias, and in a way she is.”
He smiled. It was such a happy, calm smile. The smile of someone who feels completely fulfilled, who lets out that anxious breath he's been holding for thirty years and knows he's going to live happily ever after. After all.
“Is it someone we know?' Pix asked.
He appeared to find the question irrelevant. 'It's Bird, of course.'
“Bird!' Pix gasped again, and again Faith covered her confusion with happy noises about how lovely she was and now her baby would have a good home. She would have burbled on further, but Bill interrupted. He was obviously eager to share his news and tell his tale.
“I met her last winter, and it was the proverbial falling in love at first sight. I knew I didn't have a chance, but I was happy to be her friend and she enjoyed coming to the house. She's a very bright woman, you know.”
Since they had never heard her open her mouth except for that anguished outcry in the cemetery, Faith and Pix did not know.
“She has been desperately unhappy with Andy, but felt she had to try to stay with him since he was the father of her child, and they also shared a commitment to living in the natural, or rather primitive, way they did. And they are both macrobiotics. Although I have been able to get her to eat chicken and fish on occasion. What I do is put lots of sprouts on everything, and she thinks she's eating salad.”
Faith was appalled. What a way to start a marriage. This must be what was meant by living on love alone.
“I don't pretend to think I'm Bird's first or only choice. I'm quite certain that had he lived, she would have married Roger. She's marrying me because he wants some stability in her life and she wants to stay on the island.' He paused and colored slightly. 'Of course, she does have some affection for me too.'
“Of course she does, Bill. If she didn't, she'd be out of her mind. She's the lucky one here.' Pix was getting a bit irritated at all the self-deprecation. Trading life in a fisherman's bait shack with no amenities and a quixotic, perhaps abusive, would-be rock star for Bill's beautifully designed modern house and unswerving love and devotion wasn't exactly a step down.
“We're both lucky, Pix,' Bill smiled as he put his hand over hers. 'One of those serendipitous blinks where two people find themselves in the right place at the right time. And Zoe makes it even more perfect,' he added.
“Zoe?' asked Pix. 'Oh, the baby, of course. I never knew her name.'
“Well, her name has actually undergone several transformations that are too embarrassing to reveal, but it's Zoe now for keeps. Zoe Fox.'
“I like Zoe. I think it means `life,' doesn't it?”
While Pix was musing on Zoe's name, Faith was concentrating on Bird's. Bird Fox? Better than Bird Dog, but still ludicrous. If Bill could get her to eat meat and change the baby's name, maybe he could convince her to go back to her original name, whatever that was. More important, maybe he could get her to stop tie-dyeing her clothes.
A lobster boat returning from a long morning of hauling made its way across the inlet. The herons rose up and flapped off in the opposite direction.
“I have to be going,' Bill said. 'Bird and Zoe had fallen asleep when I left, and they must be up by now.' And he didn't want to miss a single waking moment, Faith surmised.
They walked him to his car and returned to the job of identifying the quilt squares.
Pix took a sheet of paper and was making a list.
“Why don't we give them numbers starting at the upper left-hand corner and going across each row. So far we know number one, Old Maid's Puzzle, number five, Mariner's Compass, and this one, number seven, is Crossroads or something like that.'
“And Louise said this was Fern Berry, number sixteen. I remember, because it was an interesting name.'
“Right, and in the next row, number eighteen is Shady Pine.”
Pix stood back, regarding the quilt intently. 'Number thirteen is obviously Schoolhouse, or Little Red Schoolhouse, I think it's called. And number fourteen is Jacob's Ladder.'
“Pix, this is great. We've already named seven, almost half.'
“Make that eight, because number ten has to be some kind of tree design. See the trunk and the leaf pattern?'
“I've been stupid about this. Of course the squares are pictures. Look at number nineteen. It looks like a chest or a trunk.'
“I know what you're thinking and it may be crazy, but I think you're right. The quilt does have some kind of message.'
“Matilda may have been religious, but I'm sure 'Seek and Ye Shall Find' meant something else. Something like 'God helps those who help themselves.' And what else is there to seek but the gold?' Faith was definitely getting excited.
“Naming the first block Old Maid's Puzzle is too much of a coincidence to be one, together with the quotation and that square at the bottom with the chest or whatever on it.'
“Exactly. Now all we have to do is solve the puzzle.'
“And to do that, we have to find the names of all the squares. Not an easy job. But we can start by figuring out if the squares are four-patch, nine-patch, applique, what have you.'
“And what have you? What's all this patch business?'
“Many blocks are made up of four, six, or nine, etc. smaller squares sewn together, and the books list the patterns this way, so we don't have to go through every category searching. We can narrow it down a little.
“Wonderful. Applique is in my vocabulary, but I don't see any here, except maybe this schoolhouse.' Faith was down on her hands and knees, looking closely at each square. 'No, it's your little nine, ten, whatever blocks too.”
Pix had started to open a book. 'Ickis's
“Pix!' Faith interrupted. 'There's something peculiar about some of these squares. Look—on Mariner's Compass she only embroidered one point, and E for East. And in this one, number three, the top triangle is red and all the others are blue. It's not a code. Pix—the quilt is some kind of map!”
Pix knelt down next to Faith. 'You're right! Look at Crossroads. The calico for the one on the left is different from the rest.'
“And number nine has the same thing—the fabric in the upper right is different from the rest. She's telling us which way to turn. What a smart lady. I'm really sorry I never knew her,' Faith said with regret in her voice.
“I have a feeling you're going to be a whole lot better acquainted with Matilda by the time we ever figure this out,' Pix commented.
They pored over the books, taking turns at amusing Ben, who awoke and vociferously demanded some entertainment. After an hour and a half, they had identified four more squares: Harbor View, number two, Weather Vane, number three, Odd Fellows Chain, number six, and North Star, number eleven.
“Harbor View is the name of the Prescott house. It's painted on a board over the barn door. So that means the map must start there and we must read across the rows, not down.'
“Then Weather Vane refers to the ship weather vane. Which way is north?'
“Toward this side of the island, but we don't know what the square in between is—before Mariner's Compass.”
Faith had been scanning the designs in one of the books. 'It looks like this one, Pullman Puzzle, but that doesn't make sense. There aren't any train tracks on the island.'
“I should have told you,' Pix said apologetically. 'Many of the same squares have different names depending on what part of the country you're in.'
“Wonderful. All right, we'll put a question mark next to that one. And in any case we may not have to identify all the squares to figure it out. The most important ones have to be the last few. Why don't we concentrate on those, now that we know the starting point?”
