Chapter 4: The Cedar Chest

Graham left for his office at nine in a fresh shirt, whistling.

Delphine drove Teddy to his playgroup at nine thirty.

I waited until the blue sedan was past the maples.

Then I walked down the back hall with the brass key in my fist.

Gran's sewing room is on the ground floor, behind the back stairs, a narrow room with one window facing the garden.

Nobody ever went in it but her.

When she died, I couldn't make myself clear it out, so I had turned the key and left it.

Now every other door in the back hall had a new brass plate on the lock.

Graham had changed the locks on the rest of the ground floor.

Gran's door was the only one he had skipped, and I think he had forgotten it was a room.

It was painted the same cream as the wall.

I slid Gran's key in.

It turned on the first try.

The room smelled of lavender and old thread.

Her machine sat under its cover.

Her pincushion shaped like a tomato sat on the sill, and her reading glasses lay folded on a book of crosswords.

I stood in the doorway until my eyes stopped stinging.

The cedar chest was under the window, where it had always been.

I had sat on it as a child while she hemmed my school skirts.

I knelt in front of it and lifted the lid.

The top layer was her good tablecloths, folded in tissue.

Under them were the christening gown, three bundles of letters tied in ribbon, and a rolled blue quilt.

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