6. Beckett
BECKETT
I came to the cutting table the next morning.
The gown had gone out at two in the morning. Talia's state dinner was in thirty-six hours and the Washington gown was on its way to her hotel. I'd finished it on the stand and handed it to the courier myself, and then I'd gone upstairs to my office and slept on the couch for four hours.
When I came back down, the cutting table was exactly the way I'd left it.
Except for the ring.
It was sitting on the bolt of Ivester cloth. The blanket wool I'd pulled for the bodice lining. Right there on the cloth, catching the light.
I looked at it.
I reached for it.
I tried to put it in my pocket and my hand missed. I tried again and missed again. I stood there with my hand in the air and I didn't notice I was doing it until the third time.
I picked it up.
Her wedding ring.
I turned it over in my hand. It was warm. That didn't make sense. It had been sitting there all night.
I looked at the cutting table. At the shears I'd borrowed. At the cloth. At the place where I'd been standing for six hours yesterday finishing the gown.
She must have come by. Dropped it off for safekeeping while she was traveling. She did that sometimes. Took it off when she was working with the small machines and forgot to put it back on.
I slipped it into my pocket.
It stayed there for maybe ten seconds before I took it out again and looked at it.
I tried to put it back in my pocket. Missed.
Tried again. Missed again.
The studio was full of people. Pattern team at their tables. Two of the junior cutters laying out silk for the spring line. Winston in the doorway of his office, on the phone.
One of the pattern team walked past.
"Morning, Mr. Crowe."
"Morning."
"The gown looked perfect yesterday."
"Thank you."
Nobody else was looking at me.
I got the ring into my pocket on the fourth try.
My phone buzzed. A text from the courier. The gown had arrived. Talia's stylist had confirmed receipt.
I looked at the clock on the wall. Just after nine.
If I left now, I could be in Charlotte by two.
I pulled my phone out. Opened the message thread with Nell. The last text was from three days ago. She'd sent me a picture of the old loom at the mill with a piece of the hospital blanket cloth still on it. No message, just the picture.
I hadn't answered.
I started typing. On my way home.
I stopped.
My hand was shaking.
I deleted it. Started again. Call me when you get this.
Deleted that too.
I put the phone down on the cutting table.
One of the pattern team came over. "Mr. Crowe? The spring samples are ready for your review."
"Not now."
"You said you wanted them this morning."
"I said not now."
She left.
I picked up the phone again. Stared at Nell's name.
Just call her.
Tell her you're coming home.
Tell her you found the ring.
Tell her?—
Winston came over. "You alright?"
"Fine."
"You look like hell."
"I'm fine."
He looked at the cutting table. At the empty space where the cloth had been. "Where's the princess's gown?"
"On its way to Washington."
"You finished it last night?"
"Yes."
"Beckett." He said it the way you'd say someone's name to get them to look at you. "You've been here nineteen hours."
"Twenty-two."
"Jesus."
"I'm fine."
"You're not fine. Go home."
"I will."
"When."
"Soon."
"Beckett."
"I said I will."
He didn't move. He was looking at me the way he looked at a ledger that didn't balance.
"What," I said.
"Nothing."
"Say it."
"You need to call your wife."
I pulled the ring out of my pocket and showed it to him.
He looked at it. Then at me.
His face changed.
"When did she give you that," he said.
"She didn't. She left it here."
"When."
"I don't know. Yesterday, I think. It was on the cutting table this morning."
"On the table."
"Yes."
"Beckett—"
"She probably just dropped it off. She does that sometimes."
Winston didn't say anything.
"She takes it off when she's working," I said. "With the machines. She forgets to put it back on."
"She came here yesterday."
"I think so."
"While you were finishing the gown."
"I don't know. I didn't see her."
"And she left her wedding ring on your cutting table."
"She was probably in a hurry. She had a flight."
Winston looked at me for a long time.
Then he said, "You need to go home. Right now."
"I know."
"Beckett."
"I know. I will. I just need to?—"
"You need to go home."
"The spring line?—"
"I'll handle it."
"The Milan build-out?—"
"I'll handle it."
"Winston—"
"Go."
But I didn't move.
Because the spring line was due in six weeks and I hadn't approved the final samples yet.
Because the Milan showroom was opening in two months and I hadn't signed off on the build-out.
Because Talia's people had just sent over the list of events for the next quarter and three of them needed custom work.
Because if I stayed here, I could fix all of it.
Because if I went home, I didn't know what I'd be walking into.
Winston looked at me. Then he looked at the pattern team. At the junior cutters. At the whole studio floor.
"Everyone out," he said.
Nobody moved.
"Out. Now. Take an early lunch."
They left.
When the studio was empty, Winston came back to the cutting table. He picked up the shears I'd borrowed. Nell's shears. My grandfather's, and hers since the day we married.
He put them in my hand.
"These need to go back to your wife," he said.
"I know."
"So take them back to her."
"I will."
"When."
I didn't answer.
Winston took the shears out of my hand. He took the bolt of Ivester cloth. He cleared the whole table and folded the cutting mat and put it away.
Then he took my jacket off the back of my chair and held it out to me.
"Go," he said.
I took the jacket.
I didn't put it on.
"Beckett," Winston said. "Go home."
I looked at the empty cutting table. At the place where the ring had been sitting.
"I can't," I said.
"Why not."
"The reception gown. For the dinner tomorrow night. It needs the final fitting."
"So send Maya."
"It needs me."
"Beckett—"
"It needs me, Winston. I'm the only one who can finish it."
He stared at me.
"You're telling me you can't leave," he said.
"Not until tomorrow night."
"Your wife left her wedding ring on a table and walked away and you can't leave because of a fitting."
"It's not just a fitting. It's the state dinner. It's the most important?—"
"I don't care."
"Winston—"
"I don't care if it's the queen of England. Go home."
"I can't."
Winston looked at me like I'd just told him I couldn't read.
"Then you're a fool," he said.
And he walked away.
—
I stayed.
The reception gown. The spring samples. The Milan renderings. By the time I got to the airport, it was late the next afternoon.
I sat in the terminal and watched the departure board. My phone started lighting up just after six.
The first picture came through from Talia's stylist. The gown in the hotel suite. Then another. Talia being fitted one last time.
I boarded the seven o'clock flight.
Halfway through, the real photographs started coming in. Talia on the steps of the state building. The gown catching the light. The way the skirt moved.
Perfect.
I'd done my job.
When I landed in Charlotte it was after nine. I'd been awake for thirty-eight hours.
The car dropped me at the house just before ten.
Empty. I knew it the second I opened the door.
I went upstairs. Her closet was almost untouched. A few things missing. Not many.
If she'd left, she would have taken more.
If she hadn't left, she'd be here.
I tried calling her.
It rang once. Then a recording. The number you have reached is not in service.
She'd blocked me.
I went back downstairs. The workroom door was open.
I stopped.
She never left that door open.
I'd had Maris open it to get the shears. I'd forgotten to tell her to lock it again.
I looked in. The dress form by the window. The cutting table. The light from the hallway.
I didn't go in.
I was looking for a person, not a room.
The next morning, I got back in the car.
"Where to?" the driver said.
I gave him the address for the mill.
"That's down in Ardis, right?"
"Yes."
"Forty minutes or so."
"That's fine."
—
The mill was forty minutes south. I'd been there six times in six years, always to pick Nell up for dinner when I was home, never past the front door.
It was a long low brick building on the south end of town. The sign out front said IVESTER WOOLEN in letters that needed repainting. The parking lot was empty except for a few cars near the loading dock.
I went in through the front.
There was a girl at a desk just inside the door. Nineteen, maybe twenty. She looked up when I came in.
"Can I help you?"
"I'm looking for Nell Ivester."
"She's not here."
"Do you know when she'll be back?"
"No, sorry."
I stood there. The sound of the machines was coming through the wall behind her. A steady industrial hum I could feel in my chest. The sound of Nell's work.
"Can you tell her I'm here?"
"She's not here," the girl said again.
"I know. I mean when she comes back. Can you tell her I came by?"
"I guess."
"Can you call her?"
The girl looked uncomfortable. "I don't think she's taking calls right now."
"Just try. Please."
She hesitated.
"Tell her it's important," I said.
"Okay." She picked up the phone on her desk. "What's your name?"
"Tell her Beckett Crowe is at the door."
She blinked. Looked at me again. "Okay."
She dialed. Waited.
I heard the faint sound of the line ringing. Once. Twice. Three times.
Then a voice I knew. Hazel Dunning.
The girl said, "There's someone here to see Nell. Says his name is Beckett Crowe."
A pause.
Then Hazel's voice again, too low for me to make out the words.
The girl hung up. "She'll be right out."
"Thank you."
I waited.
The girl went back to her computer. The machines kept running behind the wall. I could hear individual sounds now that I was listening. The punch of the cutting press. The rhythm of the industrial machines. The same sounds Nell's mother had worked to for thirty-one years.
The door behind the desk opened.