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"Many a time while I was piecin' that," she said, "I thought about the man that laid the pavement in that old church, and wondered what his name was, and how he looked, and what he'd think if he knew there was a old woman down here in Kentucky usin' his patterns to make a bedquilt."
And just for the fun of the thing I collected them twenty-eight pieces of yellow paper, carried 'em over to my lunch place, and spent the best part of my noon-hour piecin' 'em together. What I got was this, scribbled in lead pencil: Grebel out. Larkin melding. Teg morf rednu. "Whiffo!" thinks I. "What kind of a Peruvian dialect is this?" Course the names was plain enough.
Willie likes red, an' there's a scrap of silk in the trunk under the eaves that could be stretched into a facin' with some piecin'." "I'm afraid you wouldn't like red, Aunt Tiny," the girl replied gently. "Mebbe I wouldn't," was the prompt answer. "Well, do it as you think best. You never put me into anything yet that warn't becomin', an' I reckon I can risk leavin' it to you."
We've got everything ready, only one bow, an' Stefana's piecin' that. Oh my darlin' dear!" The curtain had gone down. Theodosia Baxter stood quite alone in her big room. In her ears was suddenly the shriek of a steam whistle of welcome; it died away, and the silence ached. A crumpled something half under a chair caught her eye and she openly sobbed. It was a forgotten little nightgown.
"Did you really make all these quilts, Aunt Jane?" I asked wonderingly. Aunt Jane's eyes sparkled with pride. "Every stitch of 'em, child," she said, "except the quiltin'. The neighbors used to come in and help some with that. I've heard folks say that piecin' quilts was nothin' but a waste o' time, but that ain't always so.
That runs on for a while, and pretty soon in comes a dandy-lookin' chap and tells her she's an abused woman and she HAS been and he begins pickin' up the scraps and piecin' them together, tellin' her all the time the pretty things the first man told her and which, fool-like, she believes over agin, and then one fine day she skips off and the husband goes round, tearin' his hair with shame or shakin' his fist with rage, and says she broke up his home, and if she ever sets foot on his doorstep again he'll set the dogs on her, or let her starve before he'd give her a crumb.
And then the woodwork had got to be painted all over the house, and he was so busy with his spring's work that she had got to do it herself." And I sez, "Couldn't you let those things be till you come back?" And she said, "She couldn't, for she mistrusted she would be all beat out, and wouldn't feel like it when she got back; paintin' wuz hard work, and so wuz piecin' up."
Josiah killed a fat turkey, and I baked it, and done other things for their comfort, and we had quite a good time. Cephas wuz ruther flowery and enthusiastick, and his mouth and voice wuz ruther large, but he meant well, I should judge, and we had quite a good time. She wuz very freckled, and a second-day Baptist by perswasion, and wuz piecin' up a crazy bedquilt.
"If I stay away all night an' he don't know where, there wouldn't be any way o' piecin' on." And suddenly he knew, if she was to persist in "piecing on," she was right. "Wait," he said. "Let me think."
"'Cause I thought grandma was a peacemaker," Reginald said, "for she's piecin' a silk patchwork quilt, an' papa said she'd be blessed glad when it's done." Aunt Charlotte was the only one who did not laugh, but the small boy was not at all vexed. "You needn't laugh," he said to Katie, "for you've seen her makin' pieces out of silk, an' what's the difference between makin' pieces an' peacemakin'?"
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