Part 6
“The clothes still need people inside them.”
“I have people. Women who’ll wear them afterward. Teachers, nurses, women with hips and jobs and places to be.”
He looked back at the page.
“The customers have to recognize themselves up there,” she said. “Otherwise, I’ve misrepresented the clothes before anyone sees a seam.”
When Beckett learned of the plan, he asked that his prediction of failure be formally recorded.
Philip entered it in the minutes.
Backstage, somebody had misplaced a shoe. Lena found it beneath a chair, handed it to its owner, and checked a sleeve that needed no checking.
Twenty-two women waited to walk out in Bellora.
Among them were a forty-three-year-old schoolteacher from the northern wards, a supermarket cashier from Wexley, two students, and a retired postal clerk of sixty-two. Nurse Larkin had come straight from a shift and changed behind a screen. Denise stood ninth in line, looking calmer than anyone else.
Nathaniel sat in the second row. When the first woman emerged, the room made no sound beyond the movement of programs.
The second received the same silence.
By the third, his tongue had gone dry.
A single person applauded the fourth woman. A few others followed. By the seventh, the applause no longer sounded tentative. People leaned forward to examine a skirt in motion, a jacket on broad shoulders, a dress worn by someone whose face suggested she had other things to do that day.
Denise walked as if she had been crossing that floor for years.
Vera came second to last.
She wore a suit Lena had fitted over several evenings, allowing time for rests and arguments. Her steps were slow. Her shoulders were square. When she reached the brightest section of the runway, somebody stood.
Then the whole room rose.
Nathaniel saw Beckett get to his feet in the third row. The older man watched Vera for a moment, turned his face aside, and remained standing.
Lena waited until her grandmother was safely off the runway before she stepped out.
She wore Before Daybreak.
The previous evening, Nathaniel had gone into the display himself. He had removed the dress from its stand, supporting the heavy skirt over one arm, while Denise held the door open. For the first time in four years, the window was empty.
The silk came to rest around Lena as she halted beneath the lights. Nathaniel left his seat.
Nearly thirty cameras followed him onto the white runway, but he was watching her. He opened the box; its ruby held the color he had spent a season chasing. As the last applause died away, he went down on one knee.
“Lena. Will you marry me?”
She looked at him for so long that he became aware of his knee against the hard surface and the ridiculous care he was taking not to drop the ring.
Then she said, “Yes.”
The sound from the room sent Vera’s hand to her chest before she began laughing.
Later, the garden behind the house had cooled enough for Lena to draw a shawl around her shoulders. Vera had been asleep for hours. Through the kitchen window, an overlooked light shone onto the table where someone had left a breadboard out.
Lena slipped the ring off to examine it in her palm.
“I need one honest answer.”
Nathaniel turned toward her.
“How much did you set up? Meeting me, lunch, the library. Coming to the hospital.”
He took time before answering.
“You found the window yourself. The dress had been there for years.”
“And after that?”
“I found excuses to see you. I was afraid I’d never meet anyone like you again.”
She rolled the ring carefully between her fingers.
“The hospital?”
“I heard you needed someone. I came.”
She nodded, still looking at the ruby.
“There was one piece of theater,” he added. “I planned today three weeks ago.”
“Without consulting me.”
“I was hoping you wouldn’t hold that against the dress.”
Lena looked through the kitchen window, where Vera’s apron hung on the back of Nathaniel’s chair. Then she put the ring on again and reached for his hand.