The Midnight Dress(15)

‘I don’t want to wear something that looks . . . second-hand,’ says Rose.

‘Old things can become new things,’ says Edie.

It’s late when Rose gets home, but there is Mrs Lamond sitting with her father on the fold-out chairs, her lycra-clad legs crossed daintily, her gold scuffs hanging on her leathery feet. She has make-up on, Rose can see it even in the dark.

Only three days ago Mrs Lamond had summonsed Patrick Lovell to the kiosk via Rose.

‘The thing is,’ Mrs Lamond said to Rose, ‘your father’s going to have to pay some rent in advance. I know there’s no one here now but you wait till after April, the place is packed, people will start booking soon. I get letters from all over the country wanting a space booked, it isn’t called Paradise for nothing.’

Patrick Lovell showed up, of course, bare-chested, bearded, shoeless. He leant on the counter and sorted out Mrs Lamond in a matter of minutes.

‘You’ve got a beautiful place here,’ he said. ‘It must be the best place in the world I reckon. Rose here said I’ve got to pay up-front. I’m going to walk into town this morning to get some petrol, then I can get to the dole office. Does Mr Lamond do all the handiwork around here? I’m only asking because the sign is very faded and I’m good with paints. I don’t want money.’

‘There’s no Mr Lamond,’ said Mrs Lamond, lowering her tone, trying to sound sad about it. ‘He died ten years ago, cancer it was, cancer of the stomach.’

‘No good,’ said Patrick.

‘I tell you what,’ said Mrs Lamond, taking a long drag on her Holiday cigarette, ‘why don’t I give you enough petrol for the trip to town and you can pick up some paints to do the sign. That can be our agreement for now. I’m sure there are a few other jobs around the place as well.’

Rose shook a snow dome, listening. When she looked up Mrs Lamond flashed her large yellow-toothed smile. Rose’s father whistled all the way back to the caravan.

And now, here is Mrs Lamond sitting in Rose’s chair.

‘Your father’s been worrying about you,’ she says.

‘I didn’t think you’d be doing sewing classes until midnight,’ her father says.

He can’t meet her eyes. Mrs Lamond nurses a coffee cup, holding it like it’s an alien thing; there is left-over food between them. Mrs Lamond smiles, crinkles her eyes as though she cares, her yellow teeth glow in the dark. There is something Rose would like to say but she doesn’t. She goes inside, slamming the metal screen door.

‘Teenagers,’ Rose hears her say.

Rose brushes her teeth, sits on her bed and brushes out her hair, seventy-one strokes, presses her eyes until they burn. She lies down, tries to build her dream house inside her mind. It’s a game she plays to fall asleep. It isn’t a grand house, a cottage really, all slanted ceilings and wooden floors. There is only one bedroom. Her bed is a four-poster with dark velvet drapes; it’s so soft, like sleeping on a wave. There’s a round porthole window that looks out to sea. The house is filled with all her black things. Black nail polishes. Black lipsticks. Black jeans. Black shirts. Black notebooks filled with black words. She has a black cat called Blackie.

Mrs Lamond is laughing at something hilarious. Rose covers her head with a pillow. She has to start building the place again now, one interruption and it all falls apart.

Edie.

She thinks of the woman’s creaking house, even though she tries not to.

That night Edie had cleared the table and lit four hurricane lamps. She took the jar with the snake and the cat-shaped salt and pepper shakers and the piles of newspapers and the vase filled with plum pips and placed them all on the floor beside the old day bed in the far corner of the kitchen. On the bare table she laid out the strange collection: the midnight-blue dress, the embroidered shawl, the old black dress with the rose-lace sleeves, the lampshade with the black glass beads.

‘We’ll need black tulle, of course,’ said Edie. ‘Did you see tulle in the sewing room?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Rose. ‘What’s tulle?’

‘Don’t worry,’ Edie said, ‘I’ll find some. I think there are some old confirmation dresses with petticoats somewhere, we can unpick them.’

Rose bit her bottom lip.

‘I can see it again,’ said Edie, her hands hovering over the table in a way that made Rose feel uncomfortable.

‘What does it look like?’

‘It looks like a creek tumbling over falls, with the beads falling across the bodice and down here, through the skirt. It’s like a dark sky.’

Rose looked at the dress, the jagged tear across its skirt.

Edie sat down at the table, she patted the chair beside her. Rose sat down cautiously.

‘Do you want to hear a story?’ Edie said, holding up a seam ripper.

‘Not really,’ said Rose.

‘I come from a long line of tailors and dressmakers,’ said Edie. ‘My great-great-great-great-great grandfather on my mother’s side was a tailor on the rue Saint-Honoré. Now his name was Jean-Claude Mercier and he was trying to make ends meet with six sons and his wife dead with the last. He made thread buttons, which many other tailors did, but it was illegal thanks to the button makers’ guild, and one night when he was closing up his shop and putting down milk for the alley cats at the back door a man lunged out of the darkness shouting ‘viva la bouton’, and stabbed him in the neck. This is how seriously the French took buttons in that time. This was almost three hundred years ago.