The Lake of Dreams - Kim Edwards [42]
“Really? So you were breaking new ground.” Suzi spoke rather pensively, which made me wonder about the path she’d taken.
“I suppose I was. I didn’t think about it that way, though. I just wanted to be an acolyte. I hate to say it, looking back, but it didn’t cross my mind even then that women could be priests.”
“Some changes take a very long time. Like water on stone. That’s why I’m so especially interested in these windows.” She nodded at the manila folder Joanna had given me. “Did you find anything?”
“Yes, actually. I did.” The photocopies of the baptismal certificate and the window receipt were still faintly warm from the machine when I handed them to her. “Rose. Her name was Rose Jarrett. She would have been my great-great-aunt, though I’ve never heard of her before. She had a daughter, Iris.”
“Reverend David Prescott—he’s in one of the photos on the wall,” she noted, pointing out the signature. “Such a long time ago. No one would remember her, which is too bad. Whoever she was, she seems to have found a way to see herself—and women in general—in the sacred texts. To imagine herself into the story, so to speak. I think that must have been exceptionally difficult at the time.”
“I know. I wonder what happened to her. And to Iris, too. Plus there’s the border pattern, which is so fascinating. Keegan said the windows dated to the 1930s, but the papers I have are much earlier.”
“Keegan, yes.” She nodded, smiling, as she gave me back the photocopies. “Well, he would know, wouldn’t he? I’ve become very fond of Keegan, working with him on these windows. He has enormous expertise, and he’s been good enough to donate his time, which is a real blessing. The windows are a treasure, but they turn out to be so incredibly expensive to maintain.”
“It’s been good to see him again,” I said, remembering Keegan lifting Max into the air, their jokes back and forth, their laughter. I thought about Blake and Avery with a baby on the way, the elegant vase of gladioli sent to my mother by a stranger, the mysterious old papers, fragile and gritty to the touch.
Her cell phone rang, shattering the quiet, and the Reverend Suzi slipped it from her pocket, glancing at the number.
“Sorry—I have to take this,” she said, gesturing toward the door. “It’s good to meet you, Lucy. Come by anytime. And keep me posted on whatever you find, okay?”
Outside the muted sanctuary, the world seemed bright, newly washed and vibrant. Summer traffic was already backing up the hill and the sidewalks were crowded with tourists in their loose bright cotton clothes. I walked without intention for a while, absorbed by my discoveries, wandering through shops without really seeing what I was looking at. In the park I wove my way through the art fair to the seawall and tried to call Keegan; he didn’t pick up, so I left a message about the baptismal certificate as I wandered on through the village. At last I found myself at the pier where Blake moored his boat. The Fearful Symmetry was graceful, thirty feet long with a tall white mast, bobbing gently on the water. I stepped down onto the deck and called his name, but the voice that floated up from the cabin was Avery’s, light and questioning. She appeared at the bottom of the stairs wearing jeans and a gauzy yellow blouse, her dark hair pulled back in a ponytail.
“Oh, Lucy,” she said. “Hi there. Blake’s at work. I was just going over some papers. Come on down, if you want.”
The stairs were narrow, opening into a paneled room as compact and complete as a studio apartment, with a v-berth in the bow, a galley kitchen, a tiny bathroom, and a sitting area. I’d always marveled at how sparely furnished Blake’s life was. He didn’t care much for things; he liked the uncluttered feeling that came from owning very little. Avery moved some pillows to make room on the built-in sofa. The table was covered with drawings, and I recognized my mother’s drafting paper, her neat lines and handwriting.