It hung from an iron bar that stuck out over the door and could be read by those walking or riding down the street. On a dark green background, the white lettering was identical on both sides. It was elegant, but still easy to read.

EDMUNDS
DRESS GOODS

Hanna gasped in delight at the sight of a five-petaled lotus outlined in gilt paint.

Papa had gotten rid of so many of Mama’s things when she died. He had a good excuse: They had been preparing to travel in the wagon. But since then, Hanna had missed some of those things. The blue and white bowl that had held oranges. The enameled vase adorned with birds and flowers. The carved wooden chopsticks. At times she felt as though he had done his best to erase Mama’s presence from their lives.

Now she realized that she had been unfair in that thought. He was keeping Mama’s lotus, putting it right out front on the sign.

The sign was bordered in gilt. It had been stenciled and painted by Mr. Clyde at the newspaper office. Papa told her that he had applied three coats of varnish to protect it from the weather.

Hanna walked backwards a few steps to view the sign from farther away. She couldn’t stop smiling.

“It looks nice, Papa,” she said.

He smiled back at her. “Hope the whole town thinks the same,” he said.

Next they looked at the window display. The inside of the front window was covered with sheets of brown packing paper. Papa would take the paper down on the morning of the opening. Hanna was in charge of organizing the display. She had tacked swags of fabric to the ceiling of the window well, a robin’s-egg blue lawn alternating with diaphanous puffs of darker blue chiffon. The effect was that of a soft, romantic sky. Beneath the swags, a simple rack made of lath and dowel rods stood in the middle of the deep sill. It had been painted sage green to match the shop’s exterior.

She had chosen three bolts of fabric: the wine-colored watered silk, a cheerful calico in blue and pink and cream plaid, and a fawn-colored challis strewn with a feathery pattern. She unrolled a few yards from each bolt and draped the loose fabric over the dowels, leaving the bolts themselves out of sight behind the rack. Then she tied ribbon around the swaths of fabric, each of which looked like a gathered skirt flowing down from the “waist” created by the ribbon.

Hanna had always made it a point to examine every tailor and dressmaker’s shop she came across. She had seen a rack like this one in a shop in San Francisco; Charlie Hart had made it to her design.

“I like it,” Papa said.

“Thank you, Papa. But I’m thinking it’s still not quite right.”