Ornate lotus with feathers and moon design

The lamp-oil came Tuesday and I have been hiding the good scissors from Mam since, because she means to cut the tablecloth down for the chapel and I will not have it. You will remember the pattern. Grandmother's sheet, the lotus with the feathers hanging off it like the fringe of a shawl, and the little moon at the foot where the stem goes into the floor. I have it spread across the kitchen table now, pinned flat with the sugar bowl and two of your old sinkers.

Mr Pellow from the chandlery brought a parcel of thread and said the Dutch yarn had gone up again, so I am making do with the grey. It takes the stippling better than the white anyway. Each little dot takes an hour if you rush it and an afternoon if you do not, and I have decided not to rush. The curls round the petals I have been counting in threes, the way Grandmother taught us, so the pattern never quite leaves you alone.

On Sunday the tide came up under the slipway and I saw the moon standing over the harbour wall exactly where it sits on the cloth, a thin paring with its back to the town. I stood there longer than I should have with the basket going cold on my arm. Then I came home and finished the third chain of beads, the one that drops down past the sugar bowl to the pins.

Come home when the autumn gales are over and I will show you the cloth finished. It is nearly done. There is only the moon left, and I am saving that for when you walk up the lane.

Love, Ada