When Alice finally clicked the deadbolt into place from the outside as it was already dawn and the streets were getting rowdy with people coming back from their place of work.
The porcelain-white glare of the halogen lamps had begun to yellow against the encroaching grayness of the windowpane . Bill looked at the clothes he was making and instantly an idea flashed through his head.
Given that Mahito had proven to be a lot more than he had imagined, he resolved to get on with the job down the basement. Without any waste of thought, he packed up his hand bag filling it with the unfinished coat he was working on along with a few stitches and needles and left changing the sigh on the door from opened to closed.
Bill stood motionless with bloodshot eyes fixed entirely on the midnight-blue velvet riding coat that Mrs. Gable had left behind in her frantic retreat.
"Now I have to make a hat for no reason for a madman" he grunted realizing he still had to finish the work down below before the Columbus line updated at midnight.
With that in mind, Bill slipped out through the rear alley exit where his dark-paneled delivery van sat idling against the brickwork.
By the time the van cleared the limestone ridge and reached the lower commercial blocks of the university sector which of course was rowdy. The suffocating evening rush and timeline of the county had dissolved under the curfew regulations; factories at the eastern terminal were releasing their shifts early to clear the roads before the state police checkpoints went live at the state line.
Not far from Bill's van, concrete sidewalks were packed three-deep with laborers coming off the quarry lines, their faces gray with limestone dust, their heavy canvas jackets stiff with dried sweat as they hurried toward the bus terminals. Some were dressed for late dinners at the West End cafes, their long woolen coats open to reveal bright silk scarves and expensive Italian leather boots that clicked sharply against the wet pavement.
They walked in small, tight clusters, their voices rising in high, melodic bursts of laughter that were instantly swallowed by the roar of the diesel trucks hauling iron pipes toward the terminal.
Bill kept the van in second gear, the heavy engine letting out a low, vibrating growl as he crept along the curb of the main boulevard. The windshield wipers made a rhythmic, dry *scrape-scrape* against the glass, though the rain had stopped, leaving only a greasy film of diesel smoke and river mist on the view.
He smoked grimly, the unlit cigarette clamped between his teeth as his bloodshot eyes tracked the moving tapestry on the sidewalk. He kept up rambling about skin that glows and tone enough to hold a shape without bunching at the shoulder blades.
At the corner of Tenth and Montgomery, right outside the regional mall's secondary entrance two girls happen to catch his eyes. Beneath the orange glare of a sodium street lamp, their heads tucked together as they looked at a small paper map on their phones.
" Two birds in one night. Finally something to make my day flutter with joy" he giggled.
The girl on the left was tall, perhaps five-foot-nine, with broad, flat shoulders all dressed up in a short, light-colored trench jacket that was completely unbuttoned, revealing a dark green knit sweater beneath. Her companion was shorter, rounder, with thick blonde hair that fell in a single, heavy braid over her shoulder.
Bill on the other hand had entered his van, he touched the steering wheel with his index finger, slowly tapping it in sync with the idle of the engine.
His eyes darted in the direction of they were headed,
"The blue velvet," he muttered through his dry teeth. "It would sit flush."
He shifted the van into gear, pulling the heavy wheel to the right until the front tire scraped the concrete curb with a low crunch.
The maneuver was deceptively clumsy— awkward, the van rolled past the two girls, Gumb reached over to the passenger side, took the half-finished midnight-blue riding coat from his hand bag, and skillfully flung the sleeve through the half-open window of the passenger door.
The heavy blue fabric caught instantly on the exterior chrome mirror housing, its dark silk lining turning outward like a broken wing as the car came to a sudden, jerky halt three feet past the lamp post.
The tall girl stopped midsentence, her dark eyes tracking the sudden appearance of the velvet against the rusted paneling of the van.
"Oh! Wait—" she called out, her voice a high, clear bell that cut through the rumble of a passing cement mixer. She stepped off the curb, her hand reaching out automatically toward the mirror.
"Hey! Sir! Your coat's stuck in the door!"
Her shorter friend followed her, her mouth opening in delight giggling at the sight of the expensive blue velvet flap against the dirty metal of the door panel.
"Oh my god, look at that. He's going to ruin that silk before he even gets it out of the box."
Bill didn't move for few seconds in the dim cabin, his face obscured by the shadow cases over his face by the lamp lights. His hands were resting on the gear shift only moving after heard her boots stop right beside the passenger side panel.
Then, a frantic fluster made his large frame seem weak, he threw open the driver's door and scrambled out into the wet street, his boots slipping slightly on the greasy asphalt as he hurried around the hood of the van.
"Oh, Lord... Not again," Bill stammered, his voice raised into thin, gravelly pitch very much in contrast to his cold confident voice. He held out his large, rough hands in front of him, trembling with a beautiful, performative anxiety. "Did it catch? It's Mrs. Gable's... I'm way too broke to get another material to begin with, alas I'll be cleaning the salt marshes for a month."