A group of young Highland dancers scurried past, led by their dance teacher, Breanna Lawton. Breanna was one of my bridal clients, engaged to a man from Philadelphia I’d never met. She was a serious woman in her midthirties who was getting married for the first time and enjoying every minute of the planning. With her glorious red hair, it was easy to imagine her at the center of the Celtic-themed ceremony she dreamed of. I hoped her groom-to-be was okay with all her plans.
I waved to Breanna and the girls, admiring their soft plaid skirts held out by the numerous petticoats they’d donned for the Scottish country dances. They were simple elastic-waist skirts anyone could whip up in an hour, but they looked sweet with the girls’ ruffled white blouses and French-braided hair. The youngest dancer couldn’t have been older than five, while the oldest, Gillian King, who I knew from church, was fifteen. Somehow, she managed to wear her wholesome dance outfit in an alluring manner, swaying her hips as she walked and adjusting the wide neckline to reveal more cleavage than any reasonable dress code would allow. I knew her dad had his hands full with Gillian. There was that one time she’d snuck out during a youth group retreat at the church and hadn’t returned for several hours while the frantic chaperones searched the downtown streets for her. Another time, her dad had caught her hanging out with dubious company under the Waterworks Bridge that crosses the Schuylkill River in a sketchy part of town. Gillian had started dancing with the Highland dancers shortly thereafter, and tales of her escapades decreased.
I tore my eyes away from the dancers to catch the end of Corgi’s performance. I half expected him to fling himself to his knees the way he did at the end of every Twisted Armpits gig, but all he did was fold up his bagpipe and stride out of the gazebo. Another eager piper took his place.
Aileen clapped him on the back. “That’s showing them!”
“Very nice,” I echoed. “What was that last tune you played?”
He bent over his bagpipe case, stowing the instrument. “It’s called ‘Rowan Tree.’ I messed up a couple times there at the end—could you tell?” He wiped his forehead and slipped a small flask out of his sporran for a quick nip.
“I didn’t notice anything,” I said truthfully, for what it was worth.
“Yeah, well, you’re just getting started, so we’ll cut you some slack,” Aileen said. “That bit at the beginning of ‘Rowan Tree’ would make a great riff in ‘Midnight Hollow,’ right after Pinker finishes his drum solo.”
I left the two of them discussing musical composition for the Twisted Armpits and hurried back to my booth. It was probably time for me to give Letty a chance to stroll around and take in the Games.
I slipped past the small crowd milling about in front of our booth. Letty was in her element. She chattered with the customers, shook out antique linens for their inspection before folding them up again with a professional flourish, and held up delicate glassware to catch the light. She sent one elderly man off with a pair of purple glass earrings for his wife with the promise that, “They’ll bring out the roses in her cheeks and the romance in her heart.”
“Oh, Daria, you’re back,” she said. “Someone stopped by to ask about your making a dress. I didn’t want to commit you, so I told her to come back in half an hour.”
“Did you give her one of my cards?” I indicated the small basket holding my business cards.
She shook her head, whisking off to greet another passerby.
I shrugged it off. If the woman really wanted me to make her a dress, she’d come back, and if she didn’t, then I didn’t need to waste my time. I’d found that people were genuinely interested in the idea of custom-made clothing, but most weren’t patient enough to wait for the finished product. Brides were the exception—most women considered that once-in-a-lifetime wedding gown to be worth the wait.
I tidied my selection of bow ties and placemats, noticing that Letty’s linens had migrated onto the front of my table to overshadow my own items. I chuckled as I repositioned my Nessies. There was room for both of us here. I turned to speak to a small child looking longingly at a red plaid Nessie with a jaunty green tam o’ shanter on its head.
Ultimately, his mom didn’t buy the Nessie and the child had to settle for a lollipop. I waved goodbye and turned to see Letty chatting with the muscleman from earlier.
“Daria, this is Ladd Foster. He’s a famous athlete in the Scottish Games circle. He throws…what was it you throw again?”
Ladd grinned, a flash of white in the stubble covering his strong chin. “I do the caber toss. It’s basically a tree trunk. You heave it into the air and try to get it to flip over before it hits the ground.” He struck a pose, flexing his biceps. “It’s a job for the Incredible Hulk.”
Letty pulled out her phone and snapped a few pictures of Ladd. “I can’t wait!” She leaned on the table with her chin in both hands. “Isn’t that hard to do in a kilt?”
He winked at her. “You’re wondering what I’m wearing under this kilt, aren’t you?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “I’ve heard men don’t wear anything underneath, but I never knew if that was for real.”
“I always go true Scot,” he proclaimed. “Want to see?”
“I’d love to—another time.” She straightened up, brushing back her hair. “I wouldn’t want to distract the Incredible Hulk from his cabers.”
“I’m all about distractions.” He flashed her another toothy grin. “You’ll come watch me, won’t you? One o’clock on the playing fields. I’m undefeated in the caber toss.”
“I’ll be there.” She picked out a lace-edged handkerchief from her pile of antiques. “You can wear my favor, like a jousting knight.” She tucked the handkerchief into the waistband of his kilt.
I turned away, trying to hide my amusement.
I busied myself with a trio of teenage girls who exclaimed over my chest of bow ties. They spent the next twenty-five minutes rooting through all the options, trying various combinations in their hair before each one bought a tie in a different tartan. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Ladd striding away. Letty bustled about the booth, laying out some vintage jewelry to show the girls. When the teens left and the booth was quiet for a few minutes, I sat down and shook a finger at Letty. “You should be ashamed, leading him on like that.”
She laughed and threw back her hair. “If he didn’t notice the wedding ring on my finger, that’s his problem. Can you believe that ‘true Scot’ line? I’ll bet he uses that on all the girls.”
I giggled along with her. “I don’t know, what about that line about wearing your favor, like a jousting knight? That was right up there.”
The next hour passed quietly enough. Letty took a stroll around the grounds while I staffed the booth. I sold a couple of Nessies and a set of antique brandy snifters for Letty and chatted with a woman whose wedding gown I had made a year ago. McCarthy stopped by to show me that he was still wearing his yellow bow tie, and then wandered off again in search of more photographs. The persistent sound of bagpipes filled the air. I closed my eyes, imagining myself on the moors of Scotland hearing the pipers marching through the mist. I could almost smell the heather, when I was snapped out of my reverie by the more familiar sound of Aileen’s guitar.
Aileen and the band were setting up on the bandstand directly opposite the Marketplace. I had forgotten that the Twisted Armpits were scheduled to play a quick set over the lunch hour, while the pipers and dancers as well as the judges took a break. Amps and mics and miles of cords overflowed from the stage as the band members positioned and plugged in all their gear. Aileen stood on the platform in the midst of the chaos, a mic stand in one hand and a canvas bag bursting with cords in the other. Her guitar case lay open on the ground off the side of the stage. Open