Chapter 14

By the end of July, the first two houses were moving along to completion nicely. The work was progressing so well in fact that my thoughts turned to furnishing the houses. The problem there was that we had no spare furniture of the correct type or period in our Realm. All of the fine antique furniture that the O’Connell Women had gathered in the 21st Century was now either in use in various houses, or was on display in the houses of the Founder’s Children with preservation spells on them. The remaining furniture in our Realm would not be correct for this time period in the Fourth Reality.

Mother was the one who pointed out the obvious solution to me, at least at the time it seemed to be the obvious solution.

“North Carolina isn’t far from here, and that’s where the original furniture came from. It shouldn’t be that difficult to go up there and buy sufficient furniture for both houses, as well as rugs, curtains, china, silverware and other items,” she told me with a smile.

“That sounds reasonable, but I am in no condition to ride the train up there. Do we know anyone who has been to North Carolina?” I asked her. Mother didn’t know but would check with our Relatives. As it turned out, none of them had ever been to North Carolina, let alone to the High Point area there, which is where the center of their furniture industry was located.

“Celeste and I will go up there and then transfer back to get you when we have located some appropriate furniture,” Mother informed me a few days later.

The following day, she and Celeste transferred to Savannah where they took a Southern Railroad train to High Point, North Carolina. They had been gone for over four days when they reappeared in my parlor at my house in the O’Connell Realm. Neither of them appeared to be very happy.

“How was your trip?” I asked first, followed by, “Did you see any furniture that I would be interested in?” Both of them had sunk onto the sofa across from me while I had been speaking.

“As to the trip, it was fair, if somewhat longer than I expected,” Mother said in a tried voice.

“The furniture was even worse. There are NO large furniture companies like Hickory, Thomasville, Thomlinson, or Broyhill in operation in North Carolina or anywhere nearby at this time. It would appear that those companies didn’t get started until a number of years after 1907,” Mother continued before pausing for breath.

“Oh, there is a lot of furniture being made there at this time, it just isn’t the type that we were looking for. They are making rather ordinary utilitarian furniture of decent quality from various hardwoods, but not the fine dining room, living room, and bedroom furniture that the Founders and their children were so fond of, and which would go very well in these houses, just as they did in the originals,” she finished with a sigh.

“We did meet a very nice man there whose name was Fisher, and he explained the furniture business to us, at least as he understood it,” Celeste told me and paused before continuing.

“He explained that North Carolina had a long history of furniture making because of the availability of large stands of hardwood trees, but that until the last few years, it had mainly been carried on in small cabinetmakers’ shops. Those craftsmen had depended on English and French designs for the furniture that they built.

“He also told us that the reason the English had helped the Southern States in their War for Independence was triggered by the Trent Affair. A minor diplomatic incident, it was the last straw leading to them declaring war on what remained of the U.S. Their hope was to regain territories lost under the Treaty of Ghent following the War of 1812 and perhaps a bit more. Business men also wanted to continue to get cheap southern cotton for their mills.

“All of this had been very well at the start of the war according to him, but the continued fighting over the years led to a depressed economy that had just about wiped out the furniture industry in North Carolina, and following the war they had to practically start over again, but there were fewer wealthy plantation owners and wealthy merchants to buy their products, so it has taken a long time for the industry to recover, but they hope to improve both their output along with the quality and the style of their furniture in the near future,” Celeste finished.

“How far in the near future?” I asked.

“Ten to fifteen years or so he told us,” Celeste answered, much to my disappointment.

“Where does that leave us then?” I asked next.

“We will need to try furniture stores in various cities to find the type of furniture that we need. I believe that we should try Savannah first as it is the closest, but we can try Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and even Boston later if necessary,” Mother told me.

“That sounds reasonable, but it will be imported furniture that we will probably find, and it will be more expensive,” I told them, and there was no disagreement with that statement.

The following day, Mother and Celeste returned to Savannah to look for furniture and the other things that we would require to furnish the two houses. They returned that evening with happy faces and excitement.

“You really must go to Savannah with us tomorrow,” Mother told me.

“I take it that your search was successful,” I said.

“Yes, very successful, I think you will like what we have found. It’s a mix of English and Yankee furniture, but it will go well together. They also have rugs, shades and draperies,” she finished.

“We also found several stores selling china and silverware,” Celeste informed me in an excited voice.

“Good, we can obtain the more mundane items for the house right here in Statesboro, but that leaves the question of where to keep everything until the houses are finished and ready to be moved into, if we buy the furniture and other things now. On the other hand if we wait, the furniture that we like may be gone, and we won’t be able to find replacements that we like as well,”I told them.

“That’s true, dear, of course we could transfer it to the old furniture warehouse in our Realm. It wouldn’t be difficult and it would avoid any breakage due to having it shipped here by train and wagon,” Mother told me.

“We could just transfer it here and set up a defensive shell to keep it all in on one of the lots,” Celeste suggested.

“True, but I’m afraid that a plain defensive shell would draw a lot of unwanted attention from either the farmers or the construction people, possibly both,” Mother cautioned her.

“Yes, it would, if we left it a plain defensive shell,” I agreed. “However, if we cast a glamour around it so that all that one saw from any angle was the other side of the area that the shell was on, it would effectively be invisible as would its contents,” I told them to smiles from both of them.

“Should we take Grace with us?” I asked them. “She deserves a break from housework just as much as anyone.”

“Yes, she should have a break also,” Mother agreed, and we transferred to the O’Connell house at the end of Plantation Lane. Grace wasn’t startled when the three of us appeared in her kitchen.

“Grace, we’re going to Savannah tomorrow to look at furniture for the new houses. Would you like to go with us?” Mother asked.

“I’d like to go, but I have too much to do to be away for two or three days,” she replied.

“Two or three days?” Mother asked.

“We’re not taking the train, dear, we’ll be transferring to Savannah in the morning and returning the same way when we are finished,” I told her.

“In that case, I’ll be glad to accompany you,” she told us. “I’ll need to tell Owen tonight,” she finished.

I could understand why Grace had been so hesitant. She and Owen along with their helper Joe were very busy presently. The early crops had been ripe since mid-June, so Owen and Joe with some help from Grace, Robert, and I had been picking those plants that were ready to be eaten. Some had gone to our own table to be consumed, but the majority had been taken into Statesboro to the grocers there several times a week. The trip was time consuming and bumpy on the poor roads outside of town. Robert and I had offered to set up a Portal to make things easier, but Owen had at first turned us down. Though later he came to us to accept it.

“I’ve changed my mind about the Portal,” he told Robert in mid-July. “The trips consume valuable time that would be better spent working on the crops, or doing repairs in the shop. The Portal would allow us to complete the necessary trips quicker, and would also reduce wear on the wagon and the horses,” he had finished. Robert and I created a Portal from the end of the fields they were using to a place in the warehouse area in Statesboro that was less used this time of year. Owen and Joe later came to thank us.

“This gives us a lot more time to get things done here around the house. I definitely overestimated the time I would have available to work on the gates and the fences. This allows more time to work on their repair and other projects,” he told Robert after they had been using the Portal for two weeks or so.

This was also the time of year when canning started, and Grace had been busy with that since the last part of July. She would need help from Celeste and me to complete it, although I wasn’t sure how much help I would be in my current condition since I now needed to stay seated a lot of the time.

All of this was put out of our minds, however, the following morning, as we prepared to transfer to Savannah to inspect the furniture that my Mother and Celeste had located there. We were ready to depart by nine, and we four all joined hands just before Mother cast the transfer spell. We appeared in one of Savannah’s quiet parks a second later and quickly hailed a carriage to take us to the stores where they had found the furniture and other things that we needed. At the first shop that we stopped at, I was indeed impressed with the selection of furniture for sale.

“Oh Mother, you were correct. Many of these items will fit very well into the parlors of new houses,” I told her as we were approached by a gentleman who represented the shop and could have been the owner.

“Welcome back, Madam. Who have you brought with you today?” the man inquired.

“This is my Daughter, and my Niece. As I told you yesterday, we will require furniture for two large new houses,” Mother reminded him.

“Please continue to look around, and call me if you have any questions,” he told us before leaving us to continue our examination of the store’s contents, and examine it we did, very thoroughly. We located sofas, stuffed chairs, end tables, and coffee tables as well as nick-knack shelving sufficient for the parlors of both houses. We placed a small marker spell on each item that we chose. Grace even selected a few small items to add to her parlors. When finished, we called the gentleman back to inform him of our choices. He was a little shocked by the quantity of furniture that we had selected.

“You’re sure that you want all of this furniture NOW?” he asked, before adding, “I wouldn’t be able to hold all of this until later, you understand.”

“Yes, we want all of it, and as soon as you can prepare it to be shipped,” Mother informed him.

“Yes, I can prepare it for safe shipping. Where is it to be shipped to?” he asked.

“We live in Statesboro, but we will be here with our own transportation when you have it ready to be moved,” Mother assured him.

“Have you moved furniture before?” he inquired in a questioning voice.

“We are experts at moving furniture and many other things,” I assured him.

“All right, I’ll make out the bill of sale for the items that you have selected. How will you be paying for it?” he asked.

“I will be paying in gold,” I told him and held up the small satchel that I had called to me previously.

“Gold?” he asked in surprise.

“Yes, in twenty dollar Gold Double Eagles,” I told him bringing out a roll of the coins to show him.

“Certainly, madam. I will also give you a discount because of the large quantity of furniture you are buying and for prompt payment,” he assured us with a smile.

“When will everything be ready for pick up?” Mother asked when I had paid for everything and placed the bill-of-sale in the satchel.

“It will all be ready by noon tomorrow,” the gentleman assured us with a large smile as he escorted us to the door of his store to see us out.