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tentatively, as though the hat might squeal in protest, and plucked off the plume.
    Better. But it still did not look right. Turning it around, I removed one of the streamers. Ah, much better. Now, the actual shape showed. With the palm of my hand, I flattened one bauble and wriggled the others off. Threads dangled now; searching the table, I found a pair of scissors and snipped them. Now, it looked like something a woman could wear.
    After turning it around several times to assess it, I was satisfied. Its basic form couldn’t be helped, for it was the ubiquitous lady’s headpiece, with ribbons to affix it under the chin and a shallow depth intended to make it sit perkily on the head. Hardly ideal, but it worked for what it was. Turning around, I found my aunts and sister still staring at me. I thought I saw shock on their faces. A tremor went through me. I had just ruined a hat that Louise had no doubt worked on for weeks, ordered by a customer, entrusted to her by the milliner.
    Louise gaped at me. Adrienne giggled. “See? I told you, she’s quite determined.”
    “Yes, I do see.” Louise’s voice was tight. “Obviously, her talent is raw.” She paused, inspecting the refurbished capote as if she couldn’t decide whether to scold or applaud. “And these others . . . ? What would you do with them?”
    “Nothing.” I tried to force out a smile. “They’re all lovely.”
    Louise gave me a searching look. “Please, don’t humor me. What would you do?”
    “Strip them bare and start again,” I replied, without understanding from where my brazen confidence sprang.
    “Why?” asked Louise, to my disconcertion. “Do you find them ugly, perhaps?”
    I felt as I had in the abbess’s chamber, cornered by a question with no easy answer. “Not ugly. But . . . uncomfortable. Do we really need to walk around with a basket of fruit on our heads?”
    “A basket of fruit!” Louise let out a nervous chortle. “Oh my. I think we should start slowly. These bonnets are the latest style. It’s the summer, after all. A hat must keep the sun off one’s face and yet announce to the world that one is a lady.”
    And a lady must be seen coming from a mile away, I wanted to reply. Instead, I said quietly, “Why not use one or two pins, instead?”
    “Pins?” Louise echoed.
    “Yes. Hat pins. With simple stones, to set off the hat’s shape without covering it up. It is still a hat. It should look like one. Shouldn’t it?”
    Louise turned from me to survey her hats. Excess was clearly her preference when it came to hats and food. Yet in her soul, she remained a frugal peasant of the Auvergne; and to her credit, and my astonishment, she turned to one of her cabinets and pulled out a drawer. She set it before me on the worktable. “Are these suitable?”
    The drawer was filled with hat pins of every imaginable size and shape, some far too ornate to ever be noticed in an already overblown bonnet, but others that were less so. I selected a bone one with a fake blue sapphire. “May I?” I asked.
    Louise stepped aside. I searched the hats for the least garnished andsettled on a straw-braided boater with an azure band. Taking it up, I slid the pin through the band and then rummaged in the detritus around me for suitable adornment. When I found what felt right—a white linen flower that reminded me of the camellia of Aubazine—I took up needle and thread to attach it to the rim, nestling it against the side like a fallen bloom. “There. See?”
    Adrienne didn’t wait for her sister’s verdict. Seizing it from me, she put the boater on and cocked her head, a hand at her hip. “Well? Does it suit?”
    The consternation on Louise’s face faded. “Why, it does. It does, indeed. It’s so . . . different.” She turned to me. “Where did you learn to do this?”
    I shrugged. I didn’t know, but I found myself echoing the abbess’s words: “Sometimes, it’s the simplest things we should most long for.”
    I hadn’t