Carolina Mist

by Mariah Stewart

  She locked the door and stepped into the darkness within, which was only slightly less menacing, she noted, than the murky blackness without. Slipping out of her shoes, she followed the wall, tracing the top of the wainscot with her fingers as she felt her way toward the steps.

  “How did it go?” His soft voice came from within the dark and filled it.

  She stood stock still, her shoes in her hand, then replied, “It went well.”

  “Did they offer you the job?”

  “Not yet. But they will,” Abby replied, the pronouncement confident but lacking joy.

  “Will you accept it?”

  “I don’t seem to have any other options.”

  “And if you did?”

  “Then I would consider them equally.”

  “Come here, Ab.”

  She followed his voice to where he sat alone in the dark, waiting for her.

  “I was worried about you. It’s a long drive from the airport.”

  “I was all right.”

  His hands reached for her in the dark and pulled her to him until she rested on his lap.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about the interview?” He stroked her hair gently.

  “I tried. I called your office.” She felt herself relaxing for the first time since the call from Jacqueline Post had come on Monday.

  “I didn’t get a message.”

  “I didn’t leave one,” she whispered into his neck.

  They sat in silence for several long moments. Finally, he said, “Let’s go to bed, Ab. We can talk about this and all that it means tomorrow. Right now, I am weary, as I suspect you are. Let’s just go to bed.”

  She nodded and took his hand, and they fumbled slightly in the dark until they found their way to the steps, then climbed them one by one, hand in hand, to the top.

  “Which way?” she asked.

  “This way.” He tugged her toward the room that had become his. “The bed is bigger, and I need to hold on to you tonight. All night.”

  And he did just that, until the sun rose and began to burn off the soupy fog to bring back both light and life to the dark shores of the river.

  “You are very quiet this morning, Alexander,” Belle said pointedly. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine.” He nodded. “Hey, the electricity is back. Great. I was beginning to think that I’d have to start my day without my morning stimulant.”

  Alex poured some dark brown beans into Abby’s coffee grinder and turned it on. “What did you say, Gran?”

  “I said, that blasted thing makes the most infernal racket.”

  “It does,” he agreed.

  “Did Abby make it home last night?”

  “Yes.”

  Belle watched as her grandson opened the refrigerator and began to poke around inspecting its contents. “What exactly are you looking for, Alexander?”

  “Stuff for sandwiches.”

  “Breakfast sandwiches?”

  “Lunch. I thought I’d head out to the Outer Banks this morning.”

  “I see.” Belle nodded knowingly. Matthews men always headed toward the sea when there were important thoughts to think or decisions to be made.

  “Never mind.” He closed the door and forced a smile in his grandmother’s direction. “I’ll stop at one of the little delis along the highway and pick up something.”

  “What would you like me to tell Abigail when she wakes up?”

  “Tell her that I’ve gone fishing”—he kissed the tiny woman on the top of her white head—“for options.”

  He pulled a white sweatshirt over his denim shorts and turned toward the door. “Gran,” he said as he unlocked it.

  “What, dear?”

  “I don’t want you to worry. About anything. It’s all going to work out.”

  "I know that, Alexander. And I’m not worried.” She filled up her teapot. “But what exactly do you have in mind, dear?”

  “Nothing, yet. But something will come to me. I can’t lose her again, Gran.”

  Belle nodded and blew him a kiss. She watched from the window as he backed his car down the driveway.

  “He’ll think of something, Leila. We just have to be patient… well, dear, all eternity is a luxury we don’t all have. Actually, I was hoping to see this worked out in this lifetime.”

  Belle felt the comforting cloud of faintest lavender settle around her. “Now, do come along, dear. It’s The Maid of Salem. Claudette Colbert, Fred McMurray, 1937. And it’s just about to start.”

  Abby had been disappointed when she awoke to find that Alex had taken off someplace, though Belle assured her that he would be back before the day was over.

  It was around three-thirty when he called.

  “Where are you?” she asked, the connection being somewhat unstable.

  “I’m just about to leave Nag’s Head.”

  “Did you catch anything?”

  “Ah, yes. In a manner of speaking. Listen, Ab, could you please set the table in the dining room for four? You know, good china, linen cloth, the good silver. And make some of those wonderful herbed potatoes, a big salad…”

  “Is this your way of telling me that you ran into some old friends and are bringing them home for dinner?”

  “Sort of. And they’re more like new friends.” He paused, then added, “And, actually, they are coming for the weekend, so you’d better make sure that there are two bedrooms with made-up beds and at least one bathroom with fresh towels.”

  “What?”

  “I said, they are staying over till tomorrow. Paying guests. Four of them.”

  “Four paying guests?” she repeated, certain she’d not heard correctly.

  “The first patrons of the Primrose Inn will be arriving in, oh, roughly two hours.”

  “Have you lost your mind?”

  “Sweetheart, you were looking for options. You have an option. Go for it.”

  “Alex, do I look like Wonder Woman? I can’t turn this house into an inn in two hours. Even if I wanted to—and I’m not certain that I do—I couldn’t pull this off. The house isn’t ready for this type of thing.”

  “Of course it is. What do you think still needs to be done before it’s ready?”

  “I’m not ready,” she protested. “I don’t know how to run an inn.”

  “You’re resourceful. You’ll figure it out. Look, I’m out of change. I’ll see you around five. And, Ab…”

  “What?” she yelled.

  “Make something spectacular for dessert.”

  “Arrgghhh!” She slammed the old receiver into its cradle with a roar.

  “Paying guests. Four paying guests. He has one hell of a lot of nerve. If I wanted to run an inn, I’d do it with no prodding from him,” she grumbled as she frantically ran the vacuum cleaner on the first floor, sucking up the dog hair and dust bunnies with a vengeance. Not finding Belle or Meri P. in the morning room, which, she gratefully acknowledged, she had refurbished with Sunny’s assistance, she plumped the new pillows and removed a pile of newspapers.

  “Damn that man, anyway,” she cursed as she scrubbed new potatoes and set them aside in a pot of cold water.

  She raced up the steps and checked the state of the beds.

  No sheets.

  She flew to the linen closet and selected some fine white cotton sheets, ancient but soft and cool to the touch, then set about the task of making up two guest rooms. “Thank God for the quilts,” she muttered as she spread them upon the beds.

  She pulled the curtains aside to flood the rooms with light, then ran for the vacuum cleaner. She gathered spray furniture polish and some old cloths to dust the furniture and make it shine. Puffing from the frantic exertion, she stepped back to look at the results.

  Not so bad, she grudgingly admitted.

  “Flowers,” she said aloud. “The bedrooms should have flowers.”

  Abby took the steps at record speed and flew into the kitchen, where Belle had just returned from a leisurely afternoon stroll in the
garden with Meri.

  Belle’s eyebrows rose at the sight of the young woman vigorously punching numbers into the wall phone.

  “Naomi! I need your help! Alex invited people to come, and I need flowers! And salad stuff! And yes… yes… thank you…” Abby leaned back against the wall as she hung up the phone. “She’s coming over,” Abby told Belle. “She’s going to help.”

  “Help with what, dear?” A perplexed Belle sat down on one of the kitchen chairs.

  “Your grandson has turned my home into a bed-and-breakfast inn. He will be arriving in about one and a half hours with our first guests,” Abby announced with her hands on her hips.

  “Why…” Belle blinked, absorbing the news. “Why, yes. Yes, of course. How clever of him.”

  “Don’t give him credit he doesn’t deserve,” Abby told her as she raced to the front door to let Naomi in. “It was Sunny’s idea…” Her voice trailed down the hallway.

  “Whosever.” Belle waved a hand in the air signifying that it didn’t really matter whose idea it was. It was perfect.

  “Don ’t you think so, dear?” Belle said aloud to the empty room. “Well, of course, but they will be, I am certain, perfectly nice strangers, or Alexander wouldn’t be bringing them home. Oh, yes, this could work.” Belle’s little fingers tapped an increasingly merry tune on the enameled top of the kitchen table. “We’ll both have to do our part to help, of course. Yes.” She tilted her head as if listening to a voice only she could hear. "Yes, this could be fun. It could, indeed…”

  By the time Alex pulled in the driveway, the Primrose Inn was as ready as it would ever be to receive its first guests.

  Naomi had cut armfuls of flowers from her garden and had set up a workplace for herself on the back porch, where she sorted flowers and greens to grace the house and fill it with fragrance, thereby unwittingly creating the ambience for which the inn would become known. The washbasins in the guest bedrooms overflowed with dried hydrangea from Naomi’s stash from the previous year, and the bedside tables highlighted vases of colorful tulips which perfectly accented the faded hues in the old quilts that covered the beds. Huge bowls of heady-scented peonies of deepest red transformed the front hallway into a cheerful reception room, and a carefully crafted centerpiece of vines and flowers and herbs graced the dining-room table.

  “Dessert!” Abby cried as she nearly collapsed on the back porch railing after scrubbing down the bathrooms and setting the table. “And something for hors d’oeuvres…”

  “Abigail, calm down.” Naomi spoke serenely from the opposite side of a tall display of forsythia which she was preparing to set right outside the front door, first impressions being so important. “Now, you do, as I recall, know how to make a pastry shell?”

  “Of course, I do.”

  “Then I suggest you go inside and make one. Umm, better make that two.”

  “Do you have any thoughts on what I might fill them with?”

  “As a matter of fact, I do.” Naomi grinned. “When I went back home, I took a few packages of last summer’s blackberries out of the freezer. They should be ready right about the time you will need them. And I called Colin and asked him to stop at Foster’s and pick up some whipping cream. So, you just go on inside there and make a crust for your blackberry tart. There’s some cream cheese and a jar of homemade chutney on the counter and some herbed dip in the fridge. You can set them out with the wine—which is chilling alongside the dip—so your guests can have a few minutes to warm up for dinner.”

  Abby stood drop-jawed and humbled as Naomi so calmly laid out before her the agenda.

  “What, by the way, is the main course?”

  Abby blanched, then panicked. “I… I don’t know. Alex just said to make potatoes and salad and dessert.”

  “Then he must have something else in mind. If worse comes to worst, we can run down to Foster’s. He doesn’t close until six.” Naomi smiled brightly. “Now, go, girl. You have things to do.”

  “Naomi, I don’t know what I’d do without you.” Abby spoke with all sincerity.

  “Neither do I, sugar.” Naomi shook her head slowly, then smiled meaningfully. “Neither do I.”

  41

  Abby was standing in her underwear, fresh from her shower, contemplating just what an innkeeper should wear, when she heard the sound of slamming car doors from below her windows.

  “Damn,” she whispered loudly. “Damndamndamn.”

  Dancing an anxious jig of sorts, she shimmied into a short denim skirt, pulled a long-sleeved ballerina-styled knit shirt with blue cornflowers over her head, and hastily slid into canvas espadrilles before fleeing down the steps, tying her hair back with dark blue ribbons as she went. Seeing her frazzled reflection in the hall mirror, she paused and took several deep breaths. It would not do for the innkeeper to appear unnerved at the sight of her guests. She resumed her steps, more slowly now, toward the front door and prepared to open it just as it swung aside.

  “Oh, here she is now,” Alex announced, all pleasantries as he led two couples into the front hallway. “Abby McKenna, this is Bob Conroy and his wife, Elaine, and Sue and Jeff Turner.”

  Abby did her best to cast a wide smile as she extended her hand to her guests. “Welcome to…” What had he called it? “…the Primrose Inn.”

  “This is lovely.” Sue Turner, a short, slightly pudgy woman with very short red hair and too-pink lips, looked over the length of the foyer. “And I just adore your wreath.”

  “My wreath?” Abby frowned. What wreath?

  “The one on the front door. I just love grapevine. So homey.”

  “Oh, of course. That wreath.” Abby made a mental note to steal a peek at whichever of Naomi’s creations she had loaned for the occasion.

  “We’re so glad you could accommodate us on such short notice.” Bob Conroy’s bald head bobbed up and down as he pumped Abby’s hand.

  “I ran into the Conroys and the Turners on the beach in Nag’s Head,” Alex told her in an offhand manner, as if this sort of thing happened every day. “The motel they were staying in lost part of its roof in the storm. They asked if I knew of a nice place to stay somewhere between the Outer Banks and Edenton.”

  “When Alex told us that his fiancée had just opened a B&B, well, it just seemed to be fate,” Sue Conroy told Abby. “And I’m so glad he mentioned it. We’d never have found this charming little town on our own.”

  His fiancée?

  Ignoring Abby’s raised eyebrows, Alex draped an arm over her shoulder and gave it a squeeze.

  “We’re certain you’ll enjoy your stay with us. Now, I would think you’d like to see your rooms. Abby, why don’t you show your guests upstairs while I take care of the fish…”

  "What fish?”

  “The one I caught. Right before the Conroys and the Turners came down the beach, I reeled in the biggest sea bass I ever saw. It will be perfect grilled.”

  “We don’t have a grill,” she reminded him.

  “Colin does.”

  “Ummm. Grilled sea bass.” Bob smacked his lips. “I can hardly wait.”

  “Well, then, let me show you to your rooms, and you can get settled. We’ll have dinner ready for you in half an hour.” Abby beckoned the foursome to follow her up the wide stairwell.

  “Ah, actually, Ab, it may take a little longer than that See, the fish isn’t cleaned yet, and you know it’s been some years since I last cleaned a fish…”

  “Why, Alex, you’re resourceful.” Abby turned on the steps with a smile that assured him that she enjoyed watching the tables turn. “You’ll figure it out.”

  To the Conroys and the Turners, she said, “Dinner will be served at six.”

  It was actually closer to seven when Abby seated the guests in the large dining room. Naomi’s homemade chutney, served over cream cheese with savory crackers and chilled white wine on the newly restored front porch, had been a huge hit, as had been the herbed dip. For that matter, the entire meal, she had to admit, had been prett
y terrific. Alex’s grilled sea bass was perfect with the herbed potatoes and the salad put together with greens from Naomi’s garden. The blackberry tart was oohed and ahed over. Naomi had been right, Abby noted. One entire tart and part of the second were cheerfully devoured.

  “How long have you been running your inn?” Elaine Conroy tucked a long blond strand behind one ear and peered over the top of her glasses, leaning back slightly to permit Abby to remove her dinner dishes.

  “Ah, well, actually, I just inherited the property a few months ago.”

  “Really? Well, one would think you’ve been doing this forever. Dinner was excellent. The views of the river are gorgeous. All in all, I must say that this is one of the most charming inns we’ve visited.”

  “You wouldn’t happen to have any small boats for little moonlit rides on the river? Even a rowboat would do.” Jeff Turner, stout and serious even as he contemplated a romantic row on the river in the moonlight, was apparently more of a middle-aged Lothario than his appearance implied.

  “Not quite yet,” Alex interjected before Abby could open her mouth. “We’re still in the process of renovating the carriage house. Once it’s done, we’ll be able to bring in a few rowboats for our guests’ use.”

  “Well, it’s just all too perfectly delightful,” Elaine marveled. “And you’ve just thought of every little thing. Those little sprigs of lavender on the bed pillows, for example. Just the right little touch.”

  Sprigs of lavender on the bed pillows? Another little touch of Naomi?

  “Abby, how many guest rooms do you have?” Elaine continued.

  “Umm, we have four double rooms that are finished.” Abby mentally tallied up the work she had completed. “And several others I haven’t had a chance to work on yet.”

  “Abby has done most of the renovations herself.” Alex’s pride in her accomplishment was unmistakable and genuine.