The Island of Heavenly Daze

by Angela Hunt

  Realizing that she’d overestimated her husband’s enthusiasm for the gift, Edith slipped her arm through Winslow’s and led him toward the stairs.

  When the last paper cup had been tossed away and the last crumb sent home with the Grahams, Cleta gave the basement a final look, then climbed the stairs and found her husband in the graveled parking lot. Floyd sat behind the wheel of their canopied golf cart, the Sunday sports section in his hand.

  “I’m ready to go,” she said, sliding onto the seat beside him. “If you can tear yourself away from the paper, that is.”

  The newsprint rustled in response, and after a long moment Floyd lowered the paper and folded it away. “Can’t blame a man for trying to keep up with things,” he said, tossing the sports section onto the backseat. “Paper just came in on the ferry.”

  Cleta folded her arms as the golf cart lurched to life. “I don’t mind you reading the paper. But on a day as important as today, I’d think you’d want to talk about the preacher.”

  Floyd lifted a brow as he pressed on the accelerator. “Whaddya want me to say?”

  Cleta shrugged. “Maybe that we did a good job? That the pastor liked his gift?”

  “I don’t know that he liked it much.” Floyd rubbed the stubble of his beard as he steered the cart down Ferry Road, then took a sharp turn into the alley behind their home, the Baskahegan Bed and Breakfast. “Seems to me he was a little put off by it.”

  “How,” Cleta asked, her stare drilling into her husband, “can a man be put off by the sight of his own face? His wife provided the photo we gave the artist. And it’s not like Winslow Wickam is unattractive. It’d be one thing if he were as ugly as a gargoyle, maybe you wouldn’t want that hanging in your church, but the pastor is a fine little fellow, dignified and clean and honest-looking—“

  “All the same, if he had his druthers, I think he’d druther have a book or something.” Floyd pulled the cart into the shade and turned the key. “You asked my opinion, so there it is.”

  “Well.” Cleta fell silent, then shifted her gaze back to her husband. “He won’t be put off by what we have planned for the end of the month. Reverend Rex Hartwell is coming from Portland with big news. I’m praying that some things will be changing around here.”

  Floyd gave her an uncertain look. “Are you sure we’ll be approved for that grant?”

  “Ayuh.” Cleta nodded. “We’ll prove that Heavenly Daze Church deserves that grant if I have to personally visit every home and drag the slug-a-beds out of bed by their ears.”

  Floyd slipped out of the cart and gravitated toward the back door, sniffing the air as he went. “Smells like a good roast, Mother. So stop your squawking and let’s get dinner on the table.”

  Cleta followed, refusing to let her husband dampen her good mood. “Ayuh, Floyd, hold your horses. I’m coming.”

  Chapter Three

  Leaving the parsonage and the flickering warmth of Edith’s cinnamon-scented candles in the windows, Winslow skirted the field bordering the cemetery and walked toward the sea. The sky, already dark over the ocean, was still lit by deep orange and red and purple streaks in the west.

  Ignoring the encroaching darkness, Winslow lengthened his stride through the swishing grass until he reached the rock-strewn rim that marked the eastern edge of the island. Unsuitable as a tourist beach, this rough leeward shore undoubtedly looked much as it had two hundred years ago when Jacques de Cuvier and his cronies settled the town.

  Upon reaching the rocks where walking became difficult, Winslow turned and moved along the perimeter of the cemetery. The oldest graves were situated here, and Jacques de Cuvier’s occupied one of the loftiest locations.

  Winslow paused a moment before Jacques’s worn headstone, then, in a burst of irreverence, turned and sat on the granite slab. Olympia de Cuvier would faint if she saw him sitting cross-legged upon the sainted sea captain’s final resting place, but somehow Winslow didn’t think Jacques would mind.

  Shifting to face the sea, he rubbed his hands over his arms and stared out at the rolling surf. What would old Jacques think if he were to walk among today’s residents of Heavenly Daze? Would he marvel at the electric golf carts and satellite dishes, or would he mourn the passing of the polished lanterns shedding soft yellow light on the cobblestone streets? If he were to walk into the church, would he rejoice to see that a faithful remnant remained, or would he regret that the little church had not grown? Though the population of Heavenly Daze swelled during the summer season as tourists flocked to visit the charming shops, the residential population had remained much the same from one generation to another.

  The cool evening air, as astringent as alcohol, washed over his head and shivered the bare skin. Hunching forward in his jacket, Winslow glanced over his shoulder toward the cluster of houses located along the intersection of the island’s two roads. The sun had nearly finished its course across the sky, but hadn’t yet reached the Maine shore, barely visible in the distance. On the island, lights had begun to shine from each house, and he imagined that from the air Heavenly Daze would take on the shape of a silvery cross blazing out of dense darkness. The porch lights of Frenchman’s Folly, home to the de Cuviers, would form the top of the cross that extended from the island’s southwestern shore to its midpoint, where a solitary street lamp burned outside the fire/police station, the only municipal building on the island. The lights of Birdie’s Bakery on the west and the Kennebunk Kid Kare Center on the east would create the crossbar.

  The island had been marked, probably inadvertently, with the sign of the cross, as had Winslow’s life. He had been reared in a Christian home, taught to serve God at an early age, and he had always loved to study the Bible. After college he entered seminary with lofty dreams and high aspirations; he graduated with every intention of becoming the next Billy Graham. Then he accepted the call of his first church, and his dreams shrank into the shadows, eclipsed by painful realities and the hard lessons of life. How could he win the world for Jesus when he couldn’t even convince a congregation of fifty people to cooperate with each other?

  Each time he accepted a new pastoral call he began his work with enthusiasm and prayerful dreams; each time he boxed up his books and commentaries he vowed that the next church would be different, but it never was. In North Carolina and Georgia and Boston and Vermont, church people were the same . . . and so was he.

  Time and time again, he had failed. The word tasted sour, but at least it was honest. He’d never really been honest with himself until today. He had moved from church to church, not because God had called him to be a leapfrogging servant, but because he had repeatedly grown weary of contention and longed for a clean slate.

  When the notion of leading a stubborn flock became completely unbearable, he retreated into the safety of academia. Teaching was far less stressful than pastoring, and a professor’s job was nine to five, with occasional late hours required for faculty events and grading papers.

  Winslow let his hands fall to his knees as he lowered his gaze to the chilly slab beneath him. A man didn’t often have an opportunity to survey his life from a detached perspective, but his church had given him that opportunity today. When he stared at that portrait in the gilded frame, for the first time he saw the small, weary eyes, the double chin, the uncertain, lopsided smile. The man in that portrait clutched the Bible to his chest as though it were a shield designed to hold life at bay, and his bald head sug- gested aloof intellectualism, a man afraid to risk human contact. Even the cut of his suit seemed unnaturally conservative and restrained.

  He recognized the picture, of course—Edith had obviously given them a copy of the photo he’d had taken in Boston. But the man who filled the Heavenly Daze pulpit each week was the same man, mired in a rut as old as Methuselah.

  Winslow lifted his eyes to the heavens, where night had spread her sable wings over the Atlantic. “What am I to do, God? I don’t like the person I saw in that picture.”

  Far out at sea, bright
arteries of lightning pulsed in the swollen sky, followed by a low throb of thunder. Winslow waited a moment, hoping to hear the inner voice that had urged him to action on other occasions of his life, but he heard only the wind, the waves, and the distant sound of approaching rain.

  Why had he come to Heavenly Daze? The question begged an honest answer. The call had come at a time when teaching had grown predictable, and something in his heart had yearned for another chance to prove himself as a pastor. After all, he had gone to seminary in order to shepherd the flock, not teach, and the small congregation of Heavenly Daze seemed like a wonderful opportunity. He wasn’t expecting a group of saints—you could put any two church people in a room and have them emerge an hour later with three different opinions—but he and Edith thought the island would be a safe place to fulfill their call to the pastorate. Perhaps they would even retire there.

  He’d made certain the pulpit committee from Heavenly Daze understood his strengths and weaknesses—he wasn’t the world’s most stirring orator, and he loathed that particularly preacherly habit of ending every other word with an extra “uh” syllable (pick up-uh, your Bible-uh and turn-uh to the Gospel-uh of John-uh), but he was willing and able and faithful. And so, when Olympia and Edmund de Cuvier appeared in his office with a firm offer to pastor the Heavenly Daze Community Church, he had gladly accepted it.

  Another memory flitted through his consciousness. He’d gone to seminary with a talented fellow, Roland Wiggins, who had seemed to have everything a clergyman could want—quickness, charisma, and people skills. When Winslow encountered his first problems with bickering church members, he had called Roland only to find that the man had resigned his first church after less than a year. The church secretary rather coolly informed Winslow that Roland had gone to work for Chad Randall, a hotshot television evangelist.

  After playing phone tag for nearly a week, the two finally connected. “So,” Winslow asked, “what do you do for Chad Randall?”

  “I smooth things,” Roland answered, a smile in his voice. “I arrange his interviews, carry his suitcase, and, on occasion, teach his Sunday school class.”

  Winslow stared at the phone. “And you enjoy this job?”

  Roland laughed. “You bet. The ministry pays me a really good wage to take care of the shepherd.”

  Searching through a sea of words, Winslow finally found a rejoinder: “But you’re a shepherd.”

  “Not anymore.” Roland’s voice was as light as air. “As a member of the entourage, I’m happy as a pardoned life prisoner. I’m still feeding the sheep, but in a roundabout way. And Win—we can always use a good man. The next time the goompas get you down, think about the ministry here.”

  The memory of Roland’s offer set Winslow’s teeth on edge even now. Life as a professional second banana might be interesting and glamorous and relatively carefree, but Winslow had been called to feed the sheep, not “smooth” them. But apparently his feeding had become uninteresting, for his sheep routinely dozed off every time he opened the Book that would satisfy their souls . . .

  He was as boring and out of touch as the man in the portrait.

  Cold, clear reality swept over him in a terrible wave so powerful that he gripped the edge of old Jacques’s slab for support. He had become everything the portrait revealed about him! But he could change. He was only fifty-two, and he had a good many years in him before he wanted to even think about retirement. Though his congregation was small, his people were steady, strong, and adaptable. Though Heavenly Daze had rejected automobiles, they had readily accepted satellite dishes and the Internet. Why, sixty-eight-year-old Vernie Bidderman had just completed her first Web page and was talking about selling Heavenly Daze blueberry jam internationally . . .

  Vernie would love to see him try something different in church. So would Beatrice Coughlin and Birdie Wester. And though the cultured Olympia de Cuvier might turn her nose up at any new music, she’d undoubtedly welcome a new approach to the sermon. If the older folks would welcome a more modern approach to worship, surely the younger folks would! Maybe he could even find a way to cut through the layer of cool indifference that encased Buddy Franklin . . .

  Completely surrounded by darkness now, Winslow lay back on the graveyard slab, cushioning his head with his interlocked fingers. Bending both knees, he crossed one leg and hooked it over the other while searching the sky for illumination. “I’m willing to try anything, Lord,” he whispered above the incessant rhythm of the sea. “Just don’t let me be like the man in the picture. I’m too young to be so defeated, and too willing to look so . . . resigned.”

  Again, he heard no answer but the mournful sound of the ferry horn, calling all who were leaving Heavenly Daze to get on board or be left behind for the night.

  Chapter Four

  Edith wiped the counter with her dishtowel, then hung the cloth on the edge of the sink and untied her apron. Where was Winslow? He often went for after-supper walks along the shore, but he never stayed out this long after dark. He always said it would be too easy to twist an ankle among the rocks and freeze out there when the tide came in . . .

  She moved toward the phone, lifted it from its hook, then replaced it. She could give Floyd Lansdown a thrill by placing an honest-to-goodness emergency call, but Winslow would probably be stomping his boots on the back porch before she hung up. If she completed the call and then Winslow came in, she’d have to go over to the fire station and convince Floyd that he didn’t need to crank up the fire engine and summon the Coast Guard. As fire marshal, mayor, and sheriff, Floyd had too few opportunities to exercise his civic responsibilities. Any caller to the Lansdown house ran a calculated risk that they’d either wake the entire town for nothing or put Floyd in the hospital for overexertion.

  Sighing, she moved away from the phone and poured herself another cup of tea. She wouldn’t have worried, but obviously something was bothering Winslow. He hadn’t said much at supper, and she had a feeling the anniversary portrait weighed heavily on his mind. Just why, she couldn’t say. The picture was a nice resemblance and a fitting tribute, and Cleta had wasted no time in hanging it in the vestibule. Her handyman, Micah Smith, had remained upstairs during the reception to mark the wall and drive a nail into the plaster so the portraits of Reverend Winslow Wickam and Captain Jacques de Cuvier would be perfectly balanced.

  The brilliant ringing of the telephone startled Edith so that she jumped, splashing hot tea onto her sleeve. Smiling at her tense nerves, she placed her cup back in its saucer and dabbed at her sleeve with a towel. That was probably Winslow on the phone. He must have stopped by the church or one of the parishioner’s houses.

  Smiling, she put the phone to her ear. “Hello?”

  It wasn’t Winslow. Babette Graham was on the phone, wondering if Pastor could come over and pray with Georgie. The boy had spent the afternoon watching The Wizard of Oz, and now he couldn’t sleep. He was convinced the Wicked Witch of the West would come through the window and whisk him off to her castle.

  “Pastor Winslow’s not here right now, Babette,” Edith explained, forcing a light note into her voice. “He went out for a walk. Shall I have him come over when he returns?”

  “No, that’s okay.” Despite the reassurance, Babette sounded curt. “I don’t know if I can last that long. This boy has to go to sleep, and I can’t have him up there wailing until Pastor decides to come in. Charles and I will think of something.”

  “It’s no trouble—’’ Edith began, but then the phone clicked in her ear. Sighing, she dropped the receiver back into its cradle, then moved to the window. Nothing moved in the blackness beyond, but in the reflection she saw her- self, a tiny woman with blonde hair, a trim figure, and wide, worried eyes . . .

  A familiar stomping sound made her heart skip a beat. “Well, it’s about time,” she whispered, running her hand through her hair. She was tempted to fling the back door open and berate her husband for worrying her, but in all these years of living with Winslow Wickam she h
ad learned that nagging accomplished nothing. So she moved back to the table, picked up her cup, and was quietly sipping tea as Winslow came in.

  “Hi, honey.” He slipped off his sandy boots, shrugged his way out of his jacket, then padded over in his stocking feet and kissed her cheek. “Enjoying your tea?”

  “I was.” She waited until the significance of her tone registered and he stopped in his tracks.

  “What happened?”

  She lowered her cup and shook her head slightly. “Babette Graham called. Apparently little Georgie has been spooked by The Wizard of Oz, and they can’t get him to go to bed. She called to see if you would go over and pray with the boy.”

  “Of course I will.” Winslow straightened and moved toward the boots he’d just tossed behind the kitchen door.

  “You don’t have to. Babette said she and Charles would think of something.” Edith offered this strictly in the interest of honest and full disclosure. If Winslow thought one of his parishioners needed him, wild horses couldn’t keep him away.

  “It’s no trouble.” Winslow sat on a chair and began pulling his boots on again, then he laughed. “That Georgie. I’ve never seen a child with such imagination.”

  Edith motioned toward the phone. “Shall I call Babette and tell her you’re coming?”

  “Wouldn’t want the jangling of the telephone to keep the boy from sleeping.” Winslow finished lacing one shoe and began pulling on the other. “I’ll just walk over there and surprise them. If the boy is as tired as I suspect he is by now, he might fall asleep even before I arrive.”

  Edith gave her husband a wifely smile, but lifted a brow as she asked, “Are you all right, Winslow?”

  He smiled, and it was clear that he hadn’t noticed the change in her tone. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  She shook her head and looked into her teacup. “Don’t forget your jacket. I don’t care how short a distance you’re walking; it gets chilly out there once the sun goes to bed.”