by Ellen Block
“Even your food is needy.”
She unwrapped the turkey tetrazzini entree, held her breath, and prepared to open the stove door.
“Ready or not.”
Eyes shut, Abigail jerked open the oven, anticipating an intense blast of heat. Instead, lukewarm air wafted out.
“Is that it?”
The instructions said the cooking time would be approximately twenty-five minutes. A half hour later, Abigail’s dinner remained frozen solid. She stabbed at it with a fork and nearly broke the tines. Already running late for Merle’s route, she switched off the stove and slapped together a sandwich to take with her on the road.
“I forfeit. Turkey tetrazzini wins. Time to hang up the gloves.”
While making the rounds, Abigail felt a ripple of disappointment. This would be her last night. Each evening she’d been either humiliated or petrified, yet Merle’s route had given her something she’d been missing—a purpose. She was sorry to lose that.
“Now you must be going crazy.”
The cottage on Timber Lane was her last stop. Abigail elected to believe the thief wouldn’t return so soon, logic that hadn’t leached down to her nerves. Her palms were sweating, making the flashlight and hammer hard to grip. She was wiping her hands on her pants when her customary lap around the house was interrupted by footsteps.
This can’t be happening again. Not again.
She ducked behind a clump of shrubs. This hiding in the bushes was not the type of activity Abigail ever thought she’d be making a habit of.
A glimmer of light flashed in the dark. She recognized the figure of the man from the night before. Moonlight was glinting off his wristwatch, illuminating the arc of his arm swinging as he walked. He had a slow, lumbering gait, a pace suggesting he was an older man or overweight. Abigail tracked him until he turned at the end of the lane, then she scrambled to her car, intent on pursuit. The rational side of her brain advised against it.
What are you going to do if you catch him? Make a citizen’s arrest?
Common sense lost the tug-of-war to curiosity. Abigail threw the station wagon into drive, panning from side to side along the rows of houses. The man was gone. Again.
“Relax. You are not in some scary B movie. You’re on Chapel Isle in a town full of seafaring, bingo-loving people who are, for the most part, sane, and none of them will be jumping out of the bushes with an ax.”
Or so she hoped. Since the man had vanished, Abigail was stuck with the same choice as yesterday. To tell or not to tell. She hadn’t gotten a close enough look to describe him in detail, so the conclusion was simple.
“I’m going home.”
The word home resonated in her ears like the hum of a tuning fork. Had the lighthouse become her home? Her house in Boston, the place she’d truly considered home, was gone, leveled, the land sold off. The new owner would rebuild. It hurt Abigail to picture a new house replacing hers.
She and Paul had fallen in love with the property on sight. The Classical Revival home was the picture of elegant refinement, with its white stucco faade, dental molding, and black shutters. What made the house all the more appealing was that it had been modeled after The Mount, Edith Wharton’s estate in Lenox, Massachusetts. Abigail couldn’t have asked for more than to live in a lovely home resembling that of one of her favorite authors. But soon a new house would be constructed where hers once stood. No one would remember the detail about Edith Wharton or that it was Abigail and her family who had lived there. The facts that would endure were that the former house had burned down and that two people had lost their lives to the fire.
Abigail was getting into bed when the day’s exertion finally caught up to her. She’d forgotten to buy any pain reliever at the market, and the achiness threatened to keep her awake. She would have to cope with being sore the way she coped with everything else: by ignoring it as best she could.
Thinking a book might put her to sleep, Abigail went downstairs to look for Lottie’s romance novel, which wasn’t in the bathroom, where she thought she’d left it. In the living room, she passed Mr. Jasper’s ledger on the table.
“You could read that instead.”
Cradling the ledger, she went back upstairs and settled in under the quilt, with the book propped on her knees. A page in, her eyelids began to droop, then she drifted to sleep with the ledger lying by her side.
persiflage (pûr′sə fläzh′, pûr′–), n. 1. light, bantering talk or writing. 2. a frivolous or flippant style of treating a subject. [1750–60; < F, deriv. of persifler to banter, equiv. to per– PER– 1 siffler to whistle, hiss < LL sifilāre, for L sībilāre; see SIBILANT, –AGE] —syn. 1. banter, badinage, jesting.
Abigail awoke with a start to the sound of the ledger falling to the floor.
“Good morning to you too.”
Groggy, she picked up the ledger, dusted it off, and got dressed, donning the painting togs she’d worn the week before; a pale plaid shirt and a pair of now-spattered khakis. She hunted around for Lottie’s romance novel, found it in the study, then settled in at the dining-room table, thinking she’d read over breakfast before undertaking more household chores.
The story of the heiress and her pirate captain continued, each chapter ending in a crescendo of betrayal, a sword fight, or a chase on the high seas. As a battle ensued between the armada commanded by the dastardly count and the pirate’s band of sea dogs, Abigail felt a pain in her stomach. It was long past lunch. A whole chunk of the day had vanished. The predictable romance novel had become unpredictably entertaining.
Abigail ate a yogurt as the story hurtled onward at a swift clip, laden with soppy adjectives and fervent verbs. The count was about to have the heiress’s beloved pirate captain murdered in a secluded cove when a horn honked outside. Through the front window, Abigail could see Nat’s truck in the drive.
“Right at the cliffhanger.”
She closed the paperback and stood up too fast, making her head spin. She’d been sitting for so many hours that her legs were falling asleep. Abigail slapped her thighs and hopped on the balls of her feet, forcing the blood through her legs. The horn honked again.
“I’ll be right there,” she shouted out the window. Legs tingling, Abigail shuffled down the front stairs a step at a time.
Nat stared at her from the cab of his truck. “You hurt yourself?”
“It’s a reading-related injury.”
He didn’t understand and didn’t seem as if he wanted to. “You bringing any food?”
“Why?”
“This’ll take a while. You might get hungry.”
Abigail awkwardly walked back into the house, grumbling, “How was I supposed to know I needed to bring food?”
She threw together her usual sandwich and took an apple. The only bag she had to pack them in was a jumbo paper sack from Merle’s store.
Nat raised his brows at the bag as she slid into the truck. “You must have some appetite.”
They rode in silence as they crossed the island. Aside from the scuffed leather seats and sandy floors, the truck’s interior was surprisingly tidy. A paper evergreen tree dangled from the rearview mirror.
“What?” Nat said. “You assumed it’d stink of fish in here.”
“Kind of,” Abigail confessed.
“You know what they say about assumptions. They’re usually wrong.”
Abigail would have readily admitted to being incorrect about several matters regarding Nat Rhone, except one. His attitude.
“Usually,” she added.
The northwest end of the island was flat as a tabletop and blanketed by scrub brush. Nat pulled onto a bumpy, unmarked road. A quarter mile in, the single-lane path drained into a clearing. Scattered throughout the glade were a variety of boats in various states of repair. A handful of outboards were mounted on cinder blocks, while a damaged rowboat acted as a catchall for miscellaneous parts. Grass refused to grow in the clearing. The weeds were more persistent, though, poking their heads up through
a gigantic anchor that had come to rest next to a gutted dinghy.
Between the clearing and the bay beyond was a clapboard cottage with a shake roof. The paint had been scraped away, yet traces of the former color—a ruddy beige—remained, giving the house a crusty appearance. Nat had mentioned prepping the place himself, which would easily have cost a couple hundred dollars. It must have taken days. Abigail wondered how much he owed this Duncan Thadlow.
The deal she’d struck with Nat was starting to seem unfair. All he had to do was move a few pieces of furniture, while she had indentured herself to a far more grandiose task.
“Don’t wait for an invitation,” he told her, getting out of the truck. Abigail followed.
Standing at the door to the cottage was a man with a thick brown beard so long it touched his chest. “Afternoon, Nat. Here to finish painting?”
“It’ll get done.” The man’s innocent question had rubbed Nat the wrong way. Repaying a debt in labor rather than cash wasn’t something he appeared proud of.
“Who’s your assistant?” Duncan asked.
“Oh, yeah, this is—”
“I’m Abigail. Or Abby. Whichever.”
She didn’t want to hear Nat Rhone say her name. That would make their arrangement too personal, as if they were friends instead of convenient acquaintances.
“Happy to meet you. Holler if you need anything. Besides help, that is,” Duncan deadpanned as he retired inside.
Not wasting a second, Nat said, “Get a ladder. We’ll start high and paint down.”
“Whatever you say.”
Abigail carried over one of a pair of ladders from the truck’s flatbed, as Nat hauled the cans of primer.
“Sorry. Forgot.” He took the ladder from her, propping it against the side of the house.
“Forgot what?”
“That ladder’s heavy.”
“Weren’t you just talking about assumptions?”
“Thought you might still be woozy from that ‘reading-related injury.’ Far be it from me to act like a gentleman.” Nat removed the tops from two gallon-size containers of primer and gave her a brush.
“Any tips?” Abigail asked.
“Tips?”
“On how to do this.”
“Put the brush in your hand and go like this.” He started priming.
“Always a pleasure to learn from a pro,” she said, trying to get in the last blow.
He ignored her. She did the same. It was going to be a long afternoon.
The sunny, windless day worked in their favor. The primer went on easily and dried rapidly. Abigail wished she’d brought her radio. Silence while she was alone was manageable. Silence with Nat Rhone was uncomfortable.
When the quiet became too much for her, Abigail volleyed a question. “What about the back of the house?”
“Duncan took down the shingles. Had termites.”
“Is he going to replace them? Winter will be here soon and—”
“You’d have to ask him,” Nat snapped.
Jerk.
Both returned to priming, inching inward along the side of the house so they would meet in the center. Once they did, Abigail checked her watch. An hour had gone by.
“That went pretty fast,” she said, more to herself than to him.
“Two hands are better than one.”
“Don’t you mean four?”
“Don’t know about you, but I can paint with only one hand at a time.” He took his ladder and his can of primer and went to the other end of the house.
Jerk.
They completed that side equally quick.
“Do you want to do the front before we break to eat or after?”
“Before. I’m not really hungry yet, if that’s what you’re asking,” Abigail replied.
“That wasn’t what I was asking, but fine.”
Jerk.
Each started at the far end of the front of the house, maintaining their distance. Finishing turned into a race between them, the goal being to get to the door. Abigail kept tabs on Nat out of the corner of her eye. She could tell he was doing the same. He had the advantage of stronger arms, while she had speed. Soon they were mere feet from the front door. Abigail got there first.
“Finished?” she inquired smugly.
“I am now,” he huffed. “Let’s eat.”
Abigail got her giant paper sack from Nat’s truck. He slid behind the wheel and opened a cooler.
“Are you going to eat in there?”
“Why not?” he answered.
“It might be more pleasant to eat outside.”
“I’ve been outside since sunrise.”
“Well, I’m going to eat out here.”
“Suit yourself.”
Jerk.
She took a seat on the steps of Duncan’s house and dumped the contents of the sack. Despite its size, the skimpy sandwich had gotten crushed somehow, and she’d forgotten to wash the apple. Abigail had also forgotten to bring a drink, and she was incredibly thirsty.
“Not much food for such a big bag,” Nat called through the passenger side window. “Didn’t you bring a drink?”
“Normally when I go to paint people’s houses, I remember to pack a thermos. It must have slipped my mind.”
Rudeness was a rarity for Abigail. Nat Rhone brought out the worst in her.
“I got an extra soda.”
Abigail went to the truck and took the can from him. “Thanks,” she said curtly, then returned to Duncan’s front stoop.
They ate without another word to each other. Nat gazed at the water. She stared at the ground. Her sandwich, though squashed, was delicious. Intense hunger transformed the plain turkey and bread into a feast.
“This is how you can tell you’re famished,” she mused.
“How’s that?”
“When even a mangled sandwich tastes amazing.”
“How could you not realize you were hungry?”
He was angling for a quarrel. Abigail could feel it.
“You can sense something without being completely cognizant of it,” she countered.
“Doubtful.”
“Haven’t you ever been exhausted and soldiered on because you loved what you were doing too much to stop?”
“Not the same,” he replied between bites.
Nat was baiting her. Abigail refused to fall for it, choosing to change the subject to something he might be less inclined to haggle over.
“Duncan must have made quite a lot of repairs if you have to pay him back by painting his house.”
Nat took a gulp of his soda. “Had to get Hank’s rig fixed after the accident.”
“Accident? At the dock? I thought he was drunk.”
“It was an accident,” he corrected her sharply.
“That’s not what I heard.”
“You heard wrong.”
“It’s not your boat, it’s Hank’s. So why—”
“Why is none of your business. You just got to Chapel Isle. You think you have it figured out? You haven’t got a clue about this place or these people. And you don’t have a clue about me.”
“Hmm, let me hazard a guess. This tough-guy act is a cover for the sensitive, heartbroken kid who lurks beneath the surface of the notorious Nat Rhone. Please, spare me. Because you don’t know a thing about me either, and all I know about you is that you’re a real asshole.” Abigail threw aside the rest of her sandwich. “Where’s the paint? I want to get this over with.”
She snatched a can of taupe exterior paint from the flatbed and marched to one side of the house to start painting. The truck door opened. She heard Nat moving his ladder to the opposite side of the house. Her hands were shaking so badly it made opening the paint can impossible. Abigail almost started to cry.
You only have to make it through to the end of the day. A few more hours.
Then she remembered the other half of their bargain. Nat was going to move the furniture with her. It would be worth it to leave the antiques in the basement i
f it meant not having to spend an extra second with him.
They met at the front of the house, each toting their respective ladders, briefly making eye contact before getting to work. This time it wasn’t a race between them as much as a race to finish.
Later, Nat put on the final stroke of paint, saying, “I’ll clean the brushes at home. You can load your gear in the truck and we can go.”
“I can clean them.”
“I said I’d take care of it.”
“You’re the boss.”
Duncan came outside as Nat was capping the last can. “Is this a present for me?” He motioned wit the toe of his boot to the apple Abigail had left on the steps. Beside it was her half-eaten sandwich, lying on the paper bag. She scrambled to clean the mess.
“No worries. You can leave me food anytime,” he proclaimed, patting his belly.
“Excellent job,” Duncan said, walking from end to end of the house. “Only now the missus will be on me to straighten up the yard. Say, you guys make a good team. Maybe you should go into business together.”
Abigail and Nat exchanged glances. He pulled his hat lower on his head, hiding under it instead of answering.
“I’ve really got to be getting back to the lighthouse.”
“’Course. Glad to have met you, Abby.” Duncan offered his hand. She shook it, though her fingers burned from gripping a paintbrush for hours on end.
“This squares you with me,” he told Nat. “You and Hank, that is.”
Nat thanked him and got into the truck. Abigail did the same, then they drove across the island as they had come, not speaking. He pulled up to the lighthouse and Abigail hurried out.
“What about the furniture?” Nat asked.
“Forget about it.”
“What? No. I’m not welching on my end of the deal.”
“Whatever. I’m too tired to do it today.”
“Okay, I’ll come tomorrow. Hank’s been under the weather. Doesn’t want to take the rig out. I can be here in the morning.”