Two Weeks in August (4 page)

The scent of the paint and plaster after the freshness of the sea breeze was giving Nina a headache. “A place called Channel Haven. Have you heard of it?”

Mander gave a great snort of laughter. “Hell yes, everyone’s heard of the Haven. It’s Hazy Duncan’s place.”

 
“Yes, she’s quite the character,” Nina said as Mander ushered her into the kitchen.

“What do you mean? What has she done now?” Mander asked, laughing anew.

“I just don’t know how she stays in business. Doesn’t her gruffness put everyone off?”

Mander shrugged. “She has good days and bad. Her better half, Mama New, does most of the tourist trade, with Hazy just doing the boats and upkeep mainly. How did you happen to stay there?”

Nina’s heart leapt just a bit. She had sensed Hazy’s sexual orientation but certainly didn’t feel any type of kinship with her.

“I didn’t really remember the place from previous visits here but it was recommended by Mrs. Loreli, a friend of Grandpapa Tom’s,” Nina explained. “I’d originally wanted to stay in one of Mrs. Loreli’s cottages over at Sweeping Pines but she’d already rented them all out for the season and won’t have one available till later in the week.”

“Oh, heck, I know Emma,” the carpenter said. “The Pines stays booked a lot. I just hope you’ll do okay at Hazy’s.”

“Why do you say that?” Nina asked studying Mander for clues.

“You’ll see. Just remember one thing. Don’t accept anything about her at face value. She is definitely not what she seems.”

“What do you mean by that? I don’t understand.”

With typical island reticence, Mander would tell her no more, only pressed her lips together and shook her head, eyes twinkling gleefully.

“Well.” Nina had to smile, Mander’s amusement was infectious. “Can you at least tell me where the place is from here? I’m afraid I don’t remember what road the cottages are on and I’ve gotten turned around. I had the address and directions in my notebook but left it at the cottage.”

“Don’t worry about it, you know you can only get so lost on ’Teague. All you need to do to get there is follow this road out.” She pointed to her left. “Channel Haven is on the left, right before you get to Memorial Park. There’s a sign up so it’s hard to miss. Another way you can spot it is by the color. All Hazy’s cottages are painted a weird blue color, as I guess you saw. It’s pretty, but kind of shocking.”

Mander was moving to the kitchen door, maneuvering Nina along with her. “Well, I’m off to dinner. My crew’s already gone for the day. Would you care to grab a bite with me? I know this place that serves scallops that’ll melt in your mouth.” She pulled the door closed once they were outside, shutting it possessively.

“No, thanks anyway. I’d better get back to Channel Haven before they decide I’ve wandered back to the mainland. It was a long drive in today so I think I’ll turn in early.” Nina didn’t bother telling Mander that she knew the restaurant well and had eaten there often.

Mander retrieved a battered red bicycle from the side of the house and swung one tan, shorts-clad leg across it. “Okay, I’ll take a rain check. Come out early tomorrow if you can. I need you to tell me how you want the shelves in the pantry laid out.” She moved down the drive, bike tires crunching in the shells. “I’ll see you then.” She waved as she pushed off.

Suddenly it struck Nina that she would be living full-time in this house in just a short while. It finally began to sink in: her Grandpapa Tom had left her his house and this house was on Chincoteague Island, a place she and her family adored. Would she learn to love living here as Grandpapa had? She took a deep breath of the warm, salt-laden air. Maybe she already did.

Chapter 5

A cacophony of sound woke Nina early the next morning, just after dawn. Gull cries swelled in volume, died down, and then swelled again as shouting rang out through the cool morning air.

Nina leapt from her bed and ran to a nearby window willing her sticky eyelids to open.

 
The large bedroom window faced out over the channel and boat rental docks, and she was amazed to see Hazy running along the lower dock shouting and gesturing frantically toward the water. Her loud, accented voice drifted in to Nina.

“Don’t be such a bloody tourist, ye damn fool. If you don’t know where the devil you are, come back to the office an’ I’ll give you a map to take with you.”

She paused, arms wide, rounded chest heaving, and then began anew.

“Get AWAY from there, you bloody idiot! Oh my gawd, ye’re runnin’ up on the…that’s
my
boat you’re tryin’ to destroy!”

Muttering to herself, she stalked, steps echoing, across the boards of the dock and disappeared from view. Several moments later, the sound of an outboard motor reached Nina and Hazy raced by, her small craft spewing up geysers of foam.

Nina realized she was smiling. Alone in her room and she was smiling. Hazy was certainly an entity unto herself. She didn’t care a fig how she appeared or what she said.

Nina giggled as she pictured Hazy striding across the boards, shouting at the inexperienced tourist captain. She sobered then, thinking how she’d sure hate to be the recipient of that anger and scorn. She peered out the window again and could barely make out Hazy in the distance. She was standing in her boat gesticulating wildly to a group of people on one of the rental boats. Obviously they’d found a sandbar and had gotten too close, maybe even were hung up.

Nina sighed, trying to wake up. What in the world were they doing out this early in a rental boat anyway?

Knowing she had to get the novel evaluation in the mail as early as possible, she mentally kicked herself for not mailing it the day before.

Nina showered and dressed quickly. She rushed to the small, charming post office on Main Street. It was not yet open at this early hour but fortunately Martha always supplied the correct return postage, priority at that, and Nina was able to drop the package into the outgoing mail slot.

She strolled through the slowly awakening town, enjoying the dawn. She stopped at Bren’s Fine Dining which, of course, was already open. Brenda Samm’s husband had been a fisherman and after his death, Brenda had discovered old habits die hard, such as cooking a substantial breakfast for her husband and their brood of now fully grown children. So she’d opened a restaurant on the outskirts of the town proper and even at this early hour, especially at this early hour, the small, run-down diner was packed with fishermen and a few of their wives. The locals knew Nina and greeted her with friendly cries of welcome as soon as she stepped inside the door. She called back, and waved, pausing several times on her way through the dining area to answer questions and accept condolences and hugs from several of the regulars. She adroitly hurried through, knowing from experience that if she lingered too long, she’d lose the entire day to reminiscences about Captain Tom and every sea voyage he’d ever taken. As she gained the counter, she could hear the renewed buzz of intense chatter behind her, all of it about her grandfather and his life on the island.

Bren waited behind the counter, smiling at her, dark eyes shining in welcome. Nina settled herself on one of the high leather and chrome barstools and cupped her chin in one hand, elbow on the counter. She regarded Bren, noting that she had gained a little more weight and that it added to her motherly charm. She’d had a recent haircut and her riotous salt-and-pepper curls hugged her round head closely.

 
“Lor’ an’ if you ain’ a sight for sore eyes,” Bren said, her island accent strong. “I see where Tom lef’ you ta house?”

Nina nodded. “He did and I’m moving here. Here for good.”

Bren set a steaming cup of Earl Grey tea in front of her. “Ta. Neighbors are a goodness.” She handed Nina a menu. “Got fresh bread in from Ella. ’Sgot little nutmeats in it this time. You know she’s always tryin’ the new, don’t you.”

Nina smiled. “Some of her recipes do get pretty wild but they’re always delicious.”

Bren nodded, then lifted the coffeepot and moved along the counter offering refills to the half-awake old salts sitting there.

 
After eating a filling breakfast of nut and cinnamon filled toast, jam and scrambled eggs, Nina walked slowly back to her car and headed to Grandpapa Tom’s.

Mander was already at the house working when she got there.

“Boy, you’re the early bird, aren’t you,” Nina said, smiling as she entered the living room, a to-go cup of hot tea warming her hand.

Mander grinned at Nina from her perch atop a sawhorse. She was sawing a thin strip of framing. “Yeah, just trying to get the job done. Early bird gets the worm, they say.”

Voices sounded from other rooms and Nina realized, from the strong smell of fresh paint, that Mander’s employees weren’t slug-a-beds either.

Nina rubbed her nose as she walked toward the pantry. She saw immediately what Mander meant about the configuration. The odd-shaped space could be laid out in two different ways, two sets of deep shelves or three sets of narrow ones.

“What do you think would work best in here, Mander? The wide or the narrow?” she called out.

Suddenly Mander’s form filled the space behind her and she smelled the strong woodsy scent of her. The close proximity made Nina’s skin prickle uncomfortably and she was reluctant to turn about and face her in the small confined area.

“It all depends on what you want. Do you buy a lot of large, bulky groceries or a lot of cans?”

She twisted around and stared disbelievingly at the carpenter. “What? How do I know what I’m going to buy?”

Mander looked calm, reasonable, but clearly amused. “What do you usually buy? Most people buy pretty much the same from week to week. If you buy a great amount of canned goods, they’d get lost in deep shelves and you’d have to dig around all the time to see what you have. If you buy a lot of bulky items, potatoes, pasta, fresh produce, breads, stuff like that, you’ll be needing larger shelves so things won’t fall on the floor and you can stack bins in here on the shelves.” She paused for a breath, eyes twinkling in an errant shaft of sunlight. “So, which is it?”

Nina stared at the back wall, lost in thought. Who would think of a thing like that? She never would have, not on her own, anyway.

“Bins, I guess. You’re good at what you do,” she sighed finally. “I never would have considered it.”

Mander seemed to glow under Nina’s praise but looked downward shyly. “Well, these things are important when you’re remodeling or building a house. You need to think ahead so you won’t regret it later. Sometimes things can’t be changed.”

After almost an hour of discussion about various changes in the house, Nina noticed Mander was getting restless.

Thinking she was keeping her from her unsupervised crew members, Nina wrapped up the discussion and quickly bade her goodbye, dropping her empty cup into the waste bin beside the kitchen sink. As she got to the kitchen door, Mander’s low voice arrested her.