Tucker is talking for both of them. He’ll talk when he has something to say.” Since Tanner was completely normal in even’ other way, including comprehension, she had to assume the pediatrician was right—but she still worried. She couldn’t help it; she was a mother.
“A pipe burst under the sink,” Sherry said, sounding harassed. “I turned off the valve, but we need the water back on fast. The dishes are piling up.”
“Oh, no.” Other than the obvious difficulty or having no water to cook or wash dishes with, another problem loomed even larger: her mother, Sheila Wells, was en route from Seattle for a week-long visit, and was due in that afternoon. Since her mother wasn’t happy about Cate and the twins leaving Seattle to begin with, Gate could just imagine her comments about the area’s remoteness and lack of modern conveniences should there not be any water.
It was always something; this old house seemed to need almost constant maintenance and repair, which she supposed was par for the course with old houses. Still, her finances were stretched to the breaking point; she could use just one week in which nothing went wrong. Maybe next week, she thought with a sigh.
She picked up the kitchen phone and from memory dialed the number of Earl’s Hardware Store.
Walter Earl himself answered, catching the phone on the first ring as he usually did. “Hardware.” He didn’t need further identification, since there was only one hardware store in town, and he was the only one who answered the phone.
“Walter, this is Cate. Do you know where Mr. Harris is working today? I have a plumbing emergency.”
“Mistuh Hawwis!” Tucker crowed, having caught the name of the local handyman. Excited, he banged his spoon against the table, and Cate stuck her finger in her ear so she could hear what Walter said. Both boys were staring at her in delight, quivering with anticipation. The community handyman was one of their favorite people, because they were fascinated by his tools and he didn’t mind if they played with the wrenches and hammers.
Calvin Harris didn’t have a phone, but he customarily stopped by the hardware store every morning to pick up whatever supplies he would need for the day’s work; so Walter usually knew where he could be found. When she had first moved here, Cate had been taken aback that someone wouldn’t have a phone in this day and age, but now she was accustomed to the system and didn’t think anything of it. Mr. Harris didn’t want a phone, so he didn’t have a phone. Big deal. The community was so small, finding him wasn’t a problem.
“Cal’s right here,” Walter said. “I’ll send him your way.”
“Thanks,” said Cate, glad she didn’t have to hunt him down. “Could you ask him what time he thinks he can get here?”
Walter’s voice rumbled as he relayed the question, and she heard a softer, indistinct mumble that she recognized as Mr. Harris’s voice.
Walter’s voice sounded death’ through the phone. “He said he’ll be there in a few minutes.”
Saying good-bye and hanging up, Cate breathed a sigh of relief. With any luck the problem would be minor and the water would soon be on again, with minimal impact on her finances. As it was, she needed Mr. Harris’s fix-it genius so often she was beginning to think she would come out better to offer him free room and board in exchange for repairs. He lived in rooms over the feed store, and while they might be bigger than any of her bedrooms, he still had to pay for them, plus she could throw in meals. She would lose a bedroom to rent, but it wasn’t as if the bed-and-breakfast had ever been filled to capacity. What held her back was the slightly unwelcome prospect of having someone permanently in the house with her and the twins. As busy as she was during the day, she wanted to keep the nights just for them.
Mr. Harris was so shy, though, she could easily see him mumbling something after supper and disappearing into his room, not to be seen again until the morning. But what if he didn’t? What if the boys wanted to be with him instead of her? She felt small and petty for worrying about such a thing, but—what if they did? She was the center of their voting lives, and she didn’t know if she could give that up yet. Eventually she would have to, but they were just four, and all she had left of Derek.
“Well?” Sherry prompted, her brows raised as she waited for news, good or bad.
“He’s coming right over.”
“Caught him before he got started on another job, then,” said Sherry, looking as relieved as Gate felt.
Gate looked at the boys, who were both sitting watching her, their spoons held suspended. “You two need to finish your cereal, or you won’t be able to watch Mr. Harris,” she said sternly. That wasn’t exactly the truth, since Mr. Harris would be right there in the kitchen with them, but they were four; what did they know?
“We’ll huwwy,” Tucker said, and both resumed eating with more energy than precision.
“Hurry,” Gate said, emphasizing the r sound.
“Hurry,” Tucker obediently repeated. He could say the sound when he wanted to, but when he was distracted—which was often—he fell back into babyish speech patterns. He talked so much; it was as if he didn’t take the time to properly say the words. “Mistuh Hawwis is coming,” he told Tanner, as if his brother didn’t know. “I’m gonna play with the dwill.”
“Drill,” Gate corrected. “And you will not. You may watch him, but leave the tools alone.”
His big blue eyes filled with tears, and his lower lip trembled. “Mistuh Hawwis lets us play with them.”
“That’s when he has time. He’ll be in a hurry today, because he has another job to do when he leaves here.”
When she first opened the B and B, Gate had tried to keep them from bothering the handyman while he was working, and since they’d been just one at the time, the job should have been easier, but they had shown remarkable skill in slipping away. As soon as she turned her back, both boys zoomed back to him like magnets to steel. They had been like little monkeys, poking into his toolbox, running off with anything they could pick up, so she knew they had been as severe a trial to his patience as they had been to hers, but he’d never said a word of complaint, and for that she blessed him. Not that his silence on the matter was surprising; he seldom said anything, period.
The boys were older now, but their fascination with tools hadn’t waned. The only difference was that now they insisted on “helping.”
“They don’t bother me,” Mr. Harris would mumble whenever she caught them, ducking his head as his cheeks colored. He was painfully shy, rarely looking her in the eve and actually speaking only when he had to. Well, he did talk to the boys. Maybe he felt at ease with them because they were so young, but she had heard his voice mixed with the boys’ higher-pitched, excited tones as they seemed to carry on real conversations.
She glanced out the kitchen door and saw three customers lined up to pay their bills. “I’ll be right back,” she said, and went out to take their money. She hadn’t wanted to put a cash register in the dining room, but her breakfast business had made it necessary, so she had installed a small one by the outside door. Two of the customers were Joshua Creed and his client, which meant the dining room would soon be emptying out, now that Mr. Creed was leaving.
“Cate,” Mr. Creed said, inclining his head toward her. He was tall and broad-shouldered, his dark hair silvering at the temples, and his face weathered from the elements. His hazel eyes were narrow, his gaze piercing; he looked as if he could chew nails and spit out bullets, but he was always respectful and kind when he spoke to her. “Those scones of yours just keep getting better and better. I’d weigh four hundred pounds if I ate here every day.”
“I doubt that, but thanks.”
He turned and introduced his client. “Cate, this is Randall Wellingham. Randall, this lovely lady is Cate Nightingale, the owner of Nightingale’s Bed and Breakfast, and incidentally the best cook around.”