A Month at the Shore

by Antoinette Stockenberg

  It hadn't helped her jitters that the house was a dark Victorian cottage with gingerbread trim and lurid, leaded red glass over and alongside the door, and that the massive door knocker on it was shaped in the head of a gargoyle.

  Laura would never forget that night. She was well aware of Miss Widdich's reputation, well aware that there was no moon behind the murk of fog. Unnerved and clutching her box of white roses, she had knocked timidly and waited, half expecting to be grabbed, trussed, and stuffed in an oven.

  Miss Widdich had answered the door dressed all in black. Her dark hair was beginning to go gray at the time, with a startling white slash across the front that added to the overall drama of the woman.

  "My goodness, you took your time!" she had said, sharply for her. "I've got half a mind to send you back with those."

  "I'm sorry, Miss Widdich; I had to drive special to Chatham for them, and then I had to wait, and I only just got back," Laura had whimpered.

  "Why're you delivering them? Where's Sylvia?"

  "We're really short-handed at the nursery. My ... my father wanted Sylvia there with him."

  "Oh, I'll bet," Miss Widdich had said in a way that had confused Laura and made her even more uncomfortable. She couldn't imagine what difference it made who delivered the roses.

  Thankfully, Miss Widdich had removed the lid and inspected the flowers, and instantly her face had softened with pleasure. "Ah, they're fragrant. You were able to find fragrant. Lovely, dear. I'll keep them, with pleasure. And here's something for the extra trouble."

  She had given Laura a ten-dollar tip, far and away the biggest that she'd ever received—and Laura had split it the next day with Billy, who almost never got tipped because people knew he was simple and had no real concept of money.

  What Laura had never told anyone about that delivery on that particularly eerie night was that besides hearing soft, strange music and seeing the flicker of many candles dancing on the ceiling, she had smelled the distinct odor of marijuana. It was no big deal, considering the times; Snack was always sneaking off with a joint. But it had seemed odd, almost amusing, that someone Miss Widdich's age—she had to be over fifty!—would be listening to sitar music and smoking pot. Unless, of course, she was a witch.

  But that was then. Today it was mid-afternoon, and the sun was shining and a warm breeze blowing, and Laura was old enough not to have goosebumps just because a single woman with a white streak in her hair had liked to indulge in sinful pleasures.

  She parked next to Miss Widdich's big black Ford and walked up to the porch of the little cottage, which was newly painted in the same dark gray. The porch was only two steps up and was surrounded by a wall of white azaleas in full bloom; leave it to Miss Widdich to find hybrids that were intensely fragrant. Inhaling deep, Laura lifted the old gargoyle and gave it two loud raps.

  When no one answered, she assumed that Miss Widdich was in her herb garden; it was far too fine a day to waste lingering over lunch inside. Leaving the casserole dish on the vintage wicker porch glider, Laura went around to the back to announce herself.

  Miss Widdich was indeed in her garden. But Laura was stunned to see that she wasn't simply puttering and fussing the way older gardeners do, but digging a massive hole, obviously for the balled-and-burlapped pear tree that was waiting alongside. Corinne might be strong enough to dig that kind of hole, and so might Laura, on a good day. But for someone to do it who normally hobbled around with a cane ...

  "Miss Widdichl"

  The woman looked up from her digging, saw her flabbergasted visitor and instantly dropped her spade, which fell into the hole. A look of confusion and pain replaced the fierce concentration that Laura had seen in her face.

  "Oh, thank goodness you're here," Miss Widdich said weakly, gesturing toward the back porch. "Can you fetch me my cane? Billy was supposed to dig the planting hole last week, but he hasn't come, and I—well, I was frustrated enough, and foolish enough, to try."

  She hobbled over to a nearby stone bench and dropped onto it with a groan. "Stupid me. Stupid, stupid me," she lamented. "It's so aggravating to get old. You're young, I know, but wait. You'll see. Oh! It's terrible."

  On and on she went, until Laura had the chance to explain why she had come, and then to make her escape.

  She drove back to the nursery in a state of heightened unease. Miss Widdich was certainly feisty enough to take on a project that was more than she could handle—but she seemed to have been handling it just fine. Laura had a vivid image of the arthritic woman pitching a shovelful of dirt to the side and coming right back for the next. There was nothing infirm about her.

  What was the point of the deception? Why try to convince everyone that she was so infirm? That's what Laura wanted to know.

  The blip of suspicion vanished completely from her radar screen as soon as she saw the cars in the nursery parking lot. Seven! On a Tuesday! Oh happy day!

  ****

  "It's as if that Dunkin' Donuts crowd hung a left and drove straight here," Laura told her sister during a lull later that afternoon.

  Corinne was in remarkably high spirits. "Actually, you're not far off. Word about my geraniums got out to the Chepaquit Garden Club," she explained. "You know how competitive those women are; no one wanted to miss out, especially on the variegated ones."

  "Geraniums. Who would've thought?"

  "Everyone asks me how I got them so big so early," Corinne said proudly.

  "And you tell them—?"

  "Compost. The geraniums are potted in almost pure compost. They love it."

  "Well, we have enough of the stuff. Maybe we ought to bag it and sell it."

  "Great idea!" said Corinne, removing a bunch of twenties from the register. "We could call it Cheppy Chips."

  "Hey, start talking it up," Laura said, laughing. "We'll get Snack working on them. In his spare time."

  Their brother entered the shop just then, bearing painted shelves that he arranged in the exact pyramid shape and dimensions that Laura had requested. He'd even made a special stand to place in the middle opening for the lemon tree.

  Laura was delighted, and Snack was clearly pleased with the fact.

  "It was fun," he confessed. "I like making stuff, especially making stuff fast." He went out and came back with the lemon tree, its nodding branches covered in tiny white blossoms of powerful fragrance, and set it on its throne. Immediately the area was awash in its perfume.

  "Oh, my," said an elderly woman buying packets of seed. "Oh, that smells so good. It's going to be hard to go home to my wick freshener." She drifted over to the lemon tree and scrutinized the price on the plastic tab in the pot. Sighing, she said, "I'll have to think about it."

  "This is our last one," Laura coaxed. Also the first, but it was nothing the customer needed to know.

  "Oh, well." The woman drifted out with her three-dollar purchase.

  "That was Mrs. Schmidt," said Corinne. "Remember her?"

  "Do I? She never bought something in a pot if she could find it in a packet. Surely the most tightfisted Yankee in—"

  Laura stopped herself short when she saw the woman coming back through the door.

  "You know what? I think I'll just take that tree after all," said Mrs. Schmidt, astounding both sisters. "Delivery is free, correct?"

  In fact it wasn't, but history was being made, and Laura was not about to quibble. She answered, "For you, absolutely," and Snack actually volunteered to deliver it after work.

  In every way, it was proving to be an historic afternoon at Shore Gardens.

  The blissful mood lasted right through quitting time. Laura and Corinne replaced the lemon tree with their only other citrus, a lime tree with no flowers but covered with dozens of budding fruits, and by the time they were ready to close up shop, the shop itself had been transformed. Flowers, houseplants, tools, seeds, wreaths, planters, ribbons, garden markers, cachepots, stepping stones, sundials, little frogs and turtles, even a couple of verdigris-finish birdbaths: every availabl
e wall, shelf, nook, cranny, and counter was filled. The only thing missing was Sylvia behind a counter, creating her typically whimsical and wonderful floral arrangements in keeping with the season.

  "Of course, we've skimmed the best of everything to create this illusion of plenty," said Corinne, counting their money. "In the greenhouses, we've got bupkis."

  "We'll get more. Remember Rhode Island." Laura was sitting on the counter's edge, swinging her feet and watching her sister count. "So—how'd we do, coach?"

  Corinne looked up grinning and waved a fistful of cash at her. "We scored. This keeps up, we're going to have a blowout of a Founders Week sale. Laura, honestly—we can make it," she said excitedly.

  "You bet your petunias."

  Next up: Kendall Barclay.

  Chapter 9

  "I'm nervous."

  "Why? The guy puts his pants on one leg at a time, same as everyone else."

  "Oh, Laura. You know what I mean. What if Kendall says no to a loan again? He did once, when Dad asked."

  "Then why would he make a point of seeking you out and asking whether you needed help?"

  Corinne had no answer to that, so she settled for a pessimistic sigh. She was that kind of woman: one with infinite faith in her own ability to work hard and get the job done, but with little confidence that anyone else would see that strength in her.

  They climbed down from the pickup in their Sunday best: Laura was wearing her pretty blue dress with the covered buttons, and Corinne, a simple shift of lavender which flattered the deep tan that came inevitably with the late spring season.

  Of the dozen historic buildings that comprised the town center, Chepaquit Savings Bank was the crown jewel: a historic clapboard house, painted barn red and with a gambrel roof, that two centuries earlier had served as a country tavern.

  Its cobbled parking lot was now dotted with cherry trees that were a day or so past their peak bloom, evidenced by the blanket of pink petals that eddied and swirled around the sisters' ankles as they walked up to the paneled front door of the building. It looked like such a friendly bank; it was natural to assume that its officers would be kind.

  Laura and Corinne were about to find out. "Here goes nuttin'," Laura said, squeezing down on the heavy brass doorlatch.

  Her heart had begun to beat at a different rhythm altogether, and her emotions were a soup mix of fear and fury, regret and longing. When she was thirteen, Kendall Barclay had been her knight, and then he'd pushed her away and had galloped off. Twenty years later, here she was, forced to seek his services again: he was the only knight in town.

  Inside, a too-cool woman wearing a forties-look rayon dress, and with a retro hairdo that was parted and kinked and falling over one eye, came out from a small office and asked them if she could be of assistance. She looked like something out of a Hepburn-Tracy film.

  "We have an appointment to see Kendall Barclay," said Laura, filling in for her tongue-tied sister.

  The assistant's smile was immediate and deferential; apparently not everyone got to see the bank president. She led them through a narrow hall, still floored with wide, original planks the color of butterscotch and overlaid with a subdued oriental rug, and ushered them through a small anteroom directly into the office of Kendall Barclay himself.

  It threw Laura off balance, somehow. She hadn't expected to skip right past the wait-and-be-seated phase.

  The bank's president was at a mahogany desk and looking hard at work: the sleeves of his pale blue shirt were rolled up, and his red tie, printed with colorful hot-air balloons, was loosened to allow room for the opened buttons of his shirt.

  His smile included them both, but it seemed to Laura that it came back and settled on her, lingering over her dress. She was convinced that he'd been expecting to greet two clodhoppers in overalls and carrying pitchforks.

  He came around to the front of his desk to shake their hands. Laura, who had scrubbed her nails during her shower until her skin hurt, was caught and held in his warm, callused grasp. Again she was surprised: he had the grip of a lumberjack.

  "Have a seat," he said to her, snatching up the navy blazer that had been thrown across the chair nearest his desk. "The air-conditioning's on the fritz again. Historic building, lousy systems," he explained. "It's like a sauna in here, I know; sorry about that."

  Laura was glad to hear that she wasn't the only one feeling the heat.

  Nerdy, geeky, skinny Kendall Barclay. What happened? From his squared jaw to his broad, easy grin, he was nothing—nothing!—like the kid who'd gone to her school. She had to force herself not to stare at the new and improved version of him, so she glanced around the room as if she were considering making an offer on its contents, leaving her sister to open with whatever small talk she could scrape together.

  In a scarily eager voice, Corinne said, "Y'know ... I remember back when the outside of the bank was mustard-colored! But ... I like the red much better!"

  "Thanks for your vote," Barclay said amiably. "After my father died and I took over his desk, I thought it would be useful to do something dramatic—but not too dramatic—to announce it. A color change was all I dared," he added with a wry smile. "I dropped the idea of building a new facility; Chepaquit would never have stood for it. Hence today's sauna."

  "Oh, that's all right; we'd rather sweat buckets and have our old bank," Corinne quipped, and then slapped her hand over her mouth, obviously afraid that she'd already said something wrong.

  Still smiling, Barclay said smoothly, "I assume that you'd like to keep things just the way they are, as well. Keep the nursery a nursery, in other words."

  "Yes! And we're doing that, only better. You should see the main shop now. Laura has a real gift. She just ... well! If you could just see ... it's nothing like ... everywhere you look, it's just so really, really ... full," she said, slowing down but nowhere near a halt. "We've never looked like that before. Ever! I don't know why. Maybe because we were there so long and couldn't really step back and see. Because you have to have a fresh eye, and Laura went off—I mean, she didn't really run off, that's not what I meant, it's more like she just moved—and when she came back, well, she just had a really, really ... fresh ... eye."

  She looked ready to burst into tears.

  Yikes.

  "What I think my sister recognizes is that my brother and I have brought a huge amount of enthusiasm with us to revitalize the nursery," Laura said in a monumental lie. "We have an excellent facility, a perfect location, and we're a brand name in the area." (They were more like a branded name, but never mind.) "All Shore Gardens really needs," she said, "is some simple updating. And then it'll be a landmark facility."

  "It's interesting to hear you say that. I've been wondering what would happen now that Mr. Shore has ... passed on," Barclay said, using the old-fashioned phrase.

  It annoyed Laura. Did he think they didn't understand that all living things died? They worked in a nursery, for crying out loud. They could handle the word "die."

  Turning to Corinne, he said, "I thought maybe you'd be feeling overwhelmed, having so much responsibility now. I didn't realize that your brother and your sister were both returning to help you run the business."

  Back to Laura he came, with brows upraised in mild query.

  Ah, shit. Was he just calling her bluff?

  "Well, we're here for the foreseeable future, anyway," she said pleasantly. A month was foreseeable enough for her.

  She was impatient with their back-and-forthing. If Kendall Barclay was going to kick them out on their butts, she'd rather it were sooner than later. Still in a breezy tone, she said, "We have absolutely no problem generating enough income for the day-to-day running of the business."

  The statement made Corinne's eyes pop open, but she was smart enough to keep her mouth shut.

  Laura crossed one leg over the other, batted her eyes at the man, and gave him a hint of an ironic smile.

  He knew why they were there, obviously, and he was waiting for them to b
eg. Well, too bad. She'd rather show him her knees than fall on them.

  She continued. "There's just one thing that we haven't quite got on top of yet."

  "The loan from Great River Finance?"

  Aha! So he was aware of it. She knew it: he was in cahoots with them.

  "How did you know about the loan?" Corinne blurted.

  Barclay didn't flinch. In fact, his smile seemed completely sympathetic, which Laura also found annoying.

  "Can I speak candidly?" he asked.

  Corinne nodded almost violently, and he said, "Great River is what's known in the bank business as a predatory lender. We were aware a few years ago that they were going literally from door to door on properties that—I'll be frank—looked as if they could use cash. They offered easy credit but brutal terms.

  "Since that time, several properties in the area have defaulted and have had their loans called in. A couple of the owners have come to us to bail them out; but one or two of them just gave up and surrendered their holdings. I wish they hadn't," he added.

  I'll bet, thought Laura. "And yet," she said grimly, "you denied my father a loan when he came to you for one."

  Barclay leaned back in his chair and locked his blue gaze on hers. "Yes. I did. I had no choice. Your father refused to have his property appraised, a formality that was required for any loan to be approved."

  "Why would he refuse something like that?" asked Corinne, dumbfounded.

  Barclay shrugged with his eyebrows. "He was offended that I even dared ask, I think. He lit into me and then stormed out of here."

  "My father? Not possible," Laura said dryly.

  Barclay's tone was just as dry as he said, "My assistant remembers the day not fondly, but well. As do the tellers. And the security guard."

  "I'm sorry," said poor Corinne, bowing her head.

  He laughed softly and said, "Good Lord, why? You're not the one who threatened to blow up the bank and teach us all a lesson."