Grace in Autumn (28 page)

Moving slowly, she walked back to the counter and methodically creamed the shortening, added salt and sugar, then picked up an egg. She cracked the shell on the edge of the counter, then watched the white stream toward the bowl as she held the yolk in the broken half-shell. Let the unimportant drift away, and keep what is good. And what had Zuriel said? That she had been richly blessed with Georgie. That Georgie's soul was worth more than earthly riches . . . and that she had become blind to his value.

Utterly ridiculous. Of course she knew her son was worth more than anything on earth. She'd endured sixteen hours of labor to bring him into the world, and she'd gladly endure whatever she must to keep him in the world. She'd give her life for him, her time, her energy . . . She dropped the yolk into the mixing bowl as her thoughts drifted to the puffin paintings. Had her actions of late given Zuriel the impression that she cared more for things than for her beloved son?

Surely not. Everything she did—from the meals she prepared to the puffin-based budget she had designed— she did to benefit her husband and son. Anyone who knew her could see that she was a loving, dedicated mother.

With a quick, sharp motion, she tossed the eggshell into the garbage. She had more important things to think about than Zuriel's well-intentioned words. She needed to make dishes for her family and Olympia's and give serious consideration to Thanksgiving dinner.

After mixing a double batch of her famous blueberry gingerbread, Babette poured the mix into two square pans, sprinkled the top of the batter with sugar, then slid each pan into the oven. After setting the oven timer for sixty minutes, she crossed the kitchen and picked up the telephone. She paused before dialing Frenchman's Fairest, wondering if a midnight call might be ill-advised.

Surely not. With a death in the house, someone was bound to be awake. Olympia or Caleb would be calling the minister, arranging for the funeral director to pick up the body, and overseeing the thousand details one had to consider after someone died.

She dialed the number, then leaned back against the counter as the phone rang. When no one answered on the first or second ring, she considered hanging up, but then a sleepy voice answered: “Hello?”

Babette recognized the voice of Annie Cuvier, Olympia and Edmund's niece.

“Hi, honey.” Babette lowered her voice to a sympathetic whisper. “I heard the news. Is your aunt okay?”

“Aunt Olympia?” Annie's voice rose in pitch. “Shouldn't she be?”

“Well—” Babette hesitated. Was it possible Caleb and Olympia were keeping the news from Annie? Of course not, the girl was a grown woman. But she was behaving as if she didn't have a clue about what had happened under her own roof.

“Let me speak to Caleb, honey,” Babette said, injecting a note of assurance into her voice. The old butler would know what to do. He knew everything that happened in Frenchman's Fairest.

Annie yawned audibly. “I think he's asleep.”

“I'm pretty sure he's awake.” Babette forced a note of steel into her voice. Maybe Annie was in shock or denial, and she needed someone to be firm with her. “Just go wake him up, okay?”

The phone dropped to a desk or some other hard surface, and a full three minutes passed before Babette heard anything. Then Annie said, “Caleb's not here! He's not in his bed!”

“What about your aunt?”

“Just a minute, she was sleeping in Uncle Edmund's room . . .”

The phone dropped again, then Babette heard the heavy thumping of bare feet upon a wooden floor. A longer silence followed, then a heartrending wail split the static humming in Babette's ear.

Slowly, she lowered the phone back into the cradle.

Annie hadn't known.

She had obviously gone to her uncle's room to find Olympia and Caleb, then had discovered what Zuriel already knew—Edmund was gone.

To heaven, Z said.

Babette slid into her chair at the kitchen table and brought her thumb to her mouth, clicking the edge of her thumbnail against her teeth as she considered the impossible.

Sleep, when it finally came to Babette, did not bring rest. She dreamed of working in her kitchen, her mixing bowl filled with mud instead of dough, the warmth in her kitchen radiating from Zuriel's kiln instead of her oven. The potter himself sat at her kitchen table, and his electric wheel occupied the center space usually filled with flowers and salt-and-pepper shakers.

Zuriel did not speak in her dream but waited patiently for her to supply the clay. Bewildered by the stiff mud around her wooden spoon, she handed the bowl to him without a word, then watched as he pulled living, pliant clay from the glass.

Babette had watched Zuriel work at his wheel before, so she wasn't surprised when he centered and rounded the clay with scarcely any effort. In the dream, however, his hands seemed to flutter over the spinning earth with a lightning quick touch. When the wheel slowed and stopped spinning, she saw that the piece was not a bowl, but an image—a softly sculptured, deftly molded statue of Georgie.

“But why not a jar?” she asked, marveling at the lifelike creases around the little boy's smile. “The tourists like the stoneware jars. I don't know if I'll ever be able to sell this statue.”

Zuriel looked at her then, but something in his appearance had subtly altered. The man sitting there still wore Zuriel's shaggy brown hair and beard, but the eyes were brighter and wiser, scanning her own as if they could see down into her heart and fathom every secret of her soul. “Jars of clay are nothing special,” he said, his voice crashing over her with the force of a rogue wave. “Their only purpose is to draw attention to what they contain.”

Blinking, she stared at the statue, which seemed to breathe and tremble with life. The potter brought his hand up, extended his thumb, and deftly smoothed a watery streak from the statue's cheek.

Babette felt her heart twist. A tear?

“What,” she asked, searching for some purpose in the beautiful object before her, “is this designed to contain? There's no opening, so it can't be a vase. There's no slot, so it can't hold coins.”

“Not coins.” The potter's hand dropped and gently covered hers. “This clay holds something far more precious.”

“What?”

The potter—who, though he wore Zuriel's splotchy overalls and Zuriel's face, definitely was
not
Zuriel—gave her a heart-stopping smile. “This clay, stamped with the image of God, houses the priceless soul of a child. And soon, if you are faithful, it may contain the Spirit of God himself.”

Silence settled upon her kitchen, a heavy absence of sound that seemed to leave her in a vacuum, without oxygen, without thought, without sense. Babette fought to breathe in the empty air, struggled to find some meaning in this man and what he'd created in her kitchen. Finally, just as the world went black, she closed her eyes and gasped out the only words her tongue could form: “What do you mean?”

When she opened her eyes, she saw nothing but the quiet shadows of her bedroom, the clock on the nightstand, and a fringe of daylight around the window shade.

It had been a dream, nothing more.

Breathing deeply, she turned to face the sleeping mound of her husband, who snored in the gentle rhythm of the ticking clock in the hall.

If she could get back to sleep, she'd forget everything.

If she could sleep.

Chapter Twelve

B
y daybreak, the news of Edmund's passing had begun to spread through Heavenly Daze. Charles heard the news from Babette, who said she'd heard it from Zuriel. As Charles stepped out to get the newspaper at the ferry landing, he met Pastor Wickam, who had just come from Frenchman's Folly. “They're all doing fine over there,” Winslow said, buttoning his jacket against the cold. “Olympia's upset, of course, but mainly because she fell asleep sitting up with Edmund last night. She keeps insisting she wanted to kiss him good-bye.”

“Annie's home?” Charles asked.

Winslow nodded. “She's a big comfort to Olympia, as is Caleb. He's the calm in the middle of the storm right now. Dr. Marc is handling all the funeral arrangements, and I'm to do the service. I think we'll have the service on Saturday.”

“If it's just us Heavenly Daze folks—,” Charles began.

The pastor interrupted him. “It won't be just islanders. Seems like everybody in the State of Maine knew and loved Edmund, and they'll all want to come pay their respects. We'll have standing room only at the church.”

Charles thought of the two blueberry gingerbreads on his kitchen counter—Babette said she made an extra to share with the de Cuviers. Birdie and Bea and Cleta would undoubtedly make something, too, so the folks at Frenchman's Folly would soon have enough food to feed a crowd. A good thing, apparently.

“Anything we can do, Pastor?” Charles asked the question out of politeness, for he knew the women would gather around Olympia and Annie like mother hens gathering in stray chicks. Though Olympia was known for her prickly, independent nature, he didn't think she'd resist comfort at this time in her life.

A resigned smile crossed Winslow's face. “Don't think there's much to be done. They were expecting this, of course, but it still hurts. I imagine they'll have to sorrow until the pain goes away. The visitors will help. Edmund was a generous and kind man, and lots of folks thought well of him.”

The welcoming blast of the ferry boat sounded over the harbor, and both men turned toward the sea. “'Bout time,” Charles said, checking his watch. “Cap'n Stroble's running a little late this morning.”

“Aren't we all.” Winslow glanced over his shoulder. “Good to see you, Charles. Say hello to the family for me.”

“I will.”

As Charles inadvertently let the storm door slam behind him, the sound seemed unusually loud. After crossing the foyer and entering the kitchen, he understood why: Babette and Georgie were at the table eating cereal, but an unnatural silence prevailed in the room. Though Georgie appeared to be absorbed in the back of his cereal box, Charles doubted that anything written on a Frosty Flakes package could hold his son's attention for sixty seconds, let alone several minutes.

Dropping the newspaper on the table, he reached out and scrubbed his son's tousled head. “Morning, kiddo.”

Georgie grunted but didn't lift his gaze from the cereal box. Charles glanced at Babette, who merely shrugged one shoulder, then leaned forward to riffle through the paper in her search for the lifestyles section.

Sighing, Charles poured himself a bowl of milk, heated it for thirty seconds in the microwave, then filled the bowl with Nuts 'n Flakes. He had just taken his seat when Georgie hopped up, dumped his cereal bowl in the sink, and dashed upstairs.

“He's still peeved at me,” Babette said, her gaze meeting Charles's over the edge of her newspaper. “He thinks I'm going to make him paint puffins.”

“Are you?”

Her smile seemed sad. “Not today.”

Charles picked up the sports section and scanned the headlines.

“Charles,” Babette's hand appeared at the top of the page and pulled it down, “do you believe God speaks to us in dreams?”

The corner of his mouth twisted. “Good grief, Babs, at breakfast?”

He was about to lift the paper again, but something in her expression stopped him. “I need to know,” she whispered, her blue eyes piercing the distance between them. “I had a dream last night, and I think it might have been more than a dream.”

Resigning himself to the fact that he would not be allowed to read his paper, Charles folded the sports section and set it aside. “What did you dream?”

Looking away, she brought her hands to her temples, rubbing them as if the memory pained her. “I was here, in the kitchen, making clay. Zuriel—at least, I think it was Z—made a little statue of Georgie on the potter's wheel. There was more, but I can't remember all the details.”