Amazing Gracie

Gracie grinned. “Thanks.”

“You need anything else, just holler. I’ll check on your coffee now and again.”

It was three cups of coffee later, just as Gracie was beginning to get a worrisome caffeine buzz, when the man who turned out to be Johnny Payne ambled in. He headed for the counter, only to be waylaid by the waitress and directed toward Gracie. He was tall and raw-boned with a flushed complexion, liberal gray in his once-brown hair and a twinkle in his hazel eyes.

“Mr. Payne?” Gracie guessed when he stood beside her table, his hands shoved in the pockets of his chinos. Christmas-red suspenders held them up.

“Yes, ma’am, that would be me. What can I do for you?”

“Sit down, if you have a minute. I don’t want to keep you from your breakfast.”

“Not me,” he said, and pulled out a chair. “I had breakfast at home an hour ago. I come in here to fuel up on coffee and gossip.”

“Well, I certainly won’t keep you from having your coffee. As for the gossip, I’ll try not to keep you from that for too long, either.”

He grinned at her. “Not to worry. Nothing much happens around here anyway, leastways nothing that’s more exciting than a pretty stranger asking about property. That is what you wanted to see me about, isn’t it?”

“It is. I’m looking for a summer rental.”

“On the river?”

“Absolutely.”

“Big or small?”

“Small will do.”

He looked her over, his expression thoughtful. “You mind investing a little elbow grease?”

“Not at all.” It would keep her mind off of the decisions that had to be made.

He gave a brief nod of satisfaction, as if she’d just passed some sort of test. “I’ve got just the place. Owner died a few years back and his kids don’t give a hoot about the house. Can’t seem to agree about selling it, either. In the meantime, it’s for rent. Won’t suit just anybody because of its size. Two bedrooms, a big kitchen, and a living room. Most folks want the Taj Majal in the summer, so they can fill the place with everyone from back home they were trying to get away from. You know what I mean?”

Actually, she had no idea. She’d taken only one real vacation in her entire life—to this town, as a matter of fact. She nodded just the same.

“Anyway, the price is negotiable depending on how long you want it for and how much work you’re willing to put in yourself to clean it up and save me calling in a maid service.” At Gracie’s surprised look, he chuckled. “That would be my wife. She’d be mighty happy to let someone else chase the mice away for a change.”

Gracie swallowed hard and reminded herself she wasn’t at Worldwide anymore. “There are mice?”

“Not so many now that the weather’s warming up. Once you sweep away the dust bunnies and get to stirring around inside, the last of ’em will go.”

“I certainly hope so,” she muttered. “When can you show it to me?”

“Now’s as good a time as any, I suppose. You have a car with you?”

“I left it at the hotel.”

“Then you can ride with me. I’ll stop by the office and pick up the keys.”

Gracie wasn’t sure what she’d expected, someplace ramshackle and neglected, probably. At any rate, it wasn’t the tidy little white cottage with the Wedgwood-blue shutters and sprawling porch across the front. A pair of white rockers had been upended on the porch. That was all she needed.

“I’ll take it,” she said at once.

“You haven’t even been inside yet,” Johnny Payne protested.

“Okay, maybe you’re right. Maybe I was being impulsive, but this is exactly what I was looking for.”

“Miss, if you don’t mind me saying so, you must not do much negotiating.”

If only he knew, Gracie thought. She’d handled more tough negotiations in recent years than Johnny Payne probably had in his lifetime. “I’ve done my share,” she said modestly. “I just don’t believe in playing games once I’ve made up my mind about something.”

“And you want this house?”

“I do.”

He shrugged. “Then let’s see how many mice took up residence this winter before we settle on the details.”

The details were a snap. The asking price was so reasonable, Gracie saw no reason to argue about it, though Johnny Payne looked a little disappointed when she didn’t.

By nightfall, Gracie had swept and vacuumed and dusted away cobwebs. She’d left the windows open to the cool April breeze off the water. More than once she’d slipped outside to sit on the porch for just a minute and take in the view of the wide, wide Potomac with the Maryland shore in the distance and a peek at the banks of Robert E. Lee’s birthplace, Stratford Hall, off to one side.

After dinner, her muscles aching and her clothes and hair an untidy wreck, she took her cup of herbal tea onto the porch for one last time. An unfamiliar feeling stole over her as she sat there with the sky darkening and the waves lapping on the narrow patch of beach across the street. She felt at peace. Worldwide Hotels and Maximillian Devereaux were very far away. She could almost imagine a time when neither would so much as enter her thoughts.

That moment couldn’t possibly come soon enough to suit her.

2

By the end of the week Gracie had established a routine. Still up at the crack of dawn, she went for a walk along the river, always winding up at the Beachside Café for breakfast.

On her second visit, Jessie and everyone else in the place already seemed to know that she had just rented the Taylor place on the waterfront. They knew she wasn’t from the area and that she planned to stay at least through summer.

“I’m surprised they haven’t nailed down my credit rating,” she commented to Jessie, laughing at the accuracy and thoroughness of the waitress’s report.

“Oh, Johnny has that, too, I’m sure, but there are some things he manages to keep to himself.” She eyed Gracie with curiosity. “Why here? You look like a big-city girl to me. I’ll bet you don’t even own a pair of jeans.”

That was true enough, but Gracie decided not to confirm it. “Maybe I’ve just had a little too much of big-city living,” she said, which was the truth as far as it went.

“The fast pace’ll kill you, that’s for sure,” Jessie agreed, then peered at her thoughtfully. “Or was it a man?”

She nodded sagely, though Gracie hadn’t said a word. “It usually is, if you ask me. At the heart of any woman’s troubles there is guaranteed to be a man.”

“Not this time,” Gracie replied, even as an image of Max popped into her head. Max wasn’t a problem, not for her heart, anyway. He was just a simple pain in the neck, professionally speaking.

Unfortunately, her conversation with Jessie had stirred up the very memories she had been trying so hard to forget. Thanks to Max she was in a strange place, completely at loose ends. Listening to Jessie’s curious speculation reminded Gracie that this little sabbatical of hers would end sooner or later. What then?

Maybe thinking about the sorry state of her life and the dim prospects for her future explained why she noticed the house, the huge Victorian with its dilapidated, sagging porch and its intricate gingerbread trim. It was hidden away behind an overgrown hedge and a heavy wrought-iron gate.

Gracie figured she must have passed it half a dozen times before as she strolled along lost in thought, but this morning with the sun glistening on its fading white paint and grimy windows, it caught her eye.