Page 14 of Guarded by My Gargoyle

“You’ll drown,” Flora said, stealing a hushpuppy. Today’s sweatshirt was white with an enormous sunflower down one side and BE A GROW-ER NOT A SHOW-ER down the other. “You can’t be up to your elbows in brambles on the far side of that wall and behind the counter selling geraniums to Mrs. Pettimore at the same time. You need help in the shop.”

“I can’t afford help.”

“You can afford it if the mountain of money behind that wall is paying you by the hour to crawl through his shrubbery.”

“I’m not spending his money on my staff.”

“You’re spending your money,” Flora said, “which you are earning from him by doing a job. That’s not charity, dear. That’s a business expanding. You do know that’s allowed?”

She opened her mouth and found she didn’t have a good answer for that.

“There’s the Suggs girl,” Sylvie suggested. “Junie. She’s nineteen, and she finished a year at the ag college over in Asheville and decided she’d rather learn it with her hands. She’s been driving her mother crazy ever since. We’re distantly related and she knows a hydrangea from a hole in the ground. She’d take a few afternoons a week, more if it works out.”

“See?” Flora flashed her sharp little teeth. “The universe provides. I provide. Same thing, mostly.”

Rona arrived at the table in her pink uniform, put the catfish down, refilled the tea pitcher, and was gone.

Flora stole another hushpuppy. “I heard Garrick gave you the key code. On the very first day.”

“It was a practical solution,” she said, praying she wasn’t blushing.

“That’s not a male being practical, dear. That’s a male making a nest and hoping you’ll wander in.”

“It’s a large, complicated project. Practicality is essential.”

“So is a nest,” Flora said, entirely untroubled. “Has he opened up the gate in the wall yet?”

“No. Why would he?”

“To make it easier to reach you, of course.”

Flora waggled her eyebrows suggestively and was gone before Maris could come up with a retort.

“She’s impossible,” she muttered.

“She’s Flora,” Sylvie said, as if it explained everything. In Fairhaven Falls, it did.

“She means well,” a new voice added, and Maris looked up to find a slender, red-headed woman with a diaper bag over one shoulder and a baby on the opposite hip. “I don’t think we’ve been formally introduced, although I’ve seen you around town of course. I’m Robin and this is Birdie.”

Birdie had a fistful of her mother’s auburn hair and an expression of deep suspicion that she turned immediately on the plate.

“Have a seat,” Sylvie offered, and Robin sank into it with a grateful sigh, settling Birdie on her knee. She gave Maris a friendly smile, and Maris smiled back, liking her immediately.

“What did I miss?” Robin asked.

“Flora’s pairing Maris off to Garrick,” Sylvie said.

“Oh, yes. I saw that in the newsletter.” Robin snagged a hushpuppy and pinched a soft crumb off it for Birdie, who accepted it like a queen accepting tribute. “I kept house for him for the better part of a year. You want the inside scoop?”

“No,” she said. “What newsletter?”

“He works all the time,” Robin said, ignoring the question. “There’s a room at the end of the west corridor that he wouldn’t let me enter. He restored the whole library himself and I caught him in there one evening just standing, not doing anything. Looking up at it.” She fed Birdie another crumb. “He’s the loneliest male I’ve ever met and he’d rather chew glass than say so.”

Her chest suddenly ached. Down on the river a boat motor coughed and caught. Birdie mashed her crumb against her cheek and looked pleased with the result.

“He’s not lonely,” she said finally. “He’s got a company and a mansion and hundreds of employees.”

“Sure.” Robin gave her a sympathetic smile. “And you’ve got a shop and a son and a whole town that likes you. Doesn’t stop you spending the evening alone after Toby’s down, does it?”