At Last (The Idle Point, Maine Stories) - By Barbara Bretton Page 0,99

on her lap. She handled her knife and fork with a distinctly European flair that had everyone showering her with compliments. Whoever had taught his daughter table manners had done a great job. Noah was prouder of her facility with a knife and fork than he was of any of his own accomplishments.

"I think we have a vegetarian in the making," Ruth observed as she placed her utensils across her plate and leaned back in her chair.

"The aunt who took care of her last year is a vegetarian." Giselle was a perfectly lovely sixty-year-old woman who didn't want the responsibility of raising her niece's child. He couldn't fault Giselle for that; her niece had felt the same way.

Sophie tugged at his sleeve. "When is the dessert?"

"First dinner, then dessert," he said.

"Even on Thanksgiving?"

"Even then."

Sophie looked across the table at Gracie. "Do you like cranberries?"

Gracie nodded. "As long as they're soaked in sugar. It's the American way."

Sophie giggled. "You put marshmallows on your potatoes."

"Candied yams." She leaned across the table and lowered her voice to a stage whisper. "Don't tell anyone but I eat ice cream cake for breakfast on my birthday."

"Really?"

"Yes, but that's after my tuna salad sandwich. First the healthy stuff, then dessert."

"You eat tuna for breakfast?" Sophie looked shocked.

"Sometimes," Gracie said. "And some nights I eat cereal for supper."

Sophie seemed downright enchanted. "When I'm grown up, I'll have trifle for breakfast every day of the week."

"You might want to mix a little protein in there," Gracie said, tapping her forehead with her index finger. "You need to keep the brain cells well-fed."

"I have a lot to think about," Sophie said and his heart did one of those little half-twists that seemed to happen every time she opened her mouth and spoke.

"Yes, you do," Gracie said. "Life is very complicated, isn't it?"

Sophie nodded. "It is!"

Sophie seemed happier and more relaxed than he had ever seen her. Gracie had a way of talking with his daughter that worked magic. She didn't condescend. She didn't patronize. She talked with Sophie the way she talked with Doctor Jim or his mother and apparently Sophie sensed the difference and responded in kind.

His mother reached over and patted his hand. "Don't worry," she said softly. "It will work itself out."

"I know," he said, but he was lying.

Chapter Sixteen

Sleeping Adamses and their friends were scattered from one end of the den to the other. Rachel and Darnell had shooed everyone out of the kitchen while they finished cleaning up and Gracie laughed as the clan beat a hasty retreat. Ben and Laquita were napping on the sofa with one of Wiley's offspring curled up between them. The football game droned on in the background but nobody seemed to be paying any attention to it. Sage, Morocco, and Joe—and their offspring—were outside playing a game of touch with two of their sisters while Cheyenne and Storm retreated to the sewing room to work on their dresses. They begged Gracie to let them do one more fitting on the pants suit Rachel was assembling for her but Gracie said if she tried it on tonight they would have to let out all of the seams.

Ruth had excused herself to go upstairs and rest. Noah and Sophie had just plain disappeared. Gracie felt restless and unsettled. The house, big as it was, felt too small to contain her emotions and she found herself craving a lonely sweep of rocky beach. How wonderful to be able to walk out a door and step onto the beach. Everyone had said she was crazy to keep a car in the city but she had needed the means to escape whenever the noise and the crowds became too much for her. Taking the subway to Coney Island or the bus to Rockaway wasn't the same as driving east through Queens, past the Elmhurst tanks and the old World's Fair, LIE to Cross Island to Southern State where she followed the signs to Jones Beach. That wide, smooth expanse of civilized sand was nothing like the unforgiving beaches of her childhood but knowing that the same ocean crashed against the shores of Idle Point soothed her soul.

She grabbed her coat from the hall closet then let herself out the back door, the one that led out into the garden. Two late roses, blood red and just beginning to unfurl, bloomed near the stairs. Beach roses used to line the path to the rocky beach by the lighthouse. Once upon a time, in another