The Mulberry Tree Read online

  Feeling as though she was prying, she tiptoed to the desk and looked at it. On a purple pad was a mouse, but it had no cord to it. Guess he didn’t hook it up after all, she thought as she lifted the mouse and idly rolled the ball on the bottom of it. Then, to her disbelief, the computer started making noise and sprang to life. “What have I done now?” she said under her breath.

  “Nothing. It was just on sleep mode,” Matt said from behind her.

  Bailey put her hand to her chest in fright. “You startled me.”

  “I guess gardening relaxes you, but computers make you nervous.”

  “I didn’t think it was hooked up, but it came on.”

  “It’s a cordless mouse, and when you touched it, the computer came back into active mode,” he said, but he just stood there, not moving toward her or the machine.

  It took Bailey a moment to realize that he was waiting for her to step away from the computer. Obviously, he wasn’t going to get too near her. And no wonder, with the way she’d rebuffed him last night!

  “About last night,” she began slowly, looking down at her hands. “I—”

  “I owe you an apology,” he said. “Sometimes my humor can get a little crude.”

  “No!” Bailey said quickly. “It’s me who was at fault. It’s just that—” She took a deep breath. “You can’t go from sixteen years of faithfulness to what seems like adultery in just a few weeks. At least, I don’t seem able to.”

  “You don’t have to explain anything to me. I know what it’s like to lose people. You name a method, and I’ve lost someone that way, and however you lose them, it’s hard on the survivor.” He smiled at her. “I have a proposition.”

  His words made Bailey feel better. Although she’d met other people in Calburn, Matt was the closest she had to a friend. “The last one of your propositions took over my house,” she said, returning his smile.

  Matt grinned at her, and the awkwardness between them vanished. “Okay, you’re right, but this time my proposition is that we lighten up. You make jokes, I make jokes, and we stay friends. No pressure to be more. Deal?” He held out his hand for her to shake.

  Instantly, she took his hand in hers, gave a firm shake, then released her grip. “It’s a deal. Now, about the attic. I don’t remember agreeing to your taking over the whole thing.”

  “You want me to show you how to log on to the Internet?”

  “Matthew, you’re not listening to me.”

  “No, I’m listening, but I’m ignoring you. There’s a difference,” he said, his eyes fastened onto the screen.

  “I was planning to use the attic space for my business.”

  “And what business is that?”

  “I’m going to . . . Well, I haven’t really figured that out yet. Not all of it, anyway.” She squared her shoulders and tried to take the hesitancy out of her voice. “But when I do decide, I’ll need the attic.”

  “You’ll need a computer, too, so you can use mine.” He was moving the mouse around on the pad and clicking it.

  “But what if you’re using the computer when I need it?”

  “I have a laptop, and besides, I thought you didn’t know how to use a computer.”

  “I don’t, but I can learn.”

  “Before or after you decide what you’re going to do to earn a living?”

  “Before. No, after. No, I mean . . . ” She looked at him. “Do you have any idea what I could do to support myself—besides starting a canning factory, that is? I have no training of any kind, no education to speak of, and I’m sure I’d never be good at working for anyone. I’ve had too many years of independence. Any ideas?”

  “I think that whatever you do should have something to do with food. Ever thought of writing cookbooks?”

  “Now there’s an idea,” she said. “How long has it been since you’ve been inside a bookstore? There are thousands of cookbooks out there. I need something to do on a regular basis.”

  Matt stood up from the computer, put his hands on Bailey’s shoulders, and looked into her eyes. “You have recently been widowed after a long-term marriage. Give yourself some time. You need to heal a bit first, then you can make big decisions about what to do with your life.”

  His words made sense to her, and for a moment she had to work hard not to lean her head against his shoulder and let him hold her. “I guess you’re right.”

  “You know what I thought we’d do today?”

  Some part of her thought she should protest that “we,” but she couldn’t do it. She didn’t want to spend the day alone. She didn’t want to stay in the ugly house by herself and look up at every sound and think it was Jimmie coming home. “What?” she asked, and her mind filled with what he could possibly suggest. Something romantic? Sexy?

  “Buy a lawn mower.” Matt looked puzzled when Bailey laughed. “You don’t think you need a lawn mower?”

  “Of course I do. It’s just that—” She waved her hand in dismissal. “Never mind. How about breakfast, then we go buy a lawn mower?”

  “Sounds good to me,” Matt said as he turned back to look at the computer screen.

  At the head of the stairs, Bailey paused to look back at him. He was a nice man, she thought. He was a good man, kind and thoughtful. And he was easy to live with. Smiling, she went downstairs and pulled out a bag of buckwheat flour to start making pancakes.

  “May I help you?” the salesman asked. He was young and dressed in a white shirt and khaki trousers, looking as though he meant to make manager by the time he was twenty-five.

  “I want a push mower,” Bailey said at the same moment that Matt said, “We want a riding mower.”

  “There isn’t enough lawn to justify a riding mower,” Bailey said quickly, looking at Matt.

  “It’s the repetition that makes a riding mower needed,” he said patiently. “And there’s some heavy cutting that needs to be done in the back.”

  “Then get a weed whacker with a saw attachment,” Bailey shot at him. She hadn’t spent years around professional gardeners and learned nothing.

  “You need a whacker too, but—”

  “Too?! How much do you plan on cutting?”

  “The farm is ten acres, and—”

  “And half of it is trees!”

  “Excuse me,” the clerk said loudly, interrupting them. “Could I suggest a lighter riding mower?”

  Both Bailey and Matt glared at him.

  The young man put up his hands in front of his face as though to ward off blows. “I would never get between a husband and a wife. If you two need help, call me—or a divorce lawyer,” he added as he walked off.

  Looking at each other, Bailey and Matt began to laugh.

  “Okay, sorry,” Matt said. “It’s your farm, so you decide.”

  He was so nice that he was making her feel guilty. “It’s not that I don’t want a riding mower, it’s just that I can’t afford one.”

  “How about if I buy it?”

  Bailey stiffened. “I don’t want you buying things for me. I was supported by a man before, and that’s my problem now.”

  “How about this?” Matt asked. “Why don’t you hire me to do the work, and I’ll use my own equipment?”

  “How much do you charge?” she said quickly.

  “A lot.”

  She narrowed her eyes at him. “How much?”

  “You have to get my sister-in-law off my back.”

  “What are you up to?”

  Matt gave her a crooked grin. “Patsy’s big on family. She has these family get-togethers, and she . . . ” He trailed off.

  “She what?”

  “She’s going to skin me alive if I don’t take you with me when I go.”

  For a moment Bailey considered what he was saying. He was, of course, making it up about his “charge.” What he was really doing was offering to pay for the lawn mower and do the work for free. “In other circumstances I wouldn’t agree, but since Opal told me you were paying Patsy seven-fifty for rent and me o