Grace in Autumn Read Online Free

onto Heavenly Daze in the summer tourist season, in the winter months her poor son was the only child on the island. No wonder his best playmates were the local dogs and horses.
    â€œYou.” She tousled his brown hair. “You’re the light of my life and the root of my gray hairs.”
    His face crinkled into a questioning expression. “Whaddya mean, Mom? Your hair’s not gray.”
    â€œIt’s getting there,” she said, standing. “Give it time.” Placing her hands on his shoulders, she turned him toward the stairs. “Up to your room, young man, and no more playing outside today. I’ll be up to talk to you later.”

    Birdie Wester shivered as the back door opened and a gust of chilly wind blew into the room.
    â€œMercy!” Bea said, coming in. “I’d swear the wind’s kicking up a line storm if I didn’t know better.” She stomped snow off her feet, then slammed the door, eyeing the steaming teapot on the stove as she stripped off her gloves.
    Smiling, Birdie looked up, knitting needles poised in midair. “It isn’t fit for man or beast out there today. You must be frozen.”
    â€œLike a popsicle.” Bea took off her coat, then moved into the kitchen.
    â€œGet the mail delivered?”
    â€œAyuh.” Bea lifted a cup from the cabinet, then poured a cup of tea. “Got stuck in that rut on the corner of Main and Ferry. Floyd needs to do something about that hazard before I blow another tire.” After unwinding her scarf, she gravitated toward the fire with a cup of steaming liquid.
    Birdie sighed, settling deeper into the comfy recliner. Thank goodness her job kept her indoors.
    The sisters’ living quarters adjoined the bakery, and their home was considered one of the coziest in Heavenly Daze. After Frank Coughlin’s death, when Bea came to live with Birdie, the sisters had built an addition onto the back of the house, increasing the square footage to nine hundred square feet—more than enough for two little ladies and a small business.
    A Kodiak wood stove kept the rear sitting room as warm as toast. The bedrooms in the center of the building got a little cool during January, but Birdie added another blanket to her bed and made out quite well. And in the early morning, when Abner fired up the big oven on the other side of her bedroom wall, Birdie would stretch out and breathe in the delicious scents of baking bread and pastry . . . what a glorious way to wake up!
    The kitchen, a tiled space between the sitting room and the bedrooms, was tiny by most standards, but it held everything the sisters needed: a large white Tappan gas range, a wooden table with four chairs, and a dependable Whirlpool refrigerator. Bea brought her microwave when she came, but the sisters didn’t use it for much other than warming leftovers and making popcorn. Birdie liked her coffee perked, her tea steeped, and her meat cooked with real heat. Bea had fussed at first, having developed an unusual dependency on the appliance, but she’d adapted nicely to doing things Birdie’s way. It took just one question—“ What if that radioactive stuff leaked out?”—and Bea had agreed to use the microwave sparingly. One could never be too careful.
    A slant-roofed back porch separated the house from the wild emptiness of the northern end of the island. The sisters’ washer and dryer sat on the covered back porch, along with a fifty pound sack of birdseed, salt for melting ice, and an assortment of muddy boots and galoshes.
    â€œThere’s cream in the refrigerator,” Birdie said. She bit off a piece of thread, then tied it.
    Bea glanced at the empty plate in the center of the kitchen table. Ordinarily, it would have been filled with two of Abner’s finest pastries.
    â€œAbner running late this morning?” Bea asked.
    â€œAyuh.” Birdie got out of the recliner and adjusted the lace draperies in the