FIVE

When she walked back into the barn, Ray was cursing.

“What’s wrong?” Candy asked.

But he didn’t have to answer. She saw the problem instantly-he had put the hinges on backwards, so the sides of the booth folded the wrong way.

“I’m sorry, Miss Candy,” he said, his eyes bright with held-back tears and his hands trembling. “I just got ahead of myself and wasn’t thinking.”

Candy sighed and set the basket of eggs on a sideboard. “It’s okay, Ray. Come on, I’ll help you fix it.”

Working together, they unscrewed the hinges and got the sides on the right way. Then, while Ray set to work on the shelves on the back of the front piece, Candy took up Ray’s hammer to nail brackets onto the ends of the crossbeams, so they could be easily attached to the tops of the side pieces.

Candy wasn’t the handiest person on the planet, and she swung the hammer wildly at the nails, missing the flat heads more than a few times and swearing under her breath as she pounded away. But she got the damned nails down into the damned wood without hitting herself on the thumb or fingers, which was good enough for her.

She had two of the brackets on and was reaching for a third when she realized Ray wasn’t doing anything. Looking up, she saw that he was frozen, staring at her.

Her brows knitted together in annoyance. “What’s wrong now?” she asked crossly.

Ray pointed. “M-myy… m-myy… my hammer.”

Not understanding, Candy looked down at the tool she held in her hand. “Yeah, what about it?”

It took Ray a moment to speak. “It’s… it’s brand new.”

He was right about that. He must have just bought it at Gumm’s Hardware Store in town. It had a red fiberglass handle with a black cushion grip and a polished claw head that looked as if it had never been used-except by her just now. She noticed that she had scarred the head in a few places and nicked the handle.

“Oh,” she said as understanding dawned on her. “Guess I am being a little rough with it, huh?” She rose, crossed to Ray, and held it out to him. “Here.”

He took the hammer gingerly in his fingers, practically cradling it, as if he were afraid it would snap in half if he held it too tightly.

Candy looked around the barn. “I think Doc’s got an old hammer around here I can use.” It took her a few moments to find it, but soon she was back at work. As she nailed on the last few brackets, she looked up to see that Ray had wrapped the red-handled hammer in a white cloth, placed it back in his toolbox, and had taken out another one, older and well used. He apparently had no intention of using his shiny new hammer any more that day.

In another twenty minutes or so they were done. Candy stepped back to admire their handiwork. “Thanks, Ray,” she said, hands on her hips. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”

After that, things got really awkward. With the booth done, Candy tried to shoo Ray on his way so she could finish up the banner and the other things that needed to be done. But he seemed reluctant to leave.

It took him a full ten minutes to pack up his tools while Candy paced about impatiently. After that he hemmed and hawed in the driveway, talking about the weather, about the folks in town, about fishing, about anything he could think of to delay the inevitable.

Candy couldn’t help glancing at her watch, feeling the press of time. Finally, as gently as she could, she said, “Ray, I’ve got a lot to finish up to get ready for the festival tomorrow. Thanks again for helping with the booth.”

“Um, sure thing, Miss Candy.” He paused a moment, his gray eyes shifting. “Can I help you with anything else? I got some spare time today.”

“Today’s not a good day. Maybe next week when things calm down, okay?”

“Doc said something this morning about fixing the banister. He said some of the spindles were loose.”

“I’ll have him give you a call and we’ll set something up. You’ll send us the bill for today, right? And, um, I’ll buy you a new hammer if you want. I didn’t mean to nick up that one with the red handle.”

He nodded absently but still he hesitated, looking down at his steel-toed boots, kicking at a stone. Finally he set his jaw firm, as if he had made up his mind about something. He looked up at her.

“Miss Candy,” he said with great seriousness, “would you go out with me some day?”

“What?” The word came out as sort of a bark, surprising even Candy. She was a little embarrassed by her outburst, but the look on Ray’s face never wavered. He had put the question out there. Now she had to answer it.

“Ray,” she began softly, “you’re a wonderful person and all, and one of these days you’re going to meet some lucky woman…”

She came to an abrupt stop when she saw the look in his eyes change. The sense of hopefulness that had been there a moment before turned wary, protective, as if he were bracing for the rejection he knew was to come.

Candy hesitated. What could she say to him without hurting his feelings? Her body relaxed a little as the tension seemed to leak out of her. She hadn’t realized she had been holding herself so stiffly.

“Oh, Ray…” Finally, impulsively, she took a step toward him and kissed him lightly on the cheek. “I’ll think about it, okay?” she said as she heard a car horn beep.

They both turned. Coming up the lane was an old red Volvo, driven by a balding, distinguished-looking gentleman with a white handlebar moustache.

“Oh, it’s Herr Georg!” Candy called happily, waving. She pronounced his name the German way, the way he liked it pronounced-gay-org.

Georg Wolfsburger was a German immigrant who had lived in Cape Willington for nearly three decades-and, in truth, he helped put the sleepy coastal town on the culinary map with his Black Forest Bakery, a quaint little shop nestled between a bookstore and a coffee shop on Main Street. Though patrons could always find scrumptious breads and cookies at Georg’s bakery, they came mostly for his specialties-cakes and pastries baked from old German recipes.

His blueberry strudel was to die for, and the cherry, blueberry, and especially chocolate cheesecakes were heavenly. Brides-to-be and their mothers came from as far away as Boston and Connecticut to purchase Herr Georg’s towering wedding cakes, and cars with license plates from such distant and exotic places as New York, New Jersey, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, even Colorado and California could be found parked in front of Georg’s shop throughout the summer and well into the fall.

Georg and Candy had struck up a friendship soon after she moved to Blueberry Acres. In season, Georg bought pounds and pounds of fresh blueberries from her, and she often helped out in his shop during busy periods. He had even helped her perfect the recipes for her muffins, scones, and pies, offering up a secret ingredient for each one-olive oil in the muffins, for instance, or a touch of vanilla in the scones. She still would not reveal these secret ingredients to anyone else, including (or perhaps especially) her father. Doc had many positive traits, but discretion was not one of them.

Herr Georg brought the old Volvo to a stop in a roiling cloud of dust and climbed out of the car, carrying a pink pastry box. “Guten tag, Candy!” he called with a wave as he joined them. “Hullo, Ray,” he added with a polite nod.

“Afternoon, Mr. George,” Ray responded in a guarded fashion. He followed the lead of many of the locals, who refused to use the German pronunciation of Herr Georg’s name, believing that if he lived in America, he should be referred to as an American would be.

Georg appeared not to notice, though he immediately turned his back to Ray, focusing his attention on Candy. “I’ve brought something special I just took out of the oven, and I couldn’t wait to show it to you,” he said in an accented voice as he held up the pastry box. “Could I perhaps tempt you with a little afternoon delight?”