He seemed to have recalled where he was standing and in what stage of undress. “Beg your pardon, Miss Grant.” He started to back up. “Flora’s coming over for oats tomorrow … well, this morning. Can you ruin some more porridge?”
“Mr. Bowden, this is a strange conversation,” she said with a laugh. “I will ruin some more porridge.”
He gave her such a grin then, the boyish kind she had seen earlier. He gave her a salute, turned on his bare heels, and walked back across the street. She watched him go. If he was going to caper nearly naked in the street at midnight, she might have to suggest flannel.
Or not.
Chapter 18
Douglas came across the streetin the morning for breakfast, fully clothed. The high color on his cheeks suggested to Olive that he might have taken a good look at himself in that nightshirt and wondered if he ever dared show himself in the tearoom again. Better put him out of his misery.
He opened his mouth, probably ready to apologize, but she spoke first. “My lips are sealed, sir,” she said. “Would you like porridge or porridge?”
“I believe porridge would be best,” he replied. “Do forgive last night’s enthusiasm, but I had been wondering what to do. Will Gran require convincing?”
“Let’s find out. When breakfast is over and I have ruined sufficient porridge for Flora’s sake, let us see if Flora can put the chimes together.”
“I should find a piece of driftwood,” he said after he finished breakfast. He stood up to drink his coffee, which told Olive worlds about his busy life during the war. She wondered how many meals he ate sitting down.
“Nothing simpler. If you haven’t already noticed, it piles up against the bridge.”
He raised his cup in salute and hurried away, a far cry from the man who had walked by her place only yesterday, head down, hands clasped behind his back, dejection written everywhere except on a placard around his neck.
Feeling more optimistic than usual, Olive surprised Maeve by instructing her to add more fish to the noonday stew and be generous in slicing the loaves of bread.
Flora came into the kitchen like a breath of spring, desperation gone from her face. She came right up to Olive. “Miss Grant, I stopped to see Pudding first and she is moving around! Please may I have some more thin porridge for her?”
She handed over the penny that Douglas had surely given her and made no comment when Olive’s first batch of porridge was too thick. She ate it with no objection, likewise the second, which took longer for her to eat because she wasn’t starving today. Flora concluded breakfast with bread from Maeve, who said she hadn’t meant to slice it so thick.
Her eyes widened to see butter on the bread. Olive’s breath caught in her throat when Flora clapped her hands at the sight of butter. Olive watched, tears just below the surface, as the little girl tested it with her tongue and gave a small sigh. Olive decided that tomorrow there would be eggs, although what excuse she could give for them escaped her at the moment. Deformed yolks? Three minutes instead of four? Olive took a page from the surgeon’s book and decided she would think about it later. No sense in rushing into prevarication. Perhaps a good fib was like fine wine and needed to age.
“I nearly forgot,” Flora said as she waited for Olive to spoon Pudding’s thin gruel into a can. She darted outside and returned with a piece of driftwood. “Mr. Bowden wanted you to see this.”
She held it out and Olive took it, turning the nicely weathered wood over in her hands. “Brilliant.”
“I don’t understand,” Flora said. “He wants you to come with me, and that it is all he would say.”
“Very well, Flora. I have a little time before I must start luncheon.”
They were almost out the door when the greengrocer stopped by with a basket of onions, leeks, and potatoes. Olive took a moment to savor the happiness in the man’s eyes, even though he appeared to need sleep. He looked like a new father.
He held the basket out to her. “I paid Mr. Bowden, but I wanted to do this too. Since he’s eating here, he said you should have it, Miss Grant.”
She took it with thanks, mentally adding more potatoes to the as-yet-unmade luncheon, which in a stroke went from fish soup to fish stew.
He held out a smaller basket, this one with eggs nestled in oats so they would not crack. “And here are these.”
“I appreciate your kindness,” Olive said simply. After the greengrocer left, she took the food past Maeve and into the pantry. She touched the eggs, pleased to see two brown ones.I can tell Flora tomorrow that people would rather eat white eggs than brown ones, she thought.
Douglas met them in the waiting room. He had carried Pudding’s box into the room, where kitten watched them with interest.
“I have to keep several layers of bandage on that limb because Pudding licks it,” Douglas said. “Thank the Almighty that none of my Royal Navy patients licked their sutures.”
Flora laughed out loud, which made Douglas smile. When Flora turned her attention to Pudding, he leaned toward Olive. “What would you wager that she has not laughed like that in ages?”
“I never wager,” she replied, struck again at the great care Douglas took of his patients, and their owners in this case.
While Flora made certain her pet licked the porridge instead, Douglas enlisted Olive to help him. “I have drilled holes in the shells of appropriate size, and here is my spool of catgut. Did you like that piece of driftwood?”
