Twice Blessed by Jo Ann Ferguson Read Free Book Online

was closed for the day. The sun had not yet set, but it was Saturday evening, and she always closed early on Saturdays. Few customers came in after mid-afternoon. Saturdays were for baths and courting. She would enjoy the former tonight, but not the latter. Thank goodness Harvey Schultz had finally gotten it through his sweet head the last time he had walked her home from practice for the village chorus that she was not interested in more than friendship.
    â€œSean?” she called.
    The boy peeked out from the storage room. The apron she had given him hung past his knees and was spotted with dust and flour and something she could not identify from where she stood. In the past two days, the boy had treated each hour as a special adventure. He was fascinated with everything in the store, and she wondered if he had ever been inside a mercantile before his arrival in Haven.
    â€œI’m here, Miss Delancy.”
    Lifting her own apron over her head, she looped it onto the peg beside the door. “Sean, I told you you may call me Emma, if you’d like.”
    â€œMy ma always said a man calls a lady ‘miss.’”
    â€œWhatever is comfortable for you.” She held out her hand for his apron.
    He untied it, then grasped at his waist. Several things hit the floor and bounced. His face blanched as she bent and picked up one of the pieces of candy.
    â€œDid you take this?” she asked.
    He nodded, grinding his toe into a space between the floorboards as he had dug it into the dirt when he stood with the sheriff in the street.
    â€œWhy, Sean?”
    â€œI like candy.”
    â€œYou could have asked for some rather than trying to sneak it out of the store.”
    â€œIt costs a whole penny for the bag!”
    She set the hard candy on the shelf next to a bolt of lace. “You’ve been working hard, Sean. If you keep helping around the store as you have, I believe you deserve a bag of candy each week.”
    â€œReally?”
    â€œYes.” She fought the tears that wanted to fill her eyes. If he saw them, he was certain to be upset. “Why don’t you pick up the candy? Don’t eat any before supper.”
    â€œMiss Delancy! Not even one?”
    She smiled and ruffled his hair. “Maybe one, as long as you promise to eat all your supper.”
    â€œYes, ma’am!” He hung up his apron next to hers. In quick order, he had gathered up the candy. He wrapped it in a page of the newspaper Mrs. Randolph had left behind and stuck it in his pocket.
    Emma tied on her straw bonnet and settled her knitted shawl over her shoulders. The night was going to be chilly again. She needed to speak with Reverend Faulkner to see if there was another coat in the used clothing box at the church. The one Reverend Faulkner had brought to the store was too small for Sean, whose arms hung out of the sleeves above his wrists.
    She blew out the lantern in the storage room and locked the back door. In her mind, she heard Noah Sawyer’s laugh. She could not fault him for laughing at her when she had been so silly to announce in front of half the village that the store was always unlocked. Lewis had warned her later that she should have been more reticent. She might trust the residents of Haven, but trains and the steamboats on the Ohio often stopped in town.
    â€œWho knows who might have been listening when you said you didn’t lock up?” he had asked her. Since that afternoon, she had locked the store, although she knew there probably was no need.
    â€œBut you never know what people will do,” she whispered as she turned the key in the front door. She pushed thoughts of the past out of her head. She tried to smile as she added, “If you keep talking to yourself, people will think you’re as batty as Mrs. Randolph.”
    â€œWhat did you say, Miss Delancy?” asked Sean around the candy he had popped into his mouth.
    â€œCheck that the barrels on the porch are