hats are my real love.”
“Do you need me to help you collect your bills?” Leigh said, threading her fingers tightly together. People would take advantage of good hearts. “I’m doing that at Gabriel’s and it’s working already. Some people will put off paying if you let them.”
“No, no, no.” When Sally shook her head, bells jingled in her red feather turban. “Everyone pays but I have to charge according to what I know they can afford and that’s not much when they don’t have much.”
Leigh managed not to groan.
Sally smiled. “I see your expression. You think I’m another pushover. Perhaps I am but for different reasons. I like to encourage imagination to flourish.
“What you’re doing to help Gabriel is wonderful. We all want him to succeed and the fates haven’t been with him. He needed you to organize him and give him some new ideas.”
The compliments brought more pleasure to Leigh than she supposed they should. “I’m having fun,” she said. “I used to design games for a living. Now I feel as if I’m playing games—productive ones—for a living.”
“I’m so glad you’re at Chimney Rock Cove,” Sally said. Without warning, she flung her arms around Leigh and hugged her. “You are special and you’ve come to a special place. It’s where you’re meant to be. Just trust that. No matter what happens, believe it’s supposed to. And all you have to do if you don’t understand something, is ask me. I’ll make you feel better about it. I already know that you have the capacity to be what you need to be and do what you need to do. Above all, do not ever be afraid.”
“Thank you,” Leigh said, feeling wobbly again.
Jazzy yipped and Sally laughed. “Look at that. I heard they liked each other.”
As if his legs had become springs, Jazzy jumped to meet Blue, whose feet thumped across the wooden floor. He sat beside Leigh and looked up at her. If a dog could look pleased with himself, then he did. His golden eyes crinkled up and a great many really large and very white fangs—no, teeth—showed all the way around an impressive jaw.
“Blue,” Sally said. “Well, I’ll be, if it isn’t Blue. What have you done with Niles?”
The miniature cat, who looked slightly cross-eyed, so intense was her concentration on the new arrival, strolled slowly closer to Niles’s dog.
“I reckon someone’s going to be in trouble,” Sally said. “No, I reckon someone’s already in trouble. Who’s a naughty boy? Who’s doing what he’s not supposed to do?”
Frowning, Leigh turned, expecting to see a child.
“It’s Blue I’m talking to,” Sally said. “He shouldn’t be running around on his own so far from—” She blinked fast.
“Niles?” Leigh suggested helpfully. “You’re right. Hedrove me to Langley and went to do some errands. I bet Blue got away and ran off. Wait till Niles finds out.”
“Leave Blue be,” Sally said, sounding irritated. “Why interfering people can’t mind their own business, I don’t know. You just sit over there, Blue. I’ll decide what to do with you later.”
Chastised—and confused—Leigh cleared her throat. “Signs?” she said. “Did anyone talk to you about a sign for Gabriel’s Place?”
Sally wrinkled her nose. “Maybe they did and maybe they didn’t. If you and I come up with something special it will probably be because we’ve both forgotten what anyone else thinks they want. Take a look at this.”
She moved scissors and brown paper pattern pieces from the top of a table, knelt down and struggled, and puffed, and wriggled a piece of sheet metal from beneath the bottom shelf of the table. It kept coming until Leigh got down to help and they wrestled the plastic-edged sign completely free.
“This will change the feeling people get when they drive near Gabriel’s. It’ll make them smile and they’ll want to stop.”
With one of them at each end, they hoisted it onto the table.
“Wow,” Leigh said. “It’s