“I can see your mind’s working overtime,” Anna-Louise said, cutting into his thoughts. “What are you grappling with? What to do about Tommy?”
“Actually, I was wondering what it takes to be a minister, especially a woman minister.”
“The same thing it takes a man,” she said at once. “Just a little more of it. Dedication. Faith. Compassion. And in my case, a healthy supply of grit and determination.”
“Something tells me it’s not as simple as you make it sound. Otherwise more people would answer the calling.”
“Okay, for a woman, maybe it takes the ability to withstand a few shocked looks, a lot of doubting remarks and occasionally an organized campaign to have us banished.”
“There,” he said. “That sounds more like it. Did anybody ever try to banish you?”
Her expression clouded over. “All the time at first.”
“But you were tough enough to take it,” he said approvingly.
“I had a strong backer,” she replied.
“Richard?”
“God.”
Walker was taken aback by the quick retort, but then a smile spread across his face. “Yes, He would be a help, wouldn’t He?”
“He usually is, if we listen.”
“I’m not sure I can hear what He’s saying about me and Tommy,” Walker confided.
She gave him a serene smile. “Oh, I think you can. Maybe you’re just not ready to listen.”
“You’re telling me I should pack Tommy up and take him with me,” he said, a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach. He almost regretted asking her opinion, because she was right. He wasn’t ready to hear it.
“No,” she said at once. “I’m not telling you anything. It’s for you to decide.”
“Do you think he’d be better off here with Daisy?” he asked, trying to get a clear-cut answer from her one way or the other.
“I know she loves him,” Anna-Louise conceded, clearly choosing her words carefully.
“I thought I heard a but in there.”
“Did you?”
He shook his head at the deliberate evasiveness. “I could find you extremely annoying, Mrs. Walton.”
“Anna-Louise will do. And you only find me annoying because I won’t make your decision for you.”
“I thought your job was to point people along the path to righteousness.”
“That puts them in good standing with God. This decision is about you and your family. A private matter.”
“What if I ask for your advice?”
She laughed. “I’ll answer with a question. What do you think is right and best for Tommy?”
He dragged a hand through his damp hair. “I wish to hell I knew,” he said without thinking, then immediately apologized. “Sorry.”
“No problem. I will give you this much advice. Give it time, Walker. You don’t have to decide today or even tomorrow.”
“Tell Frances Jackson that. She’s chomping at the bit to get Tommy off her plate and onto mine.”
“No, she’s just trying to make sure he’s with someone who loves him. Every child deserves that, especially one who’s just been through the trauma of losing the only parent he’s ever known.”
“Yes,” Walker said slowly. “Yes, they do.”
But was he in any position to give Tommy the kind of love he needed? Did he even have any love left to give? The three people who’d been closest to him in his life certainly didn’t think so.
Daisy’s gaze kept straying toward the back door. She’d expected Walker to show up by now. It was after eight, and there was still no sign of him. Fortunately Tommy didn’t seem to care one way or another. He hadn’t glanced at the door once.
Still, she was disappointed. It wasn’t that she’d expected him, exactly. After all, wasn’t she the one who’d anticipated that he might bolt straight back to Washington? She’d merely hoped that he would keep his promise and be here this morning–for Tommy’s sake.
“How come you keep looking out the door?” Tommy asked eventually. “You’ve already burned one waffle because you weren’t paying attention. Looks to me like the next one is going to go any second now.”
She whirled around just in time to see the steam coming from the waffle iron turn to something that looked suspiciously like smoke. “Blast it,” she said, yanking it open to reveal a waffle almost beyond edible.
“It’s okay. I’ll take it,” Tommy said, holding out his plate. “Looks like it’s the best I’m going to get this morning.”
“Very funny, young man,” she said as she tossed it into the trash instead. “The next one will be perfect. You’ll see.”
“I hope so,” Tommy told her, “’Cause I’m about starved to death.”
Daisy carefully spooned more batter onto the waffle iron and closed it, then faced Tommy. “Now that you’ve had some time to sleep on everything that happened yesterday, what did you think of your uncle?”
Tommy’s face scrunched up. He shrugged. “He was okay, I guess.”
“You weren’t very nice to him.”
Tommy frowned. “Why should I be? I just said what you were thinking. We talked about it, remember? You don’t know why he abandoned my mom either.”
“Maybe I didn’t understand it before he and I talked, but I do now,” Daisy told the boy. “He deserves a chance to explain it so you’ll understand it, too. He told you yesterday that he tried really, really hard to find her.”
“And you bought that?” Tommy said scathingly.
She nodded slowly. “He sounded sincere. And it is true that your mom didn’t have a lot of the identification papers that most adults have, like a driver’s license and car registration. She always rode a bike.”
“Because she liked the exercise,” Tommy said defensively.
“True, but she didn’t have a Social Security number, either.”
“I don’t even know what that is,” Tommy said. “But if she didn’t have it, it was ’cause she didn’t want it.”
Daisy grinned. “I know that, but most grown-ups do have one. Some kids, too, if they want to get jobs. All of those things would have helped your uncle to find her.”
“He should have tried harder. He must be a really lousy cop,” Tommy said stubbornly.
Daisy sighed. She knew better than to push too hard. Even in just a few days, she had seen that Tommy didn’t respond well to pressure. He had a definite mind of his own, and she was a big believer in a child’s right to his own opinions. She could only try to shape them a little at a time. Besides, how much of her faith in Walker’s sincerity was because she wanted to believe he was a good man for her own reasons? If she lost Tommy, she needed to believe he was with someone who could love him the way he deserved to be loved.
Well, the proof would come soon enough. If Walker didn’t show up this morning, it would pretty much confirm Tommy’s low opinion of him. She sighed again and opened the waffle iron just in the nick of time, finally managing one