Cradle and All Read Online Free PDF

him?” Lori asked.
    Tom nodded and handed the little boy to her.
    The baby’s cry immediately escalated into a screech. “Oh, my,” Lori said. “Does he have colic?”
    “Dr. Dorn says he’s getting over a viral infection,” Tom yelled.
    Lori bounced the baby as she glanced at the contents of the shopping basket. She pulled out the blankets Anne had dropped in just a moment before. “I’ve extra blankets, so you don’t have to waste your money on these. I’ll just put them back on the shelf.”
    “You hold it right there, Lori Tubb,” Phyllis Cooper, co-owner of the general store, said as she walked up behind her.
    Lori turned to bravely face Phyllis, who was only a couple of inches taller but whose wild cloud of gray-blond hair made her seem a great deal more formidable.
    “I was just trying to save Father Tom some money, Phyl.”
    Phyllis grabbed the blankets out of Lori’s hands and dumped them back into the shopping basket. “You think Philo and me would charge Tom for these baby things? We know it’s hard enough on him, assuming the care of this little abandoned boy.”
    “Sorry, Phyl,” Lori said, sincerely contrite.
    The baby’s screams rose until they seemed to be vibrating the glass bottles on the shelves. A customer in the adjacent aisle headed for the door.
    “Let me see if I can quiet him,” Phyllis said as she took Tommy out of Lori’s arms. Phyllis rocked and cuddled the little boy, but Tommy’s unhappy tirade raged on.
    “I’ll take him outside,” Anne said, lifting the baby out of Phyllis’s arms.
    But the instant Anne settled the baby against her chest, little Tommy’s screaming stopped. All eyes turned toward her.
    “You certainly seem to have a way with him,” Lori remarked, her tone ripe with growing interest.
    “How lucky for Father Tom that you just happened to be around,” Phyllis said, her eyebrow lifting with possibilities. “I heard you were staying up at the B and B. You here to help Father Tom find this cute little baby’s mother?”
    “No, I’m just filling in the blanks on the shopping list,” Anne said.
    “Really?” Phyllis flashed Tom a speculative look before turning back to Anne. “I didn’t know you and Tom knew each other that well.”
    “We don’t,” Anne said.
    “Yet here you are, pitching in to help him,” Lori added. “And on your vacation, too.”
    Anne’s eyes dropped to her list. “You’ll need something to carry him around in, Father Christen, ” she said in her very formal judge’s tone. “I doubt you’ll want to use a towel again.”
    It was clear to Tom that Anne had caught the growing speculation coming from both Phyllis and Lori and was trying to cut it off in the bud.
    Anne obviously didn’t have a clue as to the kind of women she was up against.
    “The baby carriers are on the next shelf,” Phyllis said, pointing. “I’d recommend the over-the-shoulder sling. Keeps the baby close and frees the hands without giving you a backache. Any idea who the mother is, Father Tom?”
    “Trudi saw her car,” Lori said before Tom had a chance to respond.
    “When was this?” Phyllis asked, swiveling around to face her.
    “She was walking down Church Street last night when it whizzed right past her,” Lori said.
    Tom knew he didn’t have to ask any questions at this point. Not with Phyllis Cooper around. She was as good as any prosecuting attorney when it came to grilling a witness.
    “Did Trudi get the license number?” Phyllis asked.
    “No, it was going by too fast,” Lori answered.
    “But she got a good look at the driver?”
    “Just enough to see it was a woman.”
    “What did the woman look like?” Phyllis pushed some more.
    “I tell you, Phyl, she didn’t get that good a look.”
    “She had to have noticed whether the woman was young or old.”
    “Well, of course the woman was young. What mature woman would abandon her baby?”
    “How is Trudi doing?” Tom interjected quickly, uncomfortable with the