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drove?”
    â€œNope. No doubt Daddy would have lectured
her
on what she was doing wrong, and that would have been even worse.”
    â€œMay I point out that I am not your father, Meg?”
    â€œSo I’ve noticed. Two hours to Mystic?”
    â€œAbout that. You’ve got the map.”
    â€œSo I do.” And a sheaf of printed directions, which gave the details for local roads once they got off the main highways. She carefully unfolded and refolded the appropriate map so she could follow their progress. “I told you, I love maps. I like to follow where we’ve been, and what distance we’ve covered. A GPS is not the same, and that voice keeps yelling at me that I’ve done something wrong and it has to recalculate. I don’t like to be judged by my electronics.”
    â€œSeriously?” Seth said.
    â€œYes. Anyway, do you know where you’re going? Or should I prompt you?”
    â€œOnly in time to get off at the right exit.”
    â€œDo we know where we’re staying tonight?”
    â€œI made a reservation. Should I have consulted you first?”
    â€œNot necessary. I trust your judgment. What are we going to see?”
    â€œShips?”
    â€œI think I could have figured that out myself. It’s probably called a seaport for a reason. More than one ship?”
    â€œSo I’m told. Quite a few, actually.”
    â€œAnything else?”
    â€œA re-created nineteenth-century village, but with more sea-oriented shops than Sturbridge. You want more?”
    â€œNo, that sounds good. I like stepping back in time, and I like boats.”
    â€œDo you know much about boats?”
    â€œNot big ones. More about the smaller ones—we used to take sailing lessons when we went on vacation at the Jersey Shore. And my father likes fishing, as you know. He took me out a time or two, but it really wasn’t my thing.”
    â€œWas it the worms?”
    â€œNo, it was getting the poor wriggling fish off the hook.” She shivered at the memory. “And I don’t hunt, either, but neither does my father.”
    â€œBut you like the ocean?” Seth asked.
    â€œYes, I do, although I have to watch out for sunburn. But I like swimming, not sitting on the beach pretending to read and getting sand in my hair. You have seen an ocean, right?” she ended dubiously. One more thing she had never asked.
    â€œOf course, but not often. One year my father had a little extra cash, so he took the family on a weekend trip to Cape Cod. We stayed in the cheapest motel he could find and he still grumbled about the cost. And I also went to the Cape in college with some of my friends, when I wasn’t working for Dad. Although my memories of that trip are rather fuzzy—I believe there was a certain amount of drinking involved.”
    â€œI’ll keep an eye on your consumption on this trip. So you really are a novice at vacationing?”
    â€œLooks like it.”
    Meg laughed. “What a pair we are! We have no clue how to relax. Oh, and since we’re both self-employed and small business owners, if we look at apples and old buildings, does that mean this trip will be tax deductible?”
    â€œI won’t say no. You’re the financial genius—you tell me.”
    â€œI’ll make a mental note of it, to consider come April. So we’d better pay attention and take lots of pictures to show what we did in case the IRS wants proof.”
    The first—and shortest—leg of the trip passed quickly. The highways were all but empty on a Sunday afternoon in winter. They had no trouble locating Seaport, and the grounds weren’t crowded, either. Seth hadn’t been kidding about the ships, which ranged from whalers to tugboats to schooners to lobster boats and more. Many were in working order, although there wasn’t time to take a quick sail. Meg made another mental note to think about that for a later date, maybe in the