The porch smelled of warm red cedar and boiled linseed oil.
It was mid-afternoon on Cider Hill.
The autumn sun hung like a coin of hammered gold in a sky so clear and deep that a man could see the curve of the world.
Giles Croft stood at the edge of his new twelve-by-twenty-four-foot wrap-around porch.
He had spent the morning rubbing boiled linseed oil into the deck boards with an old flannel rag. He watched the dry timber drink the golden oil until the grain deepened into rich shades of roasted chestnut, russet, and warm honey.
The handrails were silky smooth beneath his palms, free of splinters, planed to a gentle rounded bullnose that fit the curve of a human hand.
In the corner of the porch, mounted on smooth bronze rocker pivots, sat the double cedar glider chair he had finished at twilight yesterday.
Giles had crafted the glider from western red cedar offcuts, pinning every wood slot-and-wooden peg joint with dry white oak trunnels.
