“I suggested that we open all the windows in the house—there’s a decent breeze today,” Jonas said.
“But if it’s the smell of the water, we’d be letting it in rather than out,” Katie said.
“Hmm. Good point,” Jonas agreed. “But—”
“Let’s do it anyway. With all the cleaners I’ve been using already, it’s probably a good idea,” Kelsey said.
“Hey, I’ll run back over and get my iPod and speakers,” Jonas said. “Might as well do this to some music.”
“Great,” Kelsey said.
“So, you’ll be staying here a while?” Katie asked her.
“There’s a lot to be done,” Kelsey told her.
“I think it’s great,” Jonas said enthusiastically.
“So do I,” Katie agreed. “Jonas, go get us music to heft and haul by!”
Grinning, he took off at a trot back toward the mainland. Katie snatched up a couple of the bags and headed into the house. “I think it smells great in here!” she said. “Okay, you’re right. It smells heavily of cleaner, and I think that will get worse as we go.”
“I’m sure,” Kelsey said.
In another trip, they had the last of the bags, and Kelsey was delighted that Katie had come, because she helped clean out the shelves in the kitchen as they put groceries away. “It’s amazing, what you’ve done already,” Katie said. “You know, I was a little girl the last time I was here, but this is an amazing house. I thought it was the coolest place on the whole island. I mean, it was as if you lived in a museum. That was incredibly neat.”
“I did love living here,” Kelsey said. “I loved all the stories. One night my parents were going to a major fundraiser at the Casa Marina. I remember how gorgeous my mother was coming down the stairs. Then, of course, I remember the day she died.”
“Of course. I understand. That must have been so painful.” She hesitated. “So, what do you think you want to do with the place?”
“I don’t know. How strange—I don’t think that I want to let it go, but I’m not sure I could actually ever live here again.”
“Rental property?” Katie suggested.
“I don’t know yet. I just don’t know,” Kelsey said.
Jonas returned while they were in the kitchen, shouting to them from the porch and then as he entered, pausing to stare at them. “Girls! Or young women, if that’s somehow politically incorrect! You left the door open. That’s not a good thing. Opening windows is fine—inviting in all the possible drunken riffraff in the city is not!”
“We stand corrected,” Katie said cheerfully. “All right, windows! I’ll head upstairs.”
“We’ll handle it all down here,” Jonas said. He turned toward the laundry room.
Kelsey headed in the opposite direction, to the family room, and then on into Cutter’s study.
She paused, coming into the room. As a child, she had loved this room so much. It was where she came to sit on her grandfather’s lap to have him read to her from one of the books in the endless rows of shelves, and where he weaved his great tales of adventure. It could be a dark room, though, with only the one window that led out to the porch.
She turned on the light switch, and the room came to light, revealing Cutter’s large mahogany desk, his ledger open on the old blotter as if he had been reading just before he had gone to sit down and die. Egyptian statuettes sat on one edge; a family picture taken twenty years ago sat on the other. The lamp on the desk was a beautiful Tiffany piece, and the hardwood floor was almost completely covered with a Persian carpet showing some signs of age but still beautiful. The fireplace was shared with the parlor, where the mantel was marble; in this room, it was hardwood. Elegantly designed fire utensils sat on the limestone apron around the fire, and a firebreak from the early eighteenth century hid the fact that the hearth area itself was shared.
It really was a beautiful old house. She hadn’t talked to Joe Richter yet about the actual value, but it occurred to her then that the house really was probably worth a small fortune.
And yet, oddly enough, she couldn’t imagine selling it.
She walked across the carpet and pulled back the dark crimson drapes and opened the window. Natural light flooded in softly.