Out to Canaan (140 page)

He squirmed in his office chair and looked at his watch.

In thirty minutes, he and Ron Malcolm and several others on the vestry were squiring strangers around Sadie Baxter's homeplace. He hated the thought, but he despised himself more for his wishy-washy attitude about the whole situation.

They needed desperately to sell it, get it off the shoulders of the parish; yet, here was a golden opportunity driving up the mountain in a rented car, and he wanted to run in the opposite direction.

Surely it was as simple as his dread of letting Sadie Baxter go entirely. Surely he was trying to hold on to what was vanished and gone, to another way of life that had been vibrantly preserved in Miss Sadie's engrossing stories.

When Fernbank was sold, all that would be left of the old Mitford was three original storefronts on Main Street, Lord's Chapel and the church office, the town library, and the Porter mansion-cum-town museum where Uncle Billy and Miss Rose lived in the little apartment.

Blast! he exhorted himself. Stop being a hick and move on. This is today, this is now!

He glanced at Emma, who was staring at her computer screen. What did people find to stare at on computer screens, anyway? Nothing moved on the screen, yet she was transfixed, as if hearing voices from a heavenly realm.

“I'll be darned,” she muttered, clicking her mouse.

He sighed.

“Look here,” she said, not taking her eyes off the screen.

He got up and went to her desk and looked.

“What? It looks like a list.”

“It is a list. It's a list of everybody in the whole United States, and their addresses. Our computer man sent it to us. See there?”

She moved her pointer to a name. “Albert Wilcox!” he exclaimed. “Good heavens, do you suppose . . .”

“We've been lookin' for Albert Wilcox for how long?”

“Ten years, anyway! Do you think it's
our
Albert Wilcox?”

“We heard he'd moved to Seattle,” she said, “and we tried to find him in the phone book, but we never did. This town is somewhere close to Seattle, it's called Oak Harbor.”

“Well done! Let's write this Albert Wilcox and see if he's the one whose grandmother's hand-illuminated prayer book turned up in the parish hall storage closet.”

“A miracle!” she said. “I remember the day we found it—right behind the plastic poinsettias that had been there a hundred years. How in th' dickens it ended up
there
 . . .”

“That book could be worth a fortune. Every page is done in
calligraphy and watercolor illustrations—by his own grandfather. When it disappeared out of the exhibition we did for a Bane and Blessing, it broke Albert's heart.”

“It was only Rite One, remember, not th' whole thing!”

“Nonetheless . . .”

“And don't forget he was goin' to sue the church 'til Miss Sadie talked him out of it.”

Well, that, too.

Ingrid Swenson was fashionably thin, deeply tanned, and expensively dressed.

“Arresting!” she said, as they drove along Fernbank's proud but neglected driveway.

Tendrils of grapevine leapt across the drive and entwined among a row of hemlocks on the other side. To their right, a gigantic mock orange faded from bloom in a tangled thicket of wisteria, star magnolia, and rhododendron.

The house didn't reveal its dilapidation at once, and for that he was relieved. In fact, it stood more grandly than he remembered from his caretaker's visit in March.

He was touched to recall that exactly two years ago there had been the finest of fetes at this house.

On the lawn, young people in tuxedos had served champagne and cups of punch on silver trays, as lively strains of Mozart poured through the tall windows. Inside, the ballroom had been filled with heartfelt joy for Olivia and Hoppy Harper, the glamorous bride and groom, and with awe for the hand-painted ceiling above their heads, which was newly restored to its former glory.

Roberto had flown from Italy to surprise Miss Sadie, and Esther Bolick's orange marmalade cake had stood three tiers high, each tier supported by Corinthian columns of marzipan bedecked with imported calla lilies. It had been, without doubt, the swellest affair since President Woodrow Wilson had attended a ball at Fernbank and given little Sadie Baxter a hard candy wrapped in silver paper.

The man who came with Ingrid Swenson seemed interested only
in biting his nails, speaking in monosyllables, and exploring Fernbank quite on his own. The rector saw him peering into the washhouse and wandering into the orchards, taking notes.

“A little over twelve acres,” said Ron Malcolm, a longtime member of Lord's Chapel who kept his broker's license current.

“Excellent,” said Ingrid, who took no notes at all. “Twelve acres translates to twenty-four cottages. Town water, I presume?”

“On a well.”

“Town sewer, of course . . . .”

“Afraid not,” said Ron. “And I must tell you in all fairness that the cost to connect this property to town services will run well above a hundred thousand. The connection is a half mile down the hill and the right-of-ways pose some real problems.”

Ingrid looked at him archly. “It could behoove you to make that investment and offer your buyer an upgraded property.”

“It behooves us even more,” said Ron, “to avoid putting a burden of debt on the parish.”

She smiled vaguely. “That is, in any case, a trifle, Mr. Malcolm. But let's consider an issue which is the polar opposite of a trifle, and that's the number of jobs such a facility would bring to your village. An upscale property of twenty-one rooms and twenty-four cottages, including a state-of-the-art health center, would employ well over a hundred people, many of them coming from Europe and the British Isles and requiring satisfactory housing. This, gentlemen, could create a small boom.” She paused for effect. “A small boom for a small town!” she said, laughing.

“Yes ma'am,” said Ron Malcolm.

“But we'll get to all that later. Now I'd like to start in the attic and work down to the basement.”

“Consider it done,” said the rector, wanting the whole thing behind them.

She would talk it over with her associates, Ingrid told them in the church office. They wouldn't buy an option—they'd take a risk on the property still being available when they returned with an offer in thirty to sixty days.

“Risk,” she said, toying with the paperweight on his desk, “has a certain adrenaline, after all.”

Their lawyer would begin the title search immediately, and a full topo would be done by a surveyor from Holding. No, they didn't want the window treatments or furnishings, with the possible exception of Miss Sadie's bed, which Ingrid concluded was French, a loveseat and secretary that were almost certainly George II, and a china cabinet that appeared to be made by a native craftsman.

Her people wanted to talk with the town engineer again, and expressed regret that the heating system appeared defunct and the plumbing would have to be completely modernized.

Before leaving, she mentioned the seriousness of the water damage due to years of leakage through a patched roof, and frowned when the subject of the well and sewer emerged again.

He tried to be elated, but was merely thankful that the first phase was over and done with. He made a note to get up to Fernbank with Cynthia and go through the attic, pronto.

Pauline Barlowe had the job and was to report to work on Monday morning at six-thirty.

He called Scott Murphy at once.

“Thank you!” he said. “I can't thank you enough.”

“What for, sir?”

“Why, for . . . saying anything that might have helped Pauline Barlowe get the job in your dining room.”

“I didn't say a word.”

“You didn't?”

“Not a peep out of me. That was our personnel director's idea. She said she knew she might be taking a chance, but she wanted to do it and came to talk to me about it. Lida Willis is tough, she'll watch Mrs. Barlowe like a hawk, but Lida has a soft center; she wants this to work.”

“We're thrilled around our place. This means a lot to Dooley as well as his mother. When will you come for dinner? We've got a regular corn shucking going at the rectory; it's just the thing to liven up a bachelor.”

“Name the time!” said the chaplain.

“I'll call you,” said the rector.

“We're giving a party,” announced his wife, flushed with excitement.

“We are?”

“Friday night. In the basement, a housewarming! I'm baking cookies and making a pudding cake for Harley, and Lace is doing the lemonade. I've invited Olivia, Hoppy has a meeting, and oh, I've asked Dooley, but he's not keen on the idea. Who else?”

“Ummm. Scott Murphy!” he wondered

“Perfect. Who else?”

“Tommy. But wait, I think Dooley mentioned that Tommy has a family thing on Friday, and Dooley's going over there later to watch a video.”

“OK, that's seven. Terrific! They finished painting today, the place looks wonderful, and it's all aired out and Harley is excited as anything. He raked tons of leaves from under the back hedge, and in the next couple of days he's replacing my alternator.”