Upon consulting with the lawyers, Aaron discovered that Gordon Allard’s nephew, John Larsen, did intend to put the house up for sale, but he had run into problems. The house was a white elephant. It needed a lot of repairs and he had put off his decision until the summer, when he could come back to the U.S. for a longer period of time.
When the information was related to Valerie, she was disappointed that there would be a long delay. Aaron could see that she had her heart set on the house. Personally, he didn’t understand her obsession at all and thought it was bordering on ridiculous, but he wanted her to be happy, so, without telling her, he obtained John Larsen’s phone number and gave him a personal call. Larsen turned out to be a reasonable sort and they discussed the property over the phone. In the end, they negotiated a deal that worked for both of them. John Larsen was overjoyed to unload the house as-is, and was well satisfied with Aaron’s lump sum bid. A team of lawyers handled the paperwork and, in record time, Aaron had the deed and the white elephant belonged to them.
***
“Stop frowning,” Valerie said lightheartedly as they stood in the entrance foyer of the house.
It was late afternoon and Aaron, who looked dashing in business attire and a long overcoat, had just returned from a board meeting in Manhattan and had met her at the house. In a theatrically exaggerated gesture, he swept a cobweb out of the way as they walked into the huge, now-empty drawing room. He tilted his head up toward the antique chandelier suspended from the high ceiling. “Think that ornament’s steady up there?”
Valerie elbowed him. “That ornament has survived generations. Why should it fall now?
“Because its new owners are of a different ethnicity.”
“Very funny.”
He listened with apparent amusement as she expressed her vision of how the house would look once the renovations were done, and he tolerated being dragged into a kitchen so outdated that he wouldn’t have been surprised to find a colonial brick oven and pots hanging from a rack. He looked around. There was a rack, but the pots had been confiscated. He smirked.
He laughed outright when they went into the bathroom and were confronted with the enormous water-stained claw-footed tub.
“So it’s old,” Valerie said, “but it’s now considered retro.” She looked at his expression. “Don’t worry, we’ll definitely update the bathroom.”
Next she led him up the creaky, winding staircase. There was a distinct nostalgic artistry to the curve of the staircase, but she was aware of him shaking the loose balustrades, knowing that the staircase, too, would need extensive work.
“Voila!” she exclaimed, switching on the light. “The greatest home library in the world.”
To her relief, he looked impressed that the entire second story was nothing but a gigantic library with shelves and shelves of books and a long, well-appointed oak table in the center square, with matching chairs in which phantom patrons could sit. The library was no doubt what had caused Larsen most of the problems. True to his word, he had not touched anything here.
She watched Aaron wander down the aisles looking at the shelves. He selected a book from one. “All labeled and categorized according to the Dewey Decimal system. Amazing,” he said.
He blew the dust off the book in his hand, replaced it, walked farther down the aisle, and turned a corner leading to the reference section, which contained biographies, encyclopedias, and local Long Island history. He picked up a thick ancient book of atlases with nautical charts and began thumbing through it.
“And we could…” Valerie began, but she stopped talking, realizing that he was absorbed in the book. She smiled to herself. Finally, they were in agreement. The library was of interest to both of them.
When they had at last gotten out into the blustery March sunlight, Aaron surveyed the sweeping property in the rear of the house. There were tangled winter-slumbering gardens that a decade ago must have been beautiful, an old, boarded-up well, and a crumbling trellis, which heralded the way to a cracked stone path. He followed the path to where it sloped down a bank and ended at a sea wall and boat dock overlooking the glistening Long Island Sound.
Valerie quietly trailed him down the path but remained on the bank, watching as he stepped cautiously out on the wooden dock to survey the body of water. She wished she had taken her camera to capture the way he stood, his oh-so-elegant GQ model pose, resplendent with head lifted to the horizon, exotic sculpted features, penetrating eyes, and his long gray overcoat flapping in the breeze.
On that day in Belize before they’d agreed to get married, he had warned her not to try to change him, but it delighted her to realize that without prodding or nagging, she had done just that. The changes were subtle, but he definitely smiled more and appeared more relaxed and youthful. Even his manner of dress had changed somewhat, thanks to her careful tampering. She had recently taken to buying him dress shirts in pastel colors that he normally wouldn’t wear, and instead of pointing them out to him, she’d simply hung them in his closet, mixing them with his other clothes. In truth, she had the feeling that Aaron knew exactly what she was up to, but he never said a word and she was deeply flattered when he actually did wear them.
She closed her eyes momentarily and saw their home the way it would be when it was restored. Her life was becoming almost perfect. She saw her husband tying a sailboat to a brand new dock, and she heard the emotive chatter of their children running to meet him. Children? Her eyes flew open and she clenched her hands in a fist so tight the knuckles blanched.
There were not going to be any children.