The Marsh Madness

I had been fully aware that Vera didn’t get excited, but it had slipped my mind that no one else was supposed to either. I made a mental note never to chirp again. I lowered my voice a half octave. I also moved away from Bad Cat’s outstretched claws and said, “But Summerlea is historic. It is magnificent. It’s—”

She kept rolling, barreling down the endless corridors of Van Alst House, past the ballroom and the portrait gallery festooned with ugly oils of her relatives. Have I mentioned that all the Van Alsts seemed to have suffered from serious constipation and bad teeth? I always try to avert my eyes, as the overflow relatives are displayed all along that hallway. You can’t miss them no matter how hard you try.

Vera muttered, “I have my own magnificent historic home, Miss Bingham. I do not have to seek others like an overeager tourist.”

Maybe I won’t wear the gloves, I decided, breaking into a canter to keep pace with her.

“Of course, Van Alst House is wonderful, Vera. I love it here. But you’ve been cooped up for months, if you don’t count the Thanksgiving event and Uncle Lucky’s wedding and . . .”

I decided not to mention the various murders that had disrupted Vera’s stay-at-home policy. “And Summerlea has quite a history too. They say that FDR and—”

The wheelchair stopped abruptly. “My grandfather entertained governors and visiting royalty here in Van Alst House. We have our own history. I don’t need to leave here to feel part of that.” Vera pivoted abruptly and headed into the study, one of my favorite rooms. I hustled after her.

True enough. Van Alst House had a rich past. But Summerlea had welcomed presidents and world leaders, society’s finest and Hollywood legends. Where Van Alst House had been built from the profits of a shoe factory, Summerlea was made of steel money and rail money and manufacturing money. The Kauffman heritage was more like a collaboration of robber barons on steroids. Never mind that the Kauffman family had dwindled and shrunk in influence over the years. Summerlea remained.

I knew I was being ridiculous. But I loved the whole idea. Was it a Cinderella thing? I was, after all, the motherless girl who grew up in the rooms over her uncle’s “antique” shop. I would have been better adding the cash for that raspberry wool dress to the savings that would one day fund my return to grad school. Never mind. Summerlea would be so much fun. And really, it wasn’t like anything could go wrong.

Speaking of wrong, Vera had continued sputtering.

I said, “Of course you don’t need to leave here. I couldn’t agree more. However, you have been chosen and invited to another wonderful place and given first dibs at one of the finest Ngaio Marsh collections in the world. At a very reasonable price, may I add. I’ve done my homework on this one. This is a very rare collection.”

We never admit out loud that money is a factor for Vera, but it is. Anyone with a sharp eye would notice that there is less sterling silver every year and that several key antiques are now making someone else happy. Sometimes I worried that the Aubusson rugs would vanish next.

Vera couldn’t ever simply agree. It’s not in her. “Humph. We need to knock back that dollar figure a bit. And cash only? Who ever heard of that? Maybe this Chadwick has squandered what’s left of the family fortune.”

I couldn’t let Vera bring me down. “I got the impression the price was firm. Anyway, you love Ngaio Marsh. You’ve been trying to upgrade your Marsh collection as long as I’ve been here. You know how hard they are to find, especially those early ones.”

“Be that as it may, what kind of man only collects one author?”

I shrugged. What did I know about the late Mr. Kauffman and his collecting habits? “I don’t know why he collected only the one author. It’s working for us though. We’ll be lucky to get these books. All thirty-two in fine condition. It could take years to locate the same quality any other way. Count your blessings. If they’d been part of a bigger collection, the whole shebang might have been sold off. It’s to our advantage that this was it.”