All Through The House (18 page)

You're a cynic, she thought in amazement. She'd known she
was scared, determined to be independent, all too shaky inside. But she hadn't
known that she could look so coolly at another person and wonder how sincere he
was.

That small voice murmured, Yeah, well, if you'd done that
with you-know-who, you'd have saved yourself some misery and a chunk of your
life.

And I wouldn't have Kate, she argued, for once silencing the
argument. All of her loved her blue-eyed daughter, and wouldn't have traded her
for anything, up to and including the lost chunk of her life.

The dinner with Nate was thanks to Abigail's mother, who
every couple of weeks swept her granddaughter away for the night, giving
Abigail rare time to shop by herself or rent a video she wanted to see. Or,
now, to have dinner with Nate. He had announced his intention to cook a meal
for her in keeping with the grand dimensions of the Irving House's dining room.

When she parked her car in the midst of the circular drive,
then used the brass knocker, she looked at the key box on the porch railing and
thought of the other times she had been here. Would she discover an unpleasant
surprise this time, too, if she used her key and let herself in? Then Nate
opened the ornate front door and smiled with such charm, she forgot those other
times.

"Are you expected, madam?"

"Of course," she said haughtily, then smiled even
as he kissed her. "What a forward waiter," she whispered against his
mouth as he lifted his head enough for her to breathe.

"I'm the chef," he murmured back. "They are,
you know."

"Um." Abigail slipped her arm around his waist and
leaned comfortably as he led her along the marble-floored entry hall. "Is
that the first course I smell?"

"Would you believe first, middle, and last?" he
said ruefully. "I discovered I'm not quite as good a cook as I thought I
was."

"Should I smell the smoke any minute?"

He grimaced. "Unfortunately, yes."

"You're kidding."

"Nope." He stopped in the doorway to the kitchen,
drawing Abigail to a halt with him. The atmosphere here was indeed hazy with
smoke. And pungent. "It was the brown rice," Nate said. "I, uh,
put it on and thought I'd get a little work done while it was cooking. Next
thing I knew...." He shrugged. "Thank God for smoke alarms."

Surprised at her ability to joke about it, Abigail said,
"Maybe you should try this to put off the next househunter."

"Can't compete with my plumbing disaster." He
sounded smug. Then, "Oh, hell!" and he sprinted for the stove, where
water was boiling over onto the burner and steam rising.

Laughing helplessly, Abigail said, "Anything I can
do?"

He gave her a harried look over his shoulder.
"Salad?"

"At your command." While she tore lettuce and
peeled carrots, Nate turned the new batch of rice down and sampled the beef
burgundy.

"Smoked," he uttered.

Actually, it proved to be delicious. Over dinner at the
long, shining mahogany table in the dining room, Abigail said, "You know,
you're not the first renter to try to keep a house from selling."

He had seated them at one corner of the table, despite her
insistence that a huge silver epergne blocking their view of each other was
required to create the proper atmosphere. Now Nate reached for the wine and
poured himself half a glass, then raised one brow as he held the slim-necked
bottle above her goblet. At her nod, he poured her more, too.

"I'll bet I'm more creative than most," Nate
asserted. "What do they do, leave dirty dishes in the sink, let mold grow
in the toilets? Throw garbage out the back door? No finesse. Admit it, I'm in a
class by myself."

"Oh, I don't know." Abigail sipped her wine.
"One time I was helping a young couple find their first house. She was pregnant
and he was so proud. They were sweet. Anyway, I'd made an appointment to show
them this cute little place, so I was surprised when the renter’s car was
there. The woman met us at the door in a bathrobe. Just a bathrobe. It was
gaping open enough so we could tell. I couldn't get rid of her. She followed us
around and leaned provocatively in doorways, brushed against the poor husband
every time she could think of an excuse to pass him. I finally told her, very
bluntly, that we preferred to look at the upstairs without her. Needless to
say, the couple was too distracted to even see the house. When we came down at
the end, we found the woman draped across some pillows in the living room, her
bathrobe open. She laughed when we left."

Nate's grin was provocative. "Maybe I should try that.
Some sagging pajama bottoms? Thin ones. Very thin."

"Don't you dare!"

"What, you don't like sharing?"

There he went again, everything reduced to possession.
Unfortunately, Abigail realized, she didn't like the idea of sharing. Not at
all. She remembered her first impression of him as a womanizer, so casually
charming that he spread himself thin. When had she quit thinking of him that
way? When she realized how vulnerable he was beneath that charm?

She could tell from his smile that he'd noticed she didn't
answer, but he didn't comment, thank heavens, and she managed to change the
subject without being too obvious.

After dinner Nate tucked her hand in the crook of his arm.
"How about a tour?"

"Trying to win me over?"

"No." His eyes were serious. "Trying to show
you why I love this house enough to have lied to have it."

"Was it hard?" she asked, searching his face.

His mouth twisted. "To lie to you? It was hell."

Abigail bit her Up. "I...I'd like that tour," she
finally said, simply.

His expression changed, becoming eager and almost boyish.
"Come on." He towed her into the kitchen. "You ever notice the
servants' stairs here?"

In her initial look at the house, she had opened the oddly
small paneled door tucked into a shadowy corner behind large pantry cupboards.
Moved by a sudden feeling of pity for the maids who would have been forbidden
to use the wide, graceful staircase rising from the front hall, Abigail had
made herself climb the steep, narrow staircase with a ceiling so low she had
felt claustrophobic. What had it been like, living in this magnificent house
and yet possessing less importance than a newfangled kitchen stove might have
had? Thoughtfully, Abigail tuned back in to what Nate was saying.

"These weren't here, of course," he went on, gesturing
at the cupboards. "Just open shelves, probably. And the stove here,"
he nodded at an empty wall, "one of those big cast-iron ones that heated
hot water and probably burned half a cord a day." He tugged on her hand,
pulling her along. "Did you know the floor's brick, too, under this
vinyl?"

"Really." The Realtor in Abigail perked up. A
brick floor, carefully sealed, would have far more appeal than the nicest
inlaid vinyl. It could be a selling point…. But she slammed a mental door on
the thought and sneaked a guilty glance at Nate.

He clearly hadn't noticed her momentary preoccupation.
"Think what it would have been like, back about 1900. The Irvings must
have had a dozen or more house servants—maids, governess, tutor, cook, maybe a butler.
You know there are fifteen rooms up on the servants' floor? The cook probably
slept down here," he jerked his head toward a small room whose purpose
Abigail had wondered about, "and some of the lower maids must have doubled
up. There would have been gardeners, maybe three or four, there's a good reason
the gardens have gone to pot. Josiah tried, but he had only a housekeeper and a
boy who came once a week to mow and do a little trimming."

"And then there are the stables and the carriage
house...." Abigail mused.

"Yep." Nate had a faraway look in his eyes.
"It was damn near a self-contained village. Floors gleaming, cut flowers
in every room, meals to feed fifty people cooking here in the kitchen.... All
because William Irving was smart enough to see the money to be made in timber,
and eventually in railroads. Think of it. A family like that, and now the house
is left to the ghosts and the mercy of Ed Phillips, who wouldn't care if it was
carved up into condos." His tone was sharp, even angry.

Did Nate see himself as the keeper of the flame? Abigail
wondered. A member of the Irving family in all but blood?

Her suspicion that he did grew as the tour proceeded. In the
library Nate conjured a picture of leather-bound books filling the leaded
glass-fronted bookcases, a small fire on the hearth, and the old timber baron
himself seated at an elegant cherry desk, pen in hand as he scrawled a
distinctive signature on documents. Nate showed her a letter William Irving had
written his wife in bold black cursive and flowery language, that signature
sprawled at the bottom.

"Josiah had a painting of William up right here."
The gold-and-green striped wallpaper was faded but for a large square where
Nate indicated. "Gilt frame, these eyes that watched you. If there's a
ghost in this damn house, it's him."

No, Abigail thought. William had long gone to his rest. If
Nate was haunted by a ghost, it was Josiah's. As she and Nate continued from
room to room, Nate talked incessantly of the man who had befriended the lonely
boy. He talked of Josiah's passion for the house, his pride in his ancestry,
his grief for the wife who had died twenty years before he did.

"Martha. Martha Irving. She must have been beautiful
once. By the time I knew her, she was so fragile I was always afraid if I
touched her she'd break. She was English, too; the Irvings always sent their
sons to Oxford, and the sons always brought an English bride home. Josiah was
no exception. Except this bride never gave him children. There was no son to go
to Oxford. I guess I was the next best thing."

The huge bedroom where Nate had set up his drafting table
had been William Irving's, Nate told her. To one side was a dressing room now
converted into a bathroom, to the other side a connecting door to the bedroom
that belonged to William's English wife. Abigail stood in the middle of the
Oriental rug and gazed around, conscious of small prickles down her spine.

"How do you know this was his room?" she asked.

"Josiah told me," Nate said. He smiled with a hint
of the first self-mockery she had seen since the tour began. "Somehow I
figured old William might not appreciate me stepping into his bed, so to speak.
But I thought he might enjoy looking over my shoulder. Keep the boredom at
bay."

Abigail shivered. "Damn it, Nate, you're going to have
me seeing ghosts any minute."

"Wait'll we get to the ballroom." For just an
instant Nate was with her, his eyes dark with promise, before he looked away
and said, "I'll show you the nursery."

In the hall, Abigail said, "You know, Nate, I don't
think you've ever told me where you lived. Is the house still there?"

"Lord knows," he said disinterestedly. "I
haven't been down that street in ten years."

A small frown crinkled Abigail's brow as she surreptitiously
studied Nate. Why did all this matter to him so much, and his own background so
little? Or was it more that he'd walled off the painful memories, refusing to
acknowledge their existence?

The nursery was across the hall, beside Nate's bedroom. The
wallpaper in here was especially faded, but Abigail could still make out the
rocking horses set against what had probably been a mint-green backdrop. Now it
was closer to olive-green drab, but tall, double windows would allow cheerful
sunlight to stream in during the day, and the room was a generous size. The window
seat was formed by built-in cupboards, and Abigail could easily imagine herself
as a child curled up by those windows reading.

"Do you think Kate would like this room?" Nate
asked from where he leaned against the doorframe.

Abigail slowly turned, looking at the room. She tried to
interpret the question and his tone, but couldn't quite read his expression.
"Kate'd probably like the whole house," she admitted. She could
easily picture bright wallpaper, a ruffly canopied bed, and stuffed animals
solemnly lined up on the window seat. "What little girl wouldn't?"

"I pictured her...." Uncharacteristically, he hesitated.
"I guess she's the only kid I know...."

"Didn't you say you have nieces and nephews?"

"Yeah, I just don't see 'em much. I send Christmas
presents...." He shrugged. "You know how it is."

No, she didn't, but Abigail didn't want to say so. Since she
had a sister, she couldn't imagine not wanting to stay close. Family was
something special.

On the other hand, she hadn't had a father who beat her, or
a mother who ran away from her children. Maybe those ties could be severed
beyond repair. Maybe Nate's attachment to his substitute father was
understandable, a way of salvaging his sense of self.

Nate straightened suddenly, his expression changing.
"Onward and up. The party's waiting."

Caught by his mood, she let herself be ushered up the second
flight of stairs to the ballroom, which took up half of this floor. Accessible
only by the servants' stairs were the servants' rooms, the remainder of the
third level. Remembering them, Abigail thought that the contrast between those
cramped, mostly windowless bedrooms under the eaves and this magnificent,
high-ceilinged expanse was almost painful, a reminder of a way of life largely
gone.

Whatever the ugly contrasts, the ballroom was a distillation
of all that was romantic in that time. Moonlight poured in the tall windows and
Nate made no move to reach for the light switch. Instead he crossed the silvered
floor to fling open several of the windows that opened onto a small balcony.

Faint sounds drifted in: a frog croaking, a car in the
distance, the night cry of an owl. Shadows ringed the room, as though guests
sat politely waiting for the music to begin.