The Jewelry Case (2 page)

Impulsively, she reached out and squeezed the woman’s withered hand. "Thank you."

At the gesture, Esther said abruptly, "I wasn't sure before ... but now I want you to have this." She pressed something in Paisley's hand.

She opened her fingers and looked down at a square of fine yellowed linen that had once been white, edged with intricate lace and smelling faintly of roses.

"A handkerchief! How lovely." Paisley was touched at the personal gift.

"Jonathan told me you didn't wear anything old today," the old woman said, running her eyes over Paisley's couture wedding gown. "The Perlemans aren't a particularly close family, nor are we believers in tradition, but at least this will remind you that you're not alone."

"Thank you," Paisley began again, but Auntie Esther pushed her toward the reception line with unexpected strength.

"You've wasted enough time on an old lady like me," she said firmly. "Now go on, they’re waiting for you. Finish your performance."

Performance? When Paisley turned around to ask about the word, Aunt Esther was gone.

And now the old lady had left her a house. Ensconced in Barry Klein’s glass-and-teak-appointed office, abstractedly rubbing the scar on her throat, Paisley looked at the financial spreadsheet lying on the desk and wondered again,
Why me
? It would have been logical to have left the house to Jonathan. After all, he was Esther Perleman's blood kin. Perhaps it had something to do with the spiritual connection she had felt with the other woman, although they had never met again after the wedding. That year, Paisley had impulsively sent Esther a set of opera CDs as a birthday gift, and added her to her Christmas card list.

Jonathan had glanced over her shoulder as she addressed the envelope. "You're not sending Aunt Esther a
Christmas
card, are you? She's Jewish, remember? Why don't you send her a holiday ham while you're at it?"

"It's generic," she retorted, sealing the envelope. "I doubt she would be offended by 'Season's Greetings' and a picture of penguins wearing ice skates. Besides, I liked her."

"Well, don't hold your breath waiting for an answer. She never cared much for me or the rest of my family." He sank into a deep leather armchair and opened the score for the opera he would be conducting in Milan, his first at La Scala. The appearance would be a personal triumph for him, one he had worked his whole life to attain. At age thirty-six, he was finally about to achieve that goal, and was as nervous about it as a cat sitting atop a Seguaro cactus.

A week later, Paisley received a greeting card from Auntie Esther and waved it triumphantly in Jonathan's face. The card featured three tabby kittens wearing Santa hats. The old woman had a sense of humor.

After that, Paisley continued to send cards, without telling Jonathan. Why should she? He didn't care for his aunt, even appeared to feel for her an antipathy Paisley was at a loss to understand. She hated to think of the old woman all alone, cut off from her relatives, however, and she treasured their secret correspondence, infrequent as it was.

A few years later, one of her cards was returned unopened, and their attorney had notified them that Auntie Esther had passed away, leaving Paisley the house.

"Just the house?" Jonathan had demanded from one of the clients' chairs in an office that could have been a clone of Barry Klein's. "You're sure? That's all?"

"Oh, yes, there was this." The lawyer clucked his tongue, as if chiding himself for his forgetfulness, and pulled a small package from his desk drawer, handing it to Paisley. "Like the house, however, Mrs. Perleman left it to your wife."

With an exclamation, Jonathan snatched it from her hand and tore it open. A small cameo pin fell out and landed on the desk with a musical tinkle.

"How lovely!" Paisley exclaimed, picking up the blue-and-white cameo, and held it close to examine it better. Jonathan's angular face turned beet red. Then he hunched his shoulders and muttered, as if to himself, "So
those
are the family jewels? I might have known she'd have the last laugh."

"What do you mean, darling?" Paisley looked up from pinning the cameo on her lapel. Sometimes she didn't understand her husband's mercurial moods.

"Nothing." He gave an unconvincing chuckle, a little shakily, and scraped his chair back. "Well, my dear, it seems as if you're in possession of a worthless piece of costume jewelry and a run-down house in the sticks." To the lawyer, he said, "I don't know why you wasted our time by having us come in. Couldn't you have sent the trinket by mail?" He abruptly uncrossed his legs and got to his feet.

"My apologies," the lawyer said stiffly, standing with him. "But since you were in New York, I thought.... "

"Never mind." Jonathan brushed the explanation away, and taking Paisley by the elbow, escorted her out of the room so fast that she had to jog to keep up.

#

Paisley had been sorry to learn that Auntie Esther had passed away. But life had been too busy to grieve for an old woman she had barely known and who had, by all accounts, lived a long and happy life. Caught up in an ever-increasing whirl of travel and performances, she had even forgotten the house until now.

She came to herself in the lawyer’s office, realizing Barry was waiting with barely concealed impatience for her answer. "What do I intend to do with Esther's place?" she repeated. It felt as if Barry had asked the question a long time ago. "I guess the logical thing is to sell it." Absent-mindedly, she massaged the rough line down the side of her neck. The doctor had told her doing so would reduce scarring, and by now the gesture had become a habit. "It sounds as if I need the money."

Barry nodded as if she'd given the right answer. "A real-estate agent from River Bend already contacted me. He wants to put it on the market." He flicked a business card across the desk, and she picked it up. "Name of Ray Henderson."

"Fine. Go ahead and tell him.... " Her voice faded as her eye caught something. A snapshot had spilled out of the manila file folder: a photograph of a house that had clearly seen better times. The steeply pitched slate roof was barely visible behind the shelter of an enormous oak tree, a perfect tree for climbing. If she were a little girl, she wouldn't have been able to resist scampering up its strong, spreading limbs. Once, the small white house in its shadow must have been charming. Now, it was surrounded by weeds and overgrown flowerbeds.

Seeing her interest, Barry handed her the photo. "Take a closer look if you like."

"Thank you," she said automatically. A strange emotion flashed through her, so powerful that for a moment she forgot where she was. The sensation was like hearing a piece of music for the first time, yet which had a ring of familiarity to it. This, she thought, must be the old Perelman family home, the house her husband had grown up in. The one Esther had bequeathed her more than a year ago.

She'd never found time to visit the place, although Jonathan had once told her something intriguing about it. What was it? Some old family legend, something they had laughed about together and which she had promptly forgotten. A conversation which had started over something that had happened here, in this very office. Dropping the real estate agent's card in her purse, Paisley scooped up the photograph and examined it more closely. "This is it?" she asked. "This is Aunt Esther's house?"

Barry nodded. "As you can see, the place is in poor shape. It must be nearly a century old, and it's been vacant since her death last year. The appraisal showed it's not worth much."

Paisley stared at the photograph. The inspection revealed no secrets, but still, that odd impression of familiarity lingered. "Maybe," she said slowly, "I'll go see it before putting it on the market. After all, I'll need a place to stay until my voice comes back. I might even stay a week or two ... maybe more."

If her voice came back.
She tried not to listen to the niggling thought in the back of her mind.

"Do you have any idea where River Bend is located, Mrs. Perleman?"

"Somewhere in Northern California, isn't it? Not far from Sacramento, I believe Jonathan said."

"Suffice it to say, the town is hardly New York or Paris," Barry said, leaning back in his swivel chair and crossing an ankle across a knee. "There's nothing for miles around but vineyards and rice fields. It's secluded and quiet. The closest real shopping is forty miles away, in Sacramento, or, two hours in the opposite direction, San Francisco. The settlement was built along a sharp bend in the one of the major tributaries to the Sacramento River, hence its name."

"Secluded? Quiet?" She pounced on the words. "It sounds like a perfect retreat."

"As long as you don't find yourself bored to death."

Paisley was tempted to say rudely, "What business is it of yours?" Instead, she restrained herself, merely pointing out, "You did say I need to cut back my expenses. Well, I can stay there for free, can't I? Besides, I'm curious. I've never owned a house before."

"As you please," Barry said, scooping the papers back into the file, but the taut muscles in his jaw told her that he felt Paisley was making a foolish choice.

She probably was, she thought, gathering up her purse. But something about the little white house was pulling her like a fish on a line. It wouldn't hurt to take a look. No doubt Jonathan would have jeered at her sentimental impulse, but Jonathan was not here.

After shaking Barry's hand goodbye, she slipped the photograph into her purse.

Chapter Two

A week later, Paisley stood next to an enormous black Ford Expedition staring at the house she had last seen in the photograph. The place was smaller than she had thought, with an untidy mass of roses blooming fragrantly in the yard. Unconsciously she touched the lace handkerchief in the pocket of her jacket. So this had been Esther's house. It was hard to believe it was now
her
house.

The real estate agent Barry had referred her to, Ray Henderson, descended from the driver's seat and joined her on the curving flagstone path, gulping coffee from a heavy ceramic mug he kept in one of the car’s cup holders. He was as massive as his glossy black SUV, a little too loud, a little too hearty.

"Just like I said in my email, ma'am. Hardly worth your flying all the way out here, now, is it?"

She didn't respond. She had hardly heard him. An overpowering sense of homecoming inexplicably swept over her, dazing her with its intense sense of possessiveness, of
belonging
. The sensation was as startling and tangible as if someone had reached out and swept her into waiting arms.

Paisley could not understand where the feeling had come from. Since their marriage, she and Jonathan had lived in a series of interchangeable hotel rooms like a pair of modern-day nomads. As a child she'd moved frequently as well, as her father's series of ever-changing jobs took his family around the country, from city to city. Why, then, did she feel this odd sense of connection with the run-down old place? A psychologist might say she had secretly been wishing for a home all this time, but Paisley knew better. She'd felt no urge to visit this one until she’d had that odd reaction seeing the photograph on Barry's desk.

Chiding herself for her fancifulness, Paisley shoved the lace-edged handkerchief back into her handbag. She was no sentimental homebody, nor did she watch decorating shows on TV or subscribe to magazines on gardening and cooking. She didn’t believe in the supernatural, either.

It must be the scent of roses that had made the scene seem so familiar and compelling, she thought. It matched the fragrance on the handkerchief that Esther had given Paisley at her wedding. Perhaps the romanticism of all those operas had rubbed off, making her find too much significance in minor things.

The real estate agent drained his coffee and set the big mug back in the cup holder by the driver’s seat, then turned back to her, his broad chest expanding under the gold polyester blazer. With his wide shoulders, thick neck, and buzz haircut he looked like a former football player or ex-Marine. Certainly he seemed more fitted to sell cars or a membership at the local gym than this delicate, white-painted Victorian house with its intricate molding and pink-and-white snap-dragons vying with the weeds in the overgrown flower beds.

"I told you the place was in bad shape, didn’t I? The utilities were turned off when the old lady went into the convalescent home, and no one’s been keeping things up. Looks like there may have been some vandalism as well. See that broken window on the side?" He pointed to a pane with only a few jagged shards remaining in the frame, then cocked an eye at the cloudless sky. "Lucky it hasn't rained lately or you could have ended up with water damage. Fact is, it sure would have been a lot simpler if you'd just accepted the neighbor's offer. We would have faxed you all the paperwork."

Paisley reluctantly nodded. Repairs were obviously needed, yet she still found the structure's overall appearance appealing. Delicate tracery lined the eaves of the porch, and old-fashioned casement windows peeped out of a mass of untrimmed bushes like a shy girl hiding from visitors. A branch of the enormous oak growing by the front door, presumably older than the house, curved protectively over the front porch. The place must have been a suitable setting for Jonathan's great-aunt, she thought: old-fashioned, charming, private.