The Wolf Gift (The Wolf Gift Chronicles 1)

His heart was beating.

They made their way to the table. It was easily twenty feet long and yet it seemed small in this great space, floating on the dark polished floor.

They sat down opposite each other in red velvet high-backed chairs.

Two massive black wooden hunters, boards stood against the wall behind Marchent, both identically carved with rich Renaissance figures, hunters with their retinue, and piled with heavy silver platters and goblets and stacks of what appeared to be yellow linen, napkins perhaps.

Other imposing pieces loomed in the shadow, what seemed an immense armoire, and a number of old chests.

The fireplace was huge and Gothic, of black marble and replete with solemn-faced helmeted medieval knights. The hearth was high with a medieval battle scene carved in its base. Now surely Reuben would get a well-illuminated photograph of that.

Two baroque candelabra provided the only light, other than the crackling fire.

"You look like a prince at this table," Marchent said with a light laugh. "You look as if you belong."

"You have to be teasing me," he said, "and you look like the grand duchess in this candlelight. I think we are in a Viennese hunting lodge here, not in California at all."

"You,ve been to Vienna?"

"Many times," he said. He thought of Phil leading him through Maria Theresa,s palace there, discoursing on everything from the painted walls to the great ornate enameled stoves. Yes, Phil would love this place. Phil would understand.

They dined on old lavishly painted china, some of it chipped, but still incomparable. And the silver was the heaviest he,d ever used.

Felice, a small shrunken woman with white hair and very dark skin, came and went without a word. "The girl" from the village - Nina - was a robust brown-haired little person who seemed a bit in awe of Marchent, the dining room, and every plate she brought to the table on a silver charger. Amid nervous giggles and sighs, she grinned at Reuben as she hurried out of the room.

"You have a fan," Marchent whispered.

The filet roast was perfect, the vegetables extraordinarily fresh and crisp, and the salad perfectly done with light oil and herbs.

Reuben drank a little more of the red wine than he planned to drink, but it was so smooth, and had that dark smoky taste he associated entirely with the best vintages. He really didn,t know wine.

He was eating like a pig. That,s what he did when he was happy, and he was happy, remarkably happy.

Marchent talked about the history of the house, the part he,d already researched.

Her great-grandfather - the founding Felix - had been a lumber baron in these parts, and built two sawmills along the coast, along with a small harbor, now gone, for his ships. He,d had the lumber for this house milled and planed on the site, and brought a good deal of the marble and granite up the coast by boat. The stones for the walls of the house came over land and by boat.

"All the Nidecks had European money, apparently," Marchent said, "and they made plenty of money here."

Though Uncle Felix had had the bulk of the family wealth, Marchent,s father, Abel, had still owned all the shops in the town when she was growing up. Nearby beachfront lots south of the property had been sold off before she went away to college, but few people had ever really built on that land.

"All that happened while Felix was gone on one of his long trips, my father selling the shops and the beachfront lots, and Felix was so angry when he came back. I recall their arguing about it furiously. But it couldn,t be undone." She grew sad. "I wish my father hadn,t resented Uncle Felix so much. Maybe if he hadn,t, if we,d looked for Uncle Felix sooner. But all that is long past."

The property still comprised forty-seven acres including the protected old-growth redwoods behind the house, and a great many live oaks, and the wooded slopes down to the beach all along the western flank. There was an old tree house out there in the forest, built by Felix, and remarkably high up. "I,ve never actually been in it," Marchent said. "But my little brothers said it was quite luxurious. Of course they should never have been in it before Felix was officially declared dead."

Marchent really didn,t know much about the family other than what everybody knew. They were part of the history of the county. "I think they had money in oil and in diamonds, and in property in Switzerland." She shrugged.

Her trust funds were all conventional investments managed in New York. Same with her younger brothers.

With the settling of Uncle Felix,s will had come the revelation of a great deal of money in the Bank of America and the Wells Fargo Bank, more than Marchent had ever expected.

"So you don,t need to sell this place," Reuben said.

"I need to sell it to be free," she said. She paused, closed her eyes for a second, and then, making a little fist with her right hand, she tapped her breast. "I need to know that it,s over, you see. And then there are my younger brothers." Her face changed, and so did her voice. "They,ve been bought off not to contest the will." Again came one of her little shrugs, but she looked faintly sad. "They want their ,share., "

Reuben nodded, but he really didn,t understand.

I,m going to try to buy this place.

He knew that now, no matter how daunting, no matter how expensive to fix up, to warm up, to maintain. There are times when one simply cannot say no.

But first things first.

She started talking finally about the accident that had killed her parents. They,d been flying back from Las Vegas. Her father was an excellent pilot, and it was a trip they,d made a hundred times.

"They probably never even knew what happened," she said. "It was the most unfortunate thing that they would fly right into that electric tower in the fog."

Marchent had been twenty-eight at the time. Felix had been gone for ten years. She became the guardian of her two younger brothers. "I think I made a mess of it," she said. "They were never the same after the accident. From there on out, it was drugs and booze for them, and the most disreputable friends. I wanted to go back to Paris. I didn,t spend enough time with them, then or ever. And they just went from bad to worse."

A year apart, sixteen and seventeen at the time of the accident, they were more like twins, secretive with a personal language of smirks, sneers, and murmurs that few could penetrate or tolerate for very long.

"There were some very fine Impressionist paintings in this room until a few years ago," she said. "My brothers stole them, came up when no one was here but Felice, and sold them off for a pittance. I was furious. But I simply couldn,t get them back. I found out later they,d taken some of the silver as well."