First Impressions (Edenton 1)

Eden heard the tone in his voice and looked up. Both McBride and Brad were looking at her wistfully, like little children wanting her to read them a bedtime story. Smiling, Eden handed the necklace to Brad and took the letter, then carefully opened it. Mrs. Farrington had used her beloved sealing wax on the back. “The only thing the hippie culture ever did that was good was to bring back sealing wax, so it’s easy for me to find,” she used to say.

When Eden saw Mrs. Farrington’s handwriting on the letter she pulled from the envelope, she had to sit back. This is going to be difficult, she thought. The last words of a woman she’d loved very much.

“ ‘My dearest Eden and Melissa,’ ” Eden read aloud, then had to wait a moment for her eyes to clear and her voice to come back. She took a deep breath.

“ ‘Eden, dear, if you’re reading this letter, then you’ve found the necklace. Congratulations! You always were the cleverest person! I wonder how long it took before you saw that the necklace had been painted on one of Tyrrell’s dreadful paintings. I painted the necklace on Great-Aunt Hester’s neck and I think I did a damned fine job of it! Maybe I could have been a painter too. I certainly have as much talent as Tyrrell did.”

Pausing, Eden chuckled before she continued. “ ‘Oh! How I wish I could hear you laugh at that witticism. You always did laugh long and hard at my jokes. It was one of your most endearing qualities.

“ ‘Now, on to business. I found the necklace—and the poor woman who was wearing it—when we renovated this old house. Toddy—you remember him, don’t you?—helped me cover everything up. Or, in this case, bury it. My great-grandfather Minton said he’d gone to New York to sell the necklace and had returned to find his beautiful wife dead on the library floor. On his deathbed he admitted to his son that he’d killed her lover, but I think he killed his wife too. There’s a stone for her in the family cemetery, but I think the grave is probably empty.

“ ‘Toddy found a grisly sight when one of the walls of the cellar came down, and I had to go down there to see it. You know how much I loved doing that! Minton must have disinterred his wife because what we were sure was her body was in a little stone-lined closet. A wall had been hastily and poorly erected to conceal the entryway. Inside was a skeleton wearing the tatters of what had surely been her wedding dress. Around her neck was the necklace that has caused my family so much misery. It’s my guess that Minton killed his wife when he discovered she was about to run off with her lover. Maybe he thought that a decent burial in a churchyard was too good for her, so he dug her up and hid her in the cellar. Or maybe he was so sick of all the unhappiness that necklace had caused that he let her have it for all eternity.

“ ‘Whatever happened, Toddy found the poor woman’s remains when the wall fell in. With the help of one of Toddy’s strong young grandsons—who, of course, was sworn to secrecy—we buried her far away from my family, and very far away from Minton. I hope that she can at last rest forever.

“ ‘As for the necklace that has caused my family so many problems, I spent several days thinking about what to do with it. Tell the world that it had been found? Then what? Have every shyster in the country show up here and try to sell me things? Would I have to tell the truth about Grandfather Minton? Would I have people wanting to write those nasty, hate-filled biographies about my family? Have the world know about the tears shed in my family over those stones? Know about the murders committed because of them? People would say the sapphires and my family had a curse on them. No, I didn’t want any of that. After a dozen sleepless nights, I decided to turn the whole thing over to you, my dear, clever Eden. The necklace is now yours, and you can do with it what you want. Wear it out to dinner. It’ll look good with your eyes.

“ ‘Finding the necklace has caused me no happiness, but finding the teapot caused me nothing but joy. Toddy came to me one Sunday morning, very excited. He said he’d seen something on TV that was like something I owned. He’d seen the hallmark of a Paul Revere teapot and remembered seeing it when he used to polish the silver for me. I can tell you that the two of us old duffers had an awful time prying up loose floorboards and walls to find that particular pot. But we found it, and I sold it, and it paid for at last making my house into the beauty that it had once been. And it paid to send four of Toddy’s grandchildren to college. The other two went on full scholarships, so they had no need of me.

“ ‘Eden, my dear, I have missed you and your dear child every day since you left. That you had to leave and why you had to leave was the curse of my life. No matter what my ancestors had done, nothing compared to the evil that was in my son. I will not burden you with what happened at the last. That is between God and me, and I pray that He can forgive me.

“ ‘The Farrington family that I sacrificed my happiness for in an attempt to keep the name going, is no more, and I think it’s fitting that it ends. Too much hate and anger runs in our blood. There was too much bloodshed in our history. Maybe Minton’s punishment for the murders he committed was that his seed should die out forever.

“ ‘Dear, dear, Eden, I leave my beloved house to you. I know this is selfish of me, for I know that you’ll take care of the house and love it as I did. I am glad that, in the end, I had the wherewithal to make it beautiful again. And I’m especially glad that I’m not leaving you a mummy in the basement.

“ ‘I wish you and Melissa all the happiness in the world. I’ve tried to keep up with where you were and what you were doing. I cried on the day of Melissa’s wedding. I hope she presents you with a dozen grandchildren.

“ ‘I’m sorry that you have never found the right man for you. Have you become bisexual like me?

“ ‘I want you to know that wherever you are, I’m looking down on you and sending you my love. If it’s possible, I will be protecting you from heaven—if they let me in there, that is.

“ ‘I must go now. I’m an old, old woman and I don’t have much strength left. I send you all my love. Kiss Melissa for me. And why don’t you give one of the younger Granville boys a call? Maybe one of them is as good in the sack as my Granville boys

were.

“ ‘I will love you always,

“ ‘Alice Augusta Farrington.’ ”

Chapter Fifteen

IT wasn’t until late that night that Jared got enough privacy to call Bill. Granville had stayed late, looking at the necklace as though it were the Holy Grail, and talking to Eden about what she should do with the jewels. Eden seemed to be more interested in the historical significance of the necklace than in any monetary value, so she’d talked about doing more research into the family history. Mostly, she just clutched Mrs. Farrington’s letter. It was obvious that the letter meant more to her than the jewels.

As for Jared, all evening, he’d sat back and watched and listened to both of them. He liked that Eden hadn’t had an attack of greed the second she realized that she owned a necklace that was worth…What? Millions? She hadn’t started talking about all the things she was going to buy. Her only mention of money had been to say that she’d like to set up trust funds for all her grandchildren. “Which reminds me,” she said, “I haven’t talked to my daughter in days.” Soon after that the party broke up and Granville went home. Jared knew that the two of them wanted time alone, probably to do more kissing, he thought, and was ashamed of himself at how jealous he felt at that thought. He’d given Eden a look, then glanced upward at the tiny cameras in the shadows of the corners of the ceiling. If Granville had noticed them, he hadn’t shown it. But Jared was forming the opinion that Granville didn’t let on to a lot of what he saw—or knew.

Eden had taken the hint and hadn’t performed for the FBI cameras, but had given Brad cheek kisses when he left. As soon as the door closed, she held up the necklace to the cameras. “We found it,” she said, addressing the lens. “So now all of you can go away and let me have a life.”

Jared had started to say that they had no way of knowing that the necklace had anything to do with Applegate’s swallowing of her name, but she wouldn’t listen. “I don’t want to hear it,” she said. “I’m tired and I want to go to bed.”

“Yeah, sure,” he said. Truthfully, he wanted to sit up with her for a while and talk about finding the necklace. He’d had some experience with jewels, and he thought he might be able to help her make some decisions. But, mainly, he’d wanted to just sit and talk with her. Or watch TV together. It had been years since he’d just sat beside a woman and watched TV. Not since his marriage broke up had he done such an ordinary thing.

He nodded to the necklace that was in her hand. “You think—” He broke off when she tossed the necklace at him and he barely caught it. “Sure you don’t want to wear it to bed?” he asked, teasing.

“That necklace caused the deaths of several people and rivers of tears. The sooner I get rid of it, the better. Look,” she said, “could you please do what you have to do as quickly as possible so all of you can get out of here?”

Holding the necklace, Jared thought how it was still warm from her hand. “I’ll do my best,” he said, smiling, but Eden didn’t smile back. Turning, she went up to her bedroom.

He stood at the foot of the stairs for a while, then walked into the kitchen, where he got a piece of cake to take outside to the agent on duty. He had seen nothing unusual, heard nothing.