Eden had nearly started crying on the telephone. At least someone loved her! She could hear her daughter and Stuart in the living room talking in low whispers. They had four wallpaper books and eight fabric sample books on the floor and were planning what they were going to do to the apartment as soon as Eden left.
“Ms. Palmer?”
“Yes, I’m here. It’s been an emotional time for me to hear that my friend died. We didn’t see each other for years, but I cared a great deal for her.”
“She was a wonderful woman, but she’d had a full life. My grandfather cried like a baby at her funeral.”
“He’s still alive?” Eden asked, wiping at her eyes with a tissue.
“Yes and no. Alzheimer’s. He can’t remember yesterday, but he remembers fifty years ago quite well. Unfortunately, some of his memories are, well, of an embarrassing nature. We caught him telling his twelve-year-old great-granddaughter about his trysts with Alice Farrington under a weeping willow tree.”
Eden couldn’t help but laugh.
“So you heard the story too.”
Eden could hear the smile in his voice. She also heard something else. Was he flirting? Just then one of Melissa’s giggles came from the living room; Eden had never felt more unwanted in her life. “We’ll have to compare notes of what we heard,” she said, her voice lowered.
“I’d like that very much. Perhaps over dinner one night.”
“That would be perfect,” Eden said in her softest voice, just as she heard Melissa say, “Stuart, quit that! She’ll hear us.”
“I’ll look forward to meeting you on the sixth,” he said, and they hung up.
“Well, well, well,” Eden said. One of the descendants of the beautiful Granville boys had asked her on a date. After a moment’s elation, Eden sighed. “He’s probably married and has six kids,” she mumbled. “And dinner is purely professional.”
“Are you Ms. Palmer?” Eden turned to see a young woman, about Melissa’s age, with a file folder in her hand. She looked Eden up and down hard, as though scrutinizing her.
“Yes, I’m Eden Palmer.”
The girl held out her hand to shake. “I’m Camden Granville.” She nodded toward the closed door behind her. “He’s my father.” Again she looked at Eden hard. “He’s fifty-four, in perfect health, and he has been a widower for three years now. He has all his teeth, doesn’t smoke, and he’d like to meet a woman who can talk about something outside this town.”
Eden blinked for a moment, then laughed. “I’ll see what I can do, about talking about something outside of this town, that is. Maybe I should mention Madison Avenue, or complain about taxi service. This jacket has a Bergdorf’s label. Think I should show it to him?”
The girl didn’t smile. “How are your teeth?”
“All mine, as is my hair.”
“Good,” the girl said, still not smiling, then she opened the door and motioned for Eden to go inside.
Behind the big mahogany desk sat a very good-looking man. He was broad-shouldered with a thick chest, and his suit fit him perfectly. He had a thick mane of salt-and-pepper hair. Very handsome indeed. He got up to shake her hand, then motioned her to a seat across from his desk.
“Did my daughter put you through it?” he asked.
“Completely. I’m to show you my teeth and the label inside my jacket.”
“I can do without the jacket, but I’d like to get a much closer look at your teeth.”
In spite of herself, Eden blushed. She’d meant to make a joke, not a sexual innuendo. It had been a long time since a man had made a pass at her. In New York, she’d had about three dates, each leading nowhere. The city was full of young, beautiful, young, gorgeous, young women. Eden felt that she’d never had a chance.
“So,” he said, looking down at a file folder on his desk. “Mrs. Farrington left you everything. Did you know that it took me over a year to find you? You did a good job of disappearing. It was Henry Walters who said it was his guess that you were in publishing.”
“Henry,” Eden said, smiling. “He always was impressed with my ability to spell.”
“Henry was impressed with everything about you. You were a young girl in a terrible situation, but you managed to make the best of it. He said you cataloged all the Farrington papers and became a good friend to cantankerous old Mrs. Farrington in the process.”
“No, not cantankerous. She was kind and generous and easy to love.” Eden looked down at her hands on her lap. This man’s compliments and his open appraisal of her as a woman were making her feel shy. He really was very good-looking. And she was also cursed with her memories of what Mrs. Farrington had told her about the Granville boys. Was this man as good a lover as his grandfather and great-uncle had been?
He was smiling. “I heard she used to greet trespassers with a shotgun.”