my heart," Reuben said. That was too damn personal for a reporter, wasn,t it? But he couldn,t stop himself. And who said he had to be a dispassionate witness? "This is irreplaceable, Marchent. But I,ll write the best story I can on the place. I,ll do my best to bring you a buyer, and I can,t believe it will take that long."
What he didn,t say was I wish I could buy this place myself. And he,d been thinking about that very possibility ever since he,d first glimpsed the gables through the trees.
"I,m so glad the paper sent you, of all people," she said. "You,re passionate and I like that so very much."
For one moment, he thought, Yes, I,m passionate and I want this house, and why not, and when will an opportunity like this ever come again? But then he thought of his mother and of Celeste, his petite brown-eyed girlfriend, the rising star in the district attorney,s office, and how they,d laugh at the idea, and the thought went cold.
"What,s wrong with you, Reuben, what,s the matter?" asked Marchent. "You had the strangest look in your eye."
"Thoughts," he said, tapping his temple. "I,m writing the piece in my head. ,Architectural jewel on the Mendocino coast, first time on the market since it was built., "
"Sounds good," she said. There was that faint accent again, of a citizen of the world.
"I,d give the house a name if I bought it," said Reuben, "you know, something that captured the essence of it. Nideck Point."
"Aren,t you the young poet," she said. "I knew it when I saw you. And I like the pieces you,ve written for your paper. They have a distinct character. But you,re writing a novel, aren,t you? Any young reporter your age should be writing a novel. I,d be ashamed of you if you weren,t."
"Oh, that,s music to my ears," he confessed. She was so beautiful when she smiled, all the fine lines of her face seemingly so eloquent and pretty. "My father told me last week that a man of my age has absolutely nothing to say. He,s a professor, burnt out, I might add. He,s been revising his ,Collected Poems, for ten years, since he retired." Talking too much, talking too much about himself, not good at all.
His father might actually love this place, he thought. Yes, Phil Golding was in fact a poet and he would surely love it, and he might even say so to Reuben,s mother who would scoff at the whole idea. Dr. Grace Golding was the practical one and the architect of their lives. She was the one who,d gotten Reuben his job at the San Francisco Observer, when his only qualification was a master,s in English literature and yearly world travel since birth.
Grace had been proud of his recent investigative pieces, but she,d cautioned that this "real estate story" was a waste of his time.
"There you go again, dreaming," Marchent said. She put her arm around him and actually kissed him on the cheek as she laughed. He was startled, caught unawares by the soft pressure of her breasts against him and the subtle scent of a rich perfume.
"Actually, I haven,t accomplished one single thing in my life yet," he said with an ease that shocked him. "My mother,s a brilliant surgeon; my big brother,s a priest. My mother,s father was an international real estate broker by the time he was my age. But I,m a nothing and a nobody, actually. I,ve only been with the paper six months. I should have come with a warning label. But believe me, I,ll make this a story you,ll love."
"Rubbish," she said. "Your editor told me your story on the Greenleaf murder led to the arrest of the killer. You are the most charming and self-effacing boy."
He struggled not to blush. Why was he admitting all these things to this woman? Seldom if ever did he make self-deprecating statements. Yet he felt some immediate connection with her he couldn,t explain.
"That Greenleaf story took less than a day to write," he murmured. "Half of what I turned up on the suspect never saw print at all."
She had a twinkle in her eye. "Tell me - how old are you, Reuben? I,m thirty-eight. How is that for total honesty? Do you know many women who volunteer that they,re thirty-eight?"
"You don,t look it," he said. And he meant it. What he wanted to say was You,re rather perfect, if you ask me. "I,m twenty-three," he confessed.