Elizabeth the First Wife Read Online Free Page A

that question from most guests. But I gave him the short version, because doubtless he’d walked into countless other gems in the area. My house had the same back story as scores of homes in the area: Easterners moved to sunny Pasadena in the 1920s; they started a business and it flourished; the money flowed; lovely house was built; life was good until the about late ’70s, when smog and crowds took over; original homeowners died and history was up for grabs; some homes survived yuppie remodels with character intact, and others got the popcorn-ceiling treatment.
    Luckily, my casita hadn’t really changed hands. “The house was built in 1926 by my great-grandparents on my mother’s side. According to my grandmother, her parents wanted to build the mostCalifornia house they could, to let in sun and clean air. That’s why they used a hacienda layout. Very little has been done to this house since 1926.”
    â€œVery little,” Bumble concurred, clearly working up to her rant on my inferior counter space.
    I shut her down, “My grandmother Gigi lived in it her whole life. She was the only Bosworth child, married young, had my mother, but then was widowed in World War II and moved back in with her parents. She never remarried and stayed here until her death a few years ago.”
    â€œSome days, that sounds like a good life to me,” Bumble interjected. “Alone but in charge.”
    I carried on, “Our grandmother was a great entertainer and patron of the arts. The house was always in use for fundraisers or musicales. People loved coming here. Gigi was legally blind in the last decade of her life, so we literally couldn’t change anything about the house for her sake. When she died, she left the house to me.”
    â€œNot that the rest of us minded,” Bumble added, repeating her standard beef about the will’s inequity. The truth is, Bumble really didn’t mind. She and the Congressman lived in a massive center-hall Colonial in the upstanding Madison Heights neighborhood. But Bumble liked to give the impression that we were the Most Interesting Family in Town, so she carried on for the sake of a controversy. “Elizabeth here was our grandmother’s favorite. She lived in the guesthouse for years during grad school. The two of them loved books and plays. She even suffered through the musicales, because who doesn’t love the lute? And God knows, when my grandmother lost her sight and her friends started to die off, Elizabeth would sit with her for hours and describe what all the actresses were wearing on All My Children . She earned this house in the end.”
    â€œI feel the spirit of your grandmother in this home. And your light shines through as well, Elizabeth. You are a nurturer and an emotional sponge. You soak up the needs of others. So let’s takecare of your needs now.” Pierce ran his hands over the adobe walls, caressing each dip. “I hope you know how special this house is. It’s like a virgin, touched for the very first time.”
    Bumble muffled a laugh and shot a look in my direction. Yes, Bumble, I get the virgin analogy. I‘m like the house.
    I turned to face Pierce again, his personal luster diminished slightly with the Madonna quote. But I had to admit that he seemed to really care about my hacienda, so much humbler than the cavernous old Pasadena houses he usually gutted and retiled in white. I started with my modest list. “I don’t want to change too much. But the kitchen needs a little work.”
    â€œA little work?” Bumble snorted. “I’d tear the whole thing out, blow out a wall and make this one gigantic entertaining space. Wouldn’t you, Pierce?”
    Pierce’s glass-blue eyes turned cold for an instant. If Bumble hadn’t been the wife of a member of the House Ways & Means Committee, she would have been toast. But then his face softened. “You, my dear Bumble, need