The year 1603, according to Phoebe, was the last year of the Tudor dynasty, ending with the death of Queen Elizabeth I. Phoebe was convinced that the salient piece of information in all this was one word: Tudor.
“Come on, Nick,” she prodded him after they had said good-bye to Patch in front of the Algonquin. “What have we seen recently that’s Tudor?”
Nick shrugged as they walked east. “Beats me.” It seemed like another one of his grandfather’s mind games, even if it had been administered from the grave.
“I can’t believe it-I was hopped up on tranquilizers and I remember the Tudor-style house that we all met at, the day after Thanksgiving. It was the day that-well, you know.”
It was the day that Jared’s death had been announced. It had been a traumatic day for everyone. Phoebe had been driven in a town car from the city after nearly having a nervous breakdown. It wasn’t a day in which Nick had been focusing on local architecture.
“I don’t know much about houses,” Phoebe continued, “but I do know what a Tudor revival looks like. We had them all over Los Angeles. It was what rich people lived in to make it look like they were descended from British royalty or something.”
Nick nodded dumbly. Why hadn’t he thought of that himself? Four digits. A year. Now it seemed so obvious.
“Okay,” he said. “Then we go to Southampton.”
Phoebe, Nick, and Patch arrived at the Southampton property, which Nick said was known as Eaton House, after the Mayflower-era family who had farmed the land, the next day around noon. While his father had mentioned the name of the house before, none of them knew who owned the house or what went on there, only that they had been summoned to it for that Society meeting in the fall. Thankfully, Nick’s maplike memory of Southampton’s back roads had come in handy, as he remembered where the house was without even having an address. It all started coming back to him: the grand house, greeting Phoebe at the door, everything he had felt being separated from her and then seeing her again. How he knew then, without a doubt, that she was the one. He remembered leaving the house that day and spending the night at his parents’, the first night they had spent together.
Nick chided himself. This wasn’t the time for fond memories. They had a job to do.
The gate was open, and Nick drove his beat-up Jeep Cherokee up the gravel driveway. The estate was the same as Nick had remembered it, though in the dead of winter it seemed more desolate, with barely any leaves on the trees, ground cover that was frozen a dull green, and muddy portions of the sod and landscaping that would only come back to life in the spring. Nick remembered how lavish the grounds had been, though they hadn’t gotten to enjoy them: there was a croquet court, an English garden, a reflecting pool, tennis courts.
“So you’re still telling me that we have no idea who owns all this?” Phoebe asked. “I mean, it’s a house. Someone must live here, right?”
“I have no idea,” Nick said. “The Bradford Trust must own it, I guess? Far be it from them to tell us that.”
“Far be it from your father to tell us that,” Patch said sarcastically.
“Um, our father, bro,” Nick said.
Patch was silent for a moment. “Right,” he finally said.
The tone in Patch’s voice stung Nick. They were supposed to be friends, best friends; now they were supposed to be brothers, or half brothers, at least. And yet everything they had been through had only alienated them from each other. Nick knew it wasn’t permanent, but it felt like he and Patch were walking this delicate line between trust and betrayal. Now, after yesterday’s revelation, Nick was nervous about talking to Patch. Nick was supposed to tell his best friend everything, and once again, he had failed.
Nick turned around to look at Patch in the backseat. “You haven’t been here before, have you?”
Patch shook his head. “Nope. I mean, I’ve driven by while staying with you, but I always assumed it belonged to some banker or something.”
The three of them walked up to the front door and stood there, unsure of what to do.
“We can’t just ring the doorbell,” Nick said. “‘Um, hi, we’re here to try out a key on a few locks.’”
“Should we go to a back door or something?” Patch asked. “This house looks like it has about ten different entrances on the first floor.”
At that moment, the giant oak door opened, its knocker clattering ominously. The three of them were startled, and Phoebe grabbed Nick’s arm.
They stared in amazement. It couldn’t be, but it was.
“Horatio?” Nick finally asked. “What on earth are you doing here?”