Soft crystals of light sparkled on the road as Violet drove her mother’s car toward Lynnewood Hall.
They played a Van Morrison tape as she navigated past East Girard Street and headed north on Broad, following the directions her father said would take them most quickly to Elkins Park.
“I wonder what state the house will be in,” Theo mused as he drank his coffee from a thermal cup.
“Me too. To think it was once one of the largest Gilded Age estates in all of Philadelphia. I really can’t imagine how a church could even use all 110 rooms.”
“They’d have to have a lot of priests visiting, I guess,” Theo said with a shrug.
“I feel kind of nervous,” she admitted.
“There’s nothing to be nervous about,” he reminded her. “Either the key matches something there or it doesn’t. You’re just doing a bit of field research, remember that.”
Violet turned and smiled at him. “What’s that quote Professor Gupta always says in my class with him? ‘Curiosity is, in great and generous minds, the first passion and the last!’”
“I think that’s Samuel Johnson,” he said. “It’s a good one.”
“It is,” she agreed.
“Well, you’ve definitely piqued my curiosity with all of this,” he said, as he turned up the volume to the car stereo. “And I’m equally curious which restaurant’s cheesesteak I will like better—Geno’s or Pat’s.”
“I look forward to debating that with you later today,” she said as she headed in the direction of Lynnewood Hall.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE
IT IS NOT EASY TO SEE ONE’S FAMILY HOME FALL INTOdisrepair. As Violet and Theo’s car pulled through the broken iron gates of my ancestral estate, I now experienced the sadness of its decline through their fresh eyes.
The limestone facade, once a gleaming white, had become stained and ashen. The large fountain in the front, with its sculpted bronze cherubs hunting an anguished heron, no longer flowed with water. Now what greeted them was a pitted and chipped oval basin filled with dead, brown leaves, the once-gleaming figures oxidized to an unseemly green-black. Yet, above the threshold, carved within the pediment, the symbolic hourglass of time that Grandfather had wanted his heirs to remember remained intact.
As they rang the bell and walked inside, how strange it was to see Violet come to a place where I’d lived for more than half of my life. These were the vaulted ceilings I had walked beneath countless times. The artwork that had filled the alabaster niches had been removed, and all that remained were the time-worn stains where the large, gilded frames of Grandfather’s priceless Old Master paintings once hung.
As Violet’s footsteps struck the cold marble flooring of the great hall, I thought of my mother and grandmother, who had stepped so elegantly through this palatial entrance on countless occasions. Violet extended her hand to greet the staid, colorless administrator who was assigned to meet them, then Theo followed with his.
“I’m Eileen Elderkin,” the woman in charge introduced herself. “How can I help you today?” Her voice lifted over the organ music that could be heard from a distant room of the house. “My colleague mentioned you’re both students at Harvard and are researching something for the Widener Library there, if I understand correctly.”
“Yes, we’re researching the life of Harry Elkins Widener for a project,” Violet explained. “We’ve been lucky enough to have access to a lot of the existing archival research at Harvard, but we’re still trying to fill in some gaps surrounding his personal history.”
“Well, I’m not sure if we can be of any help here. You see, the Faith Seminary has been training ministers and Christian leaders here for decades. We don’t have any archives here on the property about the Widener family. All our files are connected to our church.”
“We’re not interested in looking at any files,” Theo cut in. “We actually have a key that we’re wondering might belong to a room or a closet here.”
Theo withdrew the key from his pocket. “It’s a copy of one that is in the Memorial Library at school. The original one had birds on the top of its handle, though the locksmith has made a more simple top on this one.”
Ms. Elderkin shook her head. “I fear this will be rather a bit of a wild goose chase. We have over a hundred rooms here at Lynnewood Hall.”
But Violet remained undeterred. “We’re hoping to look at rooms that were most personal to Harry. Perhaps the library and his office and bedroom.”
“I suppose that’s a narrow enough search.” Ms. Elderkin glanced at her watch. “I can accommodate you before my next appointment. Please follow me.”
She led them down a long corridor toward two French doors that opened to one of the largest rooms in the house. Violet and Theo peered in.
“I was told that this room was originally the library.” It was a large interior space with gilt and wooden panels, windows that opened to a garden, and a ceiling with a painted fresco of pastel clouds and rosy figures encircled above.
“But after theTitanicsank, the Widener family had it converted to a ballroom and all the books were removed. Now it’s the sanctuary for our church.” She pointed to a large altar at the front of the room. The space, which had been the scene of countless balls over the years, was now filled with crude, wooden pews and a long rectangular table draped in a white cloth with an ornate crucifix resting in the center.
“Do you mind if we look around and see if the key might fit into any of the wooden panels?” Violet asked.
“Be my guest,” Ms. Elderkin said and let the two of them walk around the perimeter of the room.
